I'll post some thoughts on what was, what is, and what will still be in terms of the 2024 class for Texas and others in a bit. That said, Evans is absolutely above McKinley on Texas' list of priorities. He's a far better culture fit and he's plenty talented. Now that he's serious about Texas, this is a pretty big recruitment. I went from not caring about this guy as simple fodder for ATM's DL roster to now being willing to be really irritated if he finishes and signs with ATM because of the trend in his recruitment.
I am as skeptical as anyone, but AD Mitchell isn't a foregone conclusion to go to the NFL unless I missed an update. He's under no pressure to do so from his seriously wealthy family.
One thing that might be more instructive regarding the NIL impact is to look at the top 20 recruits nationally and who they signed with, versus, say the 2015 or 2019 classes. Parity is developing in recruiting, among tiers, and you can see it already impacting outcomes such as the playoffs, or what has happened to programs that have ignored NIL and the landscape shift. Think about Clemson, as an example.
To be clear, the work will never end on NIL for football. It would take an endowment for the roster of something like $200M for that to go away. The roster is too big and the competitors/money/fervor/eyeballs are too big.
That considered, the Texas NIL machine for football is rolling along far better than most, even if we're always playing from behind.
No one predicted Georgia falling behind. I've talked about NIL here since before NIL opened up. Georgia is always going to be a have. The reason for that isn't a rabid and wealthy fanbase. That helps, sure, but the bigger reason is due to corporate density within relevant proximity to the school.
No one predicted Alabama falling off immediately due to NIL because of their current position on the national landscape. We did discuss them struggling with it compared to Texas, Oregon, USC, Georgia and a few others. They don't have the same kind of money. And they have been impacted by that. They've struggled to keep up and they haven't won as many of the top of the list recruitments as they used to before NIL.
Schools like LSU have been visibly impacted. They don't have the money to win many of the key battles that they otherwise would when the bag game was king. Clemson is actively denying NIL's existence, and that's harming them. There are other stories like these.
While any competent HC at Texas should always be able to bring in top 10 classes, NIL is fundamental for exceeding that. The current class is underranked both relative to schools that Texas was up against for various players ranked lower than recruits that many powers paid passing attention to, but also due to the fact that Texas did not pursue a highly ranked QB in this cycle and did not take as many players as other programs due to low attrition. Nonetheless, it is top 5 to the public and we are splitting hairs on quality between Texas, Bama, and Georgia. Ohio State is ahead of Texas but they are the Tom Herman fantasy college football team in which they overload on WRs and DBs in every class and almost fully ignore OL and interior DL, which is showing up on the field now when playing quality opponents.
Miami and Oregon are excellent examples of schools that are using a fuckton of money to win recruiting battles. FSU is another example of a school lacking some of the firepower necessary to offset a neighbor's wherewithal.
Anyway, I would expect to see a more diverse field of competitors for the playoffs and titles. For most of a decade, it boiled down to Bama, Clemson, Ohio State, Georgia, Oklahoma and Michigan/LSU every now and then. Generally, you knew who the five teams were that would fill the four team playoff. This season, 20 teams could make arguments for being a contender before the season started and by season's end, there were still 7-8 teams that could do the same. That's NIL and the portal+NIL factoring in significantly.