Category Archives: Agents

Here’s Why the ’23 Draft Class Will Challenge New Agents

26 Thursday Oct 2023

Posted by in Agents, Getting started, NFL draft, NIL, Scouts

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Tonight is our third Zoom session aimed at helping “coach up” the 2023 NFL Agent Class. In our first session, we interviewed David Gregory of BullRush Sports, who was the only independent rookie agent to have a player drafted in 2023. We discussed that Zoom session in this post. In our second session, our guest was Houston Texans beat writer Aaron Wilson, who discussed the relationship between the media and the agent community. We discussed his session in this post. Tonight will be different, however.

Tonight, we’ll have no guest, and I’ll be the one doing the speaking. We’ll talk about recruiting your first client; managing state registration costs; weighing registration with schools; the all-star invitation process; figuring out what kind of commitment to make to name, image and likeness (NIL) and more. We’ll also have a couple special guests. It’s going to be a jam-packed, highly informational night.

We’ll also discuss the special challenges faced by the 2023 agent class due to the market forces affecting the ’24 draft class, which are plentiful. Here’s my take on why this year’s rookie agents will have a higher bar to clear.

This is the year the NIL/transfer portal/Covid bonus year creates a very top-heavy class. One reason there’s no NFLPA Collegiate Bowl this year is due to the difficulties the game had in populating its rosters for the ’23 game. My friend Kalyn Kahler at The Athletic did an excellent story this spring on the amount of players who skipped the ’23 draft for NIL dollars. Most of those players have already expended their Covid bonus year, so they’ll be in this year’s draft pool. That’s among the reasons there are, legitimately, six or seven QBs in the discussion for Day 1, and there are equally talented players across the board who would normally be first-round shoo-ins who’ll be drafted later. That’s going to have a cascading effect on the later rounds. My guess is that the bigger firms will still roll the dice on the would-be Day 2 types that wind up getting drafted in the fifth and sixth rounds, gambling that they’ll still have productive NFL careers. Maybe they won’t — maybe they’ll say a sixth-rounder is a long shot, regardless of the year. Time will tell, but my guess is that the major and mid-major firms will get their fill, as usual.

This was a bigger agent class than in recent years. We counted 163 new agents this year. That’s about 60 percent larger than the normal agent class over the last 2-3 years. That means a lot more competition for the usual 7th/UDFA prospects that rookie contract advisors normally battle for. 

FBS schools have robbed many FCS-and-lower schools of talent. The liberalization of the transfer rule means big schools are more often recruiting for new talent from mid-majors and sub-FBS schools. This means the talent a new agent might have been able to find at a smaller local school isn’t going to be there anymore. It’s also important to note that once a player attends an FBS school, there’s a certain expectation for pre-draft training and other amenities, regardless of his merits as an NFL prospect.

Scouts are being asked to evaluate more players than ever before. Because there’s been such a migration of talent to the big schools, NFL scouts are being asked to evaluate more players than ever. When a scout arrives at a school, typically, the pro liaison gives him a list of 8-10 players to evaluate. More and more, they’re being given lists of 20-25 prospects. The upshot of this is that there will be fewer “diamonds in the rough” that got overlooked in this draft class. This is important to note. And again, even if you’re signing a guy who only a rotational player, if he played at a Big Ten or SEC or ACC school, he’s not going to be a cheap signing. That’s just the way it is.

The all-star game schedule has been reduced. We’ve already seen the previous No. 3 game, the NFLPA Collegiate Bowl, go away. We’ll also see format changes for the two games just below it (the Collegiate Gridiron Showcase and Tropical Bowl) that were forced by new, restrictive NFL policies. This means fewer players will have a platform to impress NFL evaluators.

If discussion of these matters interests you, and you’d like to join us, it’s not too late. Just register for ITL, and I’ll share the Zoom link. If not, but you’d like to stay abreast of what’s going on in the agent community, make sure to sign up for our weekly newsletter, the Friday Wrap.

I’m Addressing Law Students Thursday — Here’s What I’ll Say

16 Monday Oct 2023

Posted by in Agents, Getting started, Uncategorized

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On Thursday afternoon, I have the privilege of addressing the South Texas School of Law here in Houston. My audience will be law students who have an interest in being NFL agents, and I look forward to answering some of their questions about the business.

I think I’ll call my presentation, Here’s What You Need to Know about NFL Player Representation. Here’s an overview of the points I will make.

  • For all intents and purposes, forget about NIL. Some agents enter the game thinking they’ll use name, image and likeness as their entree into working with players. The problem is, done correctly, NIL representation takes an incredible amount of man hours and bears fruit only slowly. What NIL has evolved into in college football is something very different, and this needs to be explored. 
  • Don’t fall into the trap of thinking negotiation is a big part of player representation. At least not at first. This is a classic sports law class talking point, and it’s something I have to spend a lot of time unwinding with many of my clients. The 2011 CBA made a player’s rookie deal mostly a paint-by-numbers proposition. You won’t be sitting across the table with an owner or GM in a smoke-filled room, pounding the table, for a good 5-7 years. If ever.
  • Don’t consider certification unless you have access to cash. This doesn’t mean you have to be personally wealthy, and it doesn’t mean you have to hand out gobs of dollars to players as a signing inducement. However, you are not going to make progress on your student loans in the early years of your career in player representation. Not if you’re doing it right. The simple fact is that you’re going to have to spend a certain amount of money to sign players worthy of NFL consideration.
  • Waiting until you’ve got 500 mostly NFL contacts on LinkedIn won’t work. If you’ve already got friends in the game, great, but you’re going to make most of your key relationships on the fly. What’s more, most of those relationships will happen because you both have skin in the game. No amount of social media connections or beers/meals bought is gonna get you a draftable player. You’re going to have to go out and do it. Then the relationships will come.
  • There’s a certain way you need to recruit players. First of all, forget about signing a draftable player in Year 1. An independent rookie contract advisor gets a player drafted about once every couple years, and then only in the sixth or seventh round. You may be the exception to that rule, but chances are, you’ll sign someone who moves up into the draft after being a UDFA prospect than someone that everyone sees as a possible fourth-round pick.
  • Plan to be independent for a while. I can’t tell you how many of my young agent clients ask me, early in their career, if any agencies are hiring. That’s just now how this industry works.

If you’re in Houston and interested in joining us, contact me on Twitter/X for details (@insidetheleague, DMs always open). I’d love to pack the room, but we need to get you registered first. Also, don’t forget to register for our newsletter, the Friday Wrap. It’s got nothing to do with Thursday, but I promise you’ll enjoy it. 

2023 New Agent Zoom Session II: Our Questions for Aaron Wilson

11 Wednesday Oct 2023

Posted by in Agents, Media

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Every year, shortly after the NFLPA announces the new agent class, we begin a Zoom series specifically for the contract advisors who have just entered the business. It’s something we’ve been doing for three years, and every year, it’s grown. We start a little earlier and we end a little later. 

I feel it’s worth it. There is so much to learn about the industry, and the Players Association does new agents no favors by making them wait until October to get started. It really puts them at a disadvantage for that draft class, and they only get three years before they face expulsion. They don’t have a lot of time to learn about how to get a player into an all-star game; who and how to recruit; how to budget and how to decide on finances; what to do when a player calls and asks to be represented; how involved they should get into NIL representation; and so many other topics. We cover all of these subjects in our Zoom sessions between now and the end of the year.

Anyway, our second guest in the series is Aaron Wilson. Aaron is a longtime friend who is relentless in his capacity to write and report, of course, but also network and build relationships. I don’t think I’ve ever found anyone who doesn’t like Aaron, and that’s pretty rare in this industry. Anyway, we’ll start at 8 p.m. ET on Wednesday, and we’ll go about an hour. Here are the questions I’ll ask Aaron, who’ll be on the other side of an interview for once. 

  • How do you develop a relationship with an agent? Who typically initiates the relationship?
  • Do new agents have much to “offer” you? Or does it take a few years before you really forge a relationship?
  • How many agents have you had to end relationships with, and why?
  • How many agents would you say you correspond with on a typical day during the season? How about during draft season?
  • What percentage of your sources do you actually like vs. have a strictly professional relationship with?
  • How has social media changed your job? How has it changed sports media in general?
  • Do you think you’ve ever written a story or a tweet that actually influenced the way a team/teams drafted?
  • You’ve covered two teams, the Ravens and the Texans. How did the teams’ attitudes toward the media differ?
  • What percentage of breaking news related to the NFL comes from an agent vs. how much comes from an NFL source (coach, scout, executive, player)?
  • When an agent shares information with you, does he expect something back? Or is it most often just a gesture of goodwill?

If this interests you, I’d love for you to join us. All it takes is that you join ITL. At $29.95/mo, I think it’s a really good deal, and you can cancel at any time. It’s especially good if you’re new to player representation and need to learn the tricks of the trade. If you haven’t signed up yet, there’s still time. 

We’ll get started at 8 p.m. ET sharp on Wednesday, and we’ll send out the Zoom link to all subscribers Wednesday afternoon. I hope you can join us.

Dogra’s Exit Headlines NFLPA Agent List Update

05 Thursday Oct 2023

Posted by in Agents, Getting started, NFL draft

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Ben Dogra is no longer an NFLPA-certified contract advisor. That’s one of the biggest revelations of the NFLPA’s updated posting of the current representation class for NFL players.

The Players Association refreshes its list of all licensed contract advisors in October after the deadline for dues payment passes on the first of the month. This year’s update brought news of several key exits and other highlights, but none is bigger than the departure of one of the first true titans in player representation. 

For those of us who have followed the business of the game for the last two decades, it’s hard to believe Dogra might not be at its forefront. When I launched ITL in 2002, Leigh Steinberg and David Dunn were fighting it out over their respective roles in the growth of Steinberg Sports, which had become a behemoth in the field of player representation. Soon, however, Steinberg, Dunn and others in the industry had a rival at the top in Dogra. By the time he had risen from an intern at SFX in the late 90s to one of the faces (along with Tom Condon) of CAA, Dogra was not just respected, but feared. I remember having a conversation with one of the top contract advisors in the game when Dogra was at the height of his powers, and I was struck by the awe in my friend’s voice, as well as his desire not to cross Dogra. From the stories of Dogra’s near-fights (literally) with NFL executives to tales of his magic tricks (again, literally) performed for friends after several late-night beverages in Mobile, Dogra cast an oversized shadow over the industry.

When Dogra was dismissed by CAA in 2014 for cause, the impact across the industry was seismic and, ultimately, began his descent. He even briefly lost his certification, and though it was restored in 2017 (and though he won a big arbitration judgement against CAA over his termination), his career never regained its luster. Still, at one time, he represented Adrian Peterson, Patrick Willis, Mario Williams, A.J. Green and countless others, and for that decade from about 2004 to 2014, if there was a black player slated for the top 10 in the draft, Dogra was the agent to beat. His last first-rounder was Ohio State’s Damon Arnette (1/19, Raiders, 2020), and per the latest NFLPA rolls, he has no active clients in the league today. In the history of player representation, no list of truly great NFL agents is complete without Dogra’s name.

If you’re an aspiring agent hoping to one day break into the league, Dogra’s rise from unpaid intern at SFX to the NFL’s mountaintop in about a decade’s time should inspire you. On the other hand, if you’re an established NFL contract advisor regularly representing the NFL’s best, his disappearance from the limelight should be a reminder that nothing is forever, especially in pro football. 

There’s a lot more to be learned from the new NFLPA list of 1,026 contract advisors. We’ll be talking more about who’s out, who’s in, and what the latest list tells us about the state of player representations at Inside the League in our Rep Rumblings and in our weekly newsletter, the Friday Wrap. You can register for it here.  

A Maybe-Alarming Look at Where NIL Is Taking College Football

28 Thursday Sep 2023

Posted by in Agents, NIL, Uncategorized

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I have to spend most of my summer focused on NFL scouting movement and NFL Agent Exam prep, so I tend to get a little behind in the fast-moving football business world. For that reason, this time of year, I’m trying to get caught up. 

To do that, I had a few conversations with three established members of the NIL and marketing world as it relates to pro and college football. What I wanted to gain was a better understanding of where college football is headed and how it will impact the pro football world. Here are six points they made:

  • The numbers that players are getting right now are not sustainable, and that goes, especially, for transfers. “I know some middle-level guys getting $20,000 per month,” said one source. “But that all depends on the school and when they came in. Transfers are getting crazy deals. It’s harder for the guys currently at schools. Some of the top offensive linemen in high school are getting close to 7-figure offers.” That’s starting to squeeze the collectives, most of whom have a 501(c)3 structure right now. We could see them go to more of an agency model so, rather than asking a big local business for a donation, they would instead solicit them for an advertising project of some kind. “Donor fatigue is real,” said one source. “Everyone I have spoken to at the colleges says there is no way they can keep raising $14 million every year to pay players.” 
  • That’s not to say collectives (or schools) will stop asking for donations. Right now, the numbers demanded by today’s star college player way outsize the value of a typical NIL deal. In other words, if a starting tackle wants $200,000 on an NIL deal, no business is gonna pay that for a couple tweets or an in-person appearance (“I think we are starting to see some of the small mom/pop NIL ‘agents’ go away . . .  as the kids learn the realities of the deals they are entering into,” added one source). That’s why there will still have to be some supplementation by donors or some kind of aggregation of advertisers to reach higher NIL thresholds. Those donors just won’t be able to write off their gifts on their taxes. Obviously, that’s a harder ask.
  • It probably doesn’t matter, anyway, because we’re starting to see schools become their own collectives, structuring themselves more as marketing agencies. This is why you saw Notre Dame hire an athletic director who came from NBC Sports. One expert I spoke to said we could see collectives disappear from the landscape within two years. “I don’t know how long (collectives) can/will last, and the landscape is changing,” said one of my sources. 
  • As these schools become populated with more and more advertising and marketing folks and fewer people with backgrounds in coaching and athletics, we’re going to see the money in the industry skyrocket. If you think the numbers are high now, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
  • This will require the federal government to get involved, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It will mean a more unified system of laws (no more 50 states and 50 laws) and, perhaps, a body with subpoena power that can actually enforce rules, unlike the NCAA, which is well-intentioned but, in all too many cases, toothless.
  • No matter what the NCAA or the bigger schools say for the record, they’re warming to the idea of revenue-sharing with players. That might come in the form of a $30,000 “stipend” for every member of the team plus a piece of uniform sales when a big-name  player’s jersey sells. That could come within 2-3 years. “They need to come up with money somewhere else,” said one source. “I think that will come in the form of (revenue sharing) with athletes on ticket sales, merchandise and media rights. I think there will be a trade made that will give the NCAA an anti-trust exemption in trade for the players getting a piece of the pie.”

So how does this affect NFL player representation, which is our main focus? That’s something we’ll look at later, perhaps next week, perhaps in this space. Stay tuned. In the meantime, make sure you’re signed up for our weekly newsletter, the Friday Wrap, which you can do here.

Ask the Agent: Our 10 Questions for Rookie Success Story David Gregory

18 Monday Sep 2023

Posted by in Agents, Getting started

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For about the last 10 years, we’ve been working with first-year agents, trying to help them avoid the usual rookie mistakes that so often take down NFLPA-certified contract advisors before they’ve really begun their new ventures. We’re entering Year 3 of moving from daily emails to monthly Zoom sessions, and the response has been great from our clients.

Zoom sessions allow us to bring in special guests like former scouts, active agents, trainers and other experts. In fact, for the last two years, we’ve brought in the directors of all the major all-star games to introduce themselves to our clients and give them guidance on getting a player invited.

At any rate, it’s that time again for us to kick things off, and Tuesday night at 8 p.m. ET, our guest will be David Gregory of Bullrush Sports. David got certified last summer, but didn’t spend his first year certified “learning” and sitting on the sidelines. He dove right in, and for his efforts, he was the only independent rookie agent to have a player drafted last year (Northern Michigan OT Jake Witt, who was selected in the seventh round by the Colts). It’s a monumental task just getting a player signed as an undrafted free agent in Year 1. To get a player drafted is off the charts.

Anyway, we’ll go about an hour, and these are the questions I’ll be asking him. 

  • Why did you choose to become an agent?
  • What is your background? Did it give you any advantages?
  • How did you decide on a budget for Year 1? What was your budget?
  • How many players did you sign? Why did you sign them?
  • How did you first identify Jake as a player to recruit? How did you then initiate contact?
  • Did you give any consideration to sending Jake to the XFL?
  • What was the lowest point for you and Jake after you signed?
  • When did you know there was real interest in Jake? Going into draft weekend, did you expect him to be drafted?
  • What was draft day like?
  • How has Jake’s selection by the Colts affected your Year 2 plans?

If you’re entering Year 1 as a contract advisor, I hope you’ll join us. There’s no cost, but you have to be an ITL client ($29.95/month, cancel at any time).  Your first year as an agent is incredibly tough, and getting to hear from the horse’s mouth how others enjoyed success is invaluable. 

We’ll send out the Zoom link to all our rookie subscribers Tuesday afternoon, a few hours before we get started. It’s going to be a good time, very informal, with plenty of time to get questions from the attendees in addition to the ones I ask. I really want this to be a win for everyone involved, and remember, we’re just getting started. We’ll have them monthly (sometimes twice monthly) for the rest of the year. Hope to see you Tuesday.

2023 NFL Agent Exam: Thoughts on ‘Results Day’

08 Friday Sep 2023

Posted by in Agent Exam, Agents, Getting started

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Today is THE most bittersweet day of the year for me, personally, because, on one hand, I get to celebrate the realization of a dream with so many people, but also have to console the disappointment of so many others. I try to get in the trenches with everyone who uses our exam prep services, and that’s the truest of good news/bad news propositions.

A few thoughts as so many people deal with life-changing emails that arrived in their inboxes this morning.

  • For many of those who didn’t get good news today, the testing centers played a big role. I heard lots of stories of people who showed up, only to find that their test was cancelled, or that it would be held later than scheduled. Other test-takers got plenty of intrusion during testing, or had some weird demands made on them. If that was you, find a new testing center next year. Even if you have to drive a little more. 
  • One other note for those who didn’t make the cut: it might be a failure of your note organization more than your grasp of the CBA. One contract advisor who helps with exam tutoring insists that you could theoretically skip studying the CBA altogether if you had extremely organized notes and you were exceptionally good at identifying what the exam asks in each question. 
  • If you passed, or if you didn’t, take this weekend to relax. If you passed, you deserve to celebrate. If you didn’t, rest up and get ready to join us in February when we resume our Zoom sessions. Nothing that happens this weekend will affect you next July.
  • If you passed, consider joining us at Inside the League. Next month (or maybe even later this month), we’ll begin our Zoom sessions for new agents. We’ll have instruction on who and how to recruit, how all-star games work, how to set a training budget, what to expect from players’ parents, and so many other relevant topics. We’ll have agents who were in your shoes next year telling their stories, as well as former scouts discussing player evaluation and other topics. We’ll also have Zooms to help you find sleepers in the draft. I hope we can work with you.
  • You probably have some favorite NFL draft accounts on social media, but begin looking for accounts that focus on small-schoolers. Unless you already work for a major agency, you won’t be signing any potential first-rounders this year.  I also highly recommend following actual former NFL scouts. They not only know their stuff, but they will often give you tips and engage with you if you ask intelligent questions. Here are a few Twitter accounts I recommend: Blake Beddingfield (@BlakeBedd), Rodrik David (@RightStepAdv), Greg Gabriel (@ggabefootball), Randy Mueller (@RandyMueller_) and Mark Gorscak (@gors55). Emory Hunt (@FBallGameplan) and Damond Talbot (@DraftDiamonds) are not former NFL scouts, but they are key follows.

Before I go, let me share some of the joyous texts I got from several successful test-takers, all of them unsolicited. 

  • “Passed! Thanks so much for all your help Neil. I’ll be sticking with ITL moving forward – Couldn’t have succeeded without your team.”
  • “I’m overwhelmed with happy emotion brother!!! 🙌🏾 And you were part of that journey!!! And I truly appreciate you!!!”
  • “I passed the exam Neil! Appreciate all the help along the way man! Let’s keep in touch man, I’ve already referred someone who’s taking the test next year to go to Inside the League.”
  • “Just found out I I passed the NFLPA agent exam. Now I’m a player agent for both NBA & NFL Players! THANK YOU & ITL FOR EVERYTHING! Now that the easy part is complete, the journey has begun!”
  • “Thank you for sticking in my corner of the past few years!!! I literally couldn’t have done it without you!!!”
  • “You are the freaking Man!!!!  Could not have done this with out you!!!!  You and (ITL instructor) Ian (Greengross) deserve a congratulation too!!!!  Thank you so much!!!!!!!” 
  • “LFG!!!!!!!!!! Can’t thank you and Ian enough. So (freaking) happy right now.”
  • “Thx! ITL has been a tremendous resource already. You are truly tapped in…just like the name Says “ITL”. Let’s go!”

See you at the Friday Wrap later today. Aren’t registered? Sign up here.

Ask the Scout: Can Docu-Series Help in Evaluation?

01 Friday Sep 2023

Posted by in Agents, NFL draft, NIL, Scouts, Uncategorized

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You won’t find a scout who doesn’t cite film as the foundation of his job. You gotta watch the tape to find out what a player offers. There are other ways to measure a prospect’s worth, of course, but it all goes back to film.

Of course, there are different kinds of film, and one kind we’re seeing more of is the kind you might find playing on ESPN, the NFL Network, HBO, or any number of networks that aim to bring behind-the-scenes action to fans eager for more exposure to the game they love. For example, the series “QB1: Beyond the Lights” featured such well-known passers as Justin Fields, Spencer Rattler and Jake Fromm long before they had reached the NFL (or are near reaching the NFL, as Rattler is). The next season offers two of this spring’s first-rounders in Bryce Young and Anthony Richardson. 

It doesn’t stop there. Netflix’s popular “Last Chance U” prominently featured two future draftees in Dakota Allen (7/251/2019, Rams) and Jermaine Johnson (1/26/2022, Jets). And lest you think this is some new phenomenon, back in the spring of 2005, the game show “Super Agent” aired on SpikeTV. It pitted nine agents against each other as they vied for USC DT Shaun Cody, who went 2/37 to the Lions in the 2005 draft. 

This is all to say nothing of how name, image and likeness have changed the game for players like USC QB Caleb Williams, who’s appearing in Wendy’s commercials these days. It begs the question: is there value in mining these series for tips on what kind of players these prospects will be under the bright lights of the NFL? We asked some friends in scouting, and this is what they told us.

  • “I think you can glean some information from those docs and reality shows from a personality standpoint. I don’t know if you remember the QB1 documentary, it was a camp . . . do you remember the one with (South Carolina QB) Spencer Rattler? It really showed him as this bratty, cocky, demeaning (guy) when he was ripping on the other quarterbacks there, and he came across as a real jerk. You hear some of these schools talking about how he was on school visits, so I think there’s something you can get from those documentaries as far as personality.”
  • “I think it can be helpful. It does give you insight to the person that is being featured. . . You just need to make sure it is valid and not just a spin piece. It really can show you how a player interacts with teammates and other staff.”
  • “No questions these shows help get inside the true person. Just like the combine has always taped interviews, it is a window into the person’s thoughts and lives without actually having to be there. . . Reality shows catch them with their guard down.”
  • “Sure they are. If scouts are willing to do the extra work, there can be all kinds of background information – family and support system, influences, maturity, life skills, attitudes, motivations, work ethic, goals, etc.”
  • “You get a snapshot of the character of the young man and his family. A lot of times you can see who are needy parents and who are good parents. Family background tells you what these players are really playing for and how to coach/motivate them. Some parents are (pains in the ass) and some are cool. Our head coach always wants to meet the parents at pro days to feel them out. Important to learn who shapes these young men.”

Every aspiring NFL player needs to understand that scouts are always watching, and they have more to watch these days than ever. If you’re a draft prospect, or you’re close to one, do them a favor and remind them of this, especially if a camera is nearby.

For more discussion of the draft and player evaluation, make sure to check out our weekly newsletter, the Friday Wrap. Register for it here.

2023 NFL Agent Class: What Do Agencies Look Like Today?

18 Friday Aug 2023

Posted by in Agent Exam, Agents, Uncategorized

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In 2-3 weeks, the people who took the 2023 NFL Agent Exam will get their results. As we’ve discussed previously, we expect a higher-than-usual passing rate based on the feedback we’ve gotten so far from test-takers. While that’s good news, what’s the bad news (as well as the good) as they enter the ranks of NFL player representatives on October 1?

Here’s a look at the NFL agent body today.

Controlled by the big agencies: While there’s been diversity in which firms represent the No. 1 overall pick, there’s not a lot of diversity when it comes to which firms consistently land the top players. For example, at ITL, we’ve tabulated draft “value points” (see here for an explanation) going back to 2007. Since 2007, 14 firms have more than 20,000 points. Some of them are defunct, but those who are still active are, in order, CAA, Athletes First, Independent Sports, Rep1 Sports, Sportstars, SportsTrust Advisors, Rosenhaus Sports, Octagon Football, BC Sports, Priority Sports and Klutch Sports Group. These are the firms that consistently dominate the first three rounds. Then you have another 20 schools who have between 5,000 and 15,000 value points that are a consistent presence in the draft, though not always on Days 1 and 2. These firms are Roc Nation Sports, Wasserman Sports, 1 of 1 Agency, WME Sports, Allegiant Athletic Agency, NC Sports, Enter-Sports, Alliance Management, The Sports and Entertainment Group, United Sports Group, Equity Sports (formerly Steinberg Sports), VaynerSports, JL Sports, Universal Sports and The Ballengee Group (again, some of the points leaders have gone out of business). After that, there are about a dozen other firms that are a regular part of the draft. If you’re not part of one of those 40 agencies, you’ve got a real uphill battle.

Allied with entertainers: This week, we learned that Druski, who gained fame making people laugh on social media platforms, has launched his own sports agency. Jay-Z, Darius Rucker, Lil Wayne and others have entered the arena in the last 10 years, and another big-name entertainer joins the business about every other year. The star power musicians bring has produced mixed results, honestly, but the fact remains that merely being attached to someone with fame and presence is quite the door-opener.

Heavily clustered: If you live on the coasts or in major metropolitan areas, you’re one of many contract advisors in your area. There are 30 agents in Greater Nashville. There are 28 in Miami proper, 39 in the five boroughs of New York City. There are almost a hundred agents in Southern California alone, 30 in Greater Houston and 44 in  Greater Dallas. On the other hand, Delaware, Hawaii, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming are states with no registered contract advisors.

There are other factors to consider, but these are some of the geographic and business aspects of the business that are pretty fundamental to understanding what today’s player representation firm looks like. For greater detail on this and other topics related to the football industry, make sure you’re reading our newsletter. You can register for it here.

 

2023 NFL Agent Exam: Three Takeaways

28 Friday Jul 2023

Posted by in Agent Exam, Agents, Getting started

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The big test is in the books for this year. After speaking to dozens of our clients post-exam, here’s what we’ve learned.

Tech issues were better, but they didn’t completely go away. As we discussed in our report on Monday, proctoring centers were mostly — but not completely — a hit. One Atlanta-area testing facility couldn’t test its 8 a.m. class, requiring them to re-register for later the same day or Tuesday. The following slot was affected, as well. When there was yet another issue, test-takers had to find a new location altogether. One aspiring agent had to fly out of state (buying a ticket for the next day, which is never cheap) to take the exam. There were also several test-takers based in South Florida who were told Sunday night (about 12 hours before they were to test) that the testing facility would not be open, and that someone would reach out to them in 3-5 business days. We don’t know how that situation was resolved. It’s our hope that they didn’t have to wait until next year. Yet another agent hopeful had to resubmit all his answers with just minutes left in his three-hour slot. Overall, however, things went smoothly enough that we’d guess the NFLPA stays status quo for ’24. Still, don’t rule out a return to Washington, D.C.

The test may have been a little easier this year. Every year, we make sure to focus on the computation of the trickier math of the CBA, i.e., workman’s comp offsets, injury grievances, veterans salary benefit, proven performance escalator, etc. However, we heard from several test-takers that there were fewer problems that required a calculator. Furthermore, while many of the questions were tricky and designed to determine if agent candidates really knew the material, several people who took the exam last year said it was just easier. “I think that this year they intentionally made the test easier,” said one aspiring contract advisor. What’s more, many more than usual first-timers told us the test was really straightforward, and that they expect to pass. Obviously, that might be false confidence, but the positive responses were unmistakeable. I’m expecting a slightly bigger class than normal. 

The reviews on our exam prep materials were really good. I never ask for positive reviews on our study guide, exams and videos, but obviously, it’s great to have happy clients. Once again, we got several unsolicited texts that made for pleasant reading. “I was prepared and organized, big thanks to you guys,” said one aspiring agent. “your study guide was a tremendous benefit . . . I will definitely be recommending people to you bro!,” texted another. “I really appreciate your time. Your promptness. Your effort. Your patience,” added yet another. That’s probably the most satisfying comment. We take seriously our efforts to help people pass the exam. 

We’ll be talking about the industry even more, as usual, in today’s Friday Wrap. Make sure to register for it if you haven’t already. You can do that here.