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Eric Nahlin: "What is going on?" A Look at the Macro/Micro NIL Landscape

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I have a very busy morning but wanted to get something up quickly. I was hoping to turn this into a more fleshed out piece but time is not on my side and I need to feed the beast. Today we’ll discuss the macro NIL/Portal landscape with a quick micro look after a couple of developments on Monday. First, let’s look big picture thanks to a couple of phone calls to college personnel department people in different parts of the country. 

Macro

How crazy is the current NIL/Portal climate? Outside of the top quarterbacks or one-offs like Jeremiah Smith, Dylan Stewart, and Colin Simmons, the feeling is everyone is available everywhere. There are only a handful of players who are untouchable simply due to what they make and a school’s resolve to keep them. IT has mentioned how the agent community actually makes it easier for schools to find talent.

Let’s forget for the moment that the agent community also makes it harder to keep your talent. It’s even easier than I thought for schools to “find” potential imPorts. Agents will send schools lists of the players they represent and personnel departments will scout to identify who they want. If you like a player, you simply ask about his circumstances and the conversation evolves from there.

Coaching changes are as brutal as we thought for schools. Any school with a new coach is having their existing roster shopped. Schools scramble to keep the absolute best players first. At Florida, that’s obviously Jadan Baugh, Dallas Wilson, and Vernell Brown. Florida is just one example, Auburn is another, so too is Ole Miss. Of the playoff teams, only Ole Miss is getting hit hard by attempts at poaching. I guess there’s already blood in the water with new hire Pete Golding. That might get interesting after their playoff game.

The NIL agent pool is not the best and brightest. This is tangential to a question we received in a recent Q&A. The smart ones are all young and inexperienced. While uncles have largely been replaced, there are a lot of agents with the “uncle” mindset. That is, their goal is driving the biggest deal possible no matter how unrealistic the number is and trying to create an auction even if the player is already fairly compensated. 

I’ve heard of a lot of examples along those lines. Player X is making FMV but the agent steps up looking for that one school to drive the price up. In the end, the market is whatever someone is willing to pay. A lot of what the uncle agents initially ask for is comically unrealistic. I was given a couple of examples that just made me laugh. Wanting $250K for a receiver with single digit catches? Come on.

Everybody seems to have a good idea of what everybody else is paying. You know what it cost you to land a player and you know what you offered a player to stay who elected to leave. After enough of this scenarios a clear picture comes together. Plus, everyone behind the scenes talks. Not so much during this crucial period but throughout the offseason. There are very few secrets when it comes to player compensation.

IT asked about the Texas roster and was told Texas doesn’t lose players because they pay up for the ones they want to keep. Outside of the players already in the portal, there’s very little noise on Texas players as of right now. 

Micro 

Yesterday we saw a shocker with Liona Lefau electing to enter the portal when it opens (January 2-16). Not much surprises us in the Portal Times but that certainly did. My intel points to a school making an offer that Texas didn’t want to match. What I don’t know, however, is what he was making and what the new price tag is. Texas knows, though, and now will apply that number towards a replacement.

IT reported that DeAndre Moore won’t be back next season. He’s heading to the NFL Draft. Could Texas have worked out a deal? Well, Texas already worked out at least two deals with him prior. But, if you take what he was asking for and add a little bit to it, what sort of player can you get in return? We should find out. In everyday life we all make these simple cost/benefit computations yet some are surprised when the staff does the same thing.

On Twitter I constantly see “what is going on???” every time we report a player is leaving. Basic economics is going on. Texas is fortunate to be in the position it is where not nearly as many players leave due to money and any player that leaves in search of better opportunity can be replaced or perhaps even upgraded. 

 

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