TLDR- It's my opinion that modern recruiting is comprised of these parts:
Traditional recruiting: Facilities, location, history, staff salesmanship, NFL #'s, etc. What we think of as being the old model.
NIL: The $$$ programs that are completely above board and are registered with the school, and now even coordinated with the IRS. Shout out to the members of this board that have us on the cutting edge of this section.
Black market recruiting: This is your bag money, but more importantly, your faux NIL "deals". The NIL moniker has been used to justify illicit transactions, because the whole underpinning of the new NIL phenomenon is these kids deserve this compensation.
Transfer Portal free agency: This is the Ewers, Addison, Mathis stuff etc. It is a mix of all three of the above. Tampering may be against the rules, but theres easy loopholes around it, and the whole system is now designed around facilitating these deals.
It's a really complex system now, and all of those parts are intertwined in different ways for different players. In the future, I agree with those saying robust NIL programs will trump the black market stuff. But I disagree it will be because schools dont want to take the risk. Theres very little risk. It will be because an above board structure will be set in place with $$$ so big, it will trump the black market money being offered. This is what Ive seen people on here refer to as the death star, and should be the ultimate goal.
Here's where I think we are right now, and where I think we need to be focusing: Faux NIL deals are the most effective at the moment. I dont think theres any real way to argue this. I dont agree with people saying this stuff a&m is doing has nothing to do with the NIL. It has everything to do with the NIL. They have taken the spirit of the NIL (paying kids for the perceived value they bring to a program), and combined it with the bag man game. In doing so, they have anticipated a necessary legal defense of their actions the same way big O&G companies do when they blatantly break the rules. Which is, if the NCAA or the State want to come after them, they better be prepared for an extremely long and expensive process. Something the NCAA isnt set up to do, and something the State isnt even inclined to do. But more, it paints any entity that comes after them as the same greedy old men who prevented these talented and deserving young student athletes from receiving due compensation for decades. I think this is the game Texas should be playing, while we assemble the death star on the NIL front.