A tweet from my colleague Darren Heitner today got a lot of traction with people interested in NFL player representation, and I feel it bears some explaining, so I thought I’d use this week’s post to break down how combine prep agreements work for the lion’s share of contract advisors and their clients.

Before we go on, I think it might be helpful if you review the evolution of training options NFL agents have offered (and players have commanded) over the past 20 years. When ITL launched in 2002, there was no combine prep to speak of, but year by year, that’s changed, and today, it’s a critical part of the agent-prospect relationship.

At any rate, the standard representation agreement (SRA) that the NFLPA mandates that all agents sign with their clients makes no mention of combine training. It strictly lays out the fee agreement between a player and his representative, how the agent will bill the player and what he can bill him for, etc. Any contract advisor who’s going to offer training — and I preach this, time and again, to new agents that we work with at Inside the League — MUST set forth everything he’s offering in a separate addendum that he requires the player to sign.

It’s commonplace to think of this addendum as solely related to traditional training — that the agent will pay for 6-8 weeks of combine prep as well as lodging and food at an agreed-upon facility. However, as players’ expectations have grown to include stipends, per diems, signing bonuses, rental cars, mid-training trips back home, more well-appointed apartments, etc., those addenda (commonly called “training riders”) have expanded significantly. If you don’t have one — and if you don’t, you are really playing with fire — it’s tantamount to gambling thousands of dollars. Just ask the nearly 50 agents who’ve already been fired by their clients with a week to go until draft day.

Now, you might think an agent would be crazy to offer such training options to players who have negligible chances to even make a 90-man roster, much less play several years in the league. Well, that’s the dilemma facing every modern player representative. Do you try to hold the line on the soaring cost of simply helping a player through the draft process, knowing you’ll probably only sign players that have no NFL interest? Or do you risk large sums of money, hoping to contain costs along the way and betting that your client beats the odds and makes a roster? These are the things no one tells you as you pursue the exciting and potentially fulfilling life of an NFL agent, just as so many are these days in the months and weeks leading to July’s NFLPA exam. 

It’s easy to criticize those who are in the arena for the decisions they make. What I can tell you is, most people who get into the agent business do it for the right reasons. Often, they only fail because the economics of the game have become so upside-down. Any honest modern NFL agent — there are more than 900 of them certified by the NFLPA — will tell you it’s gotten out of hand, but there’s no easy way to fix things. 

Monday night, we welcomed former Titans scouting executive Blake Beddingfield for our final monthly Zoom session aimed at rookie agents fighting to get their first-ever clients onto NFL rosters. Obviously, for the newest contract advisors, every shred of advice from good counsel matters, so Blake’s input was critical. The best part of having a seasoned former NFL exec around means learning, and that goes for me as well as everyone on the call.

This session was different because one thing Blake said was contrary to what I’ve always preached. One participant asked Blake if there was value in reaching out to all 32 NFL teams to remind them of an agent’s clients and their workout numbers, and Blake encouraged him to do so.

My approach has always been that, with the APT Coalition and the cooperation between teams on workout numbers, most scouts would see such communication as unnecessary and maybe even less than trustworthy. Blake’s take was that he’d rather have the chance to sift through all the numbers and make his own decision on what’s valid and what’s not. That makes sense, as long as contract advisors don’t get the impression they can lobby their clients onto NFL rosters. I think that’s a misconception that’s been long-held by some of the lesser prospects in each draft class. At the end of the day, there’s something to be said about making sure your client is front of mind on Saturday.

Here are a few other things we discussed that I found intriguing.

Not all teams are good at developing players, and you need to know which ones are and aren’t before you make a UDFA choice. Blake mentioned the Seahawks as a team that’s very good at making Day 3 players into stars, and that extends to UDFA signees. Indeed, Seattle got a lot of mileage out of two Day 3 cornerbacks, Cincinnati’s Coby Bryant (4/109) and UTSA’s Tariq Woolen (5/153), last year. Remember this if you’re weighing a post-draft offer from the Seahawks and a rival team.

Don’t lose hope if your client doesn’t have a home on Saturday. Rookie mini-camp invitations are not preferred, but they’re better than nothing, and sometimes they aren’t extended until Monday, Tuesday, or even later. It’s even possible a player get a UDFA offer Sunday or later.

There’s value in “accepting” an offer now, especially if it’s a rookie mini-camp invite. No one is going to be angry if your client gets a UDFA deal, but it’s OK to make a gentleman’s agreement on a rookie mini-camp nod before the draft. Of course, this is strictly illegal, so don’t tell anyone, but it happens all the time.

The $3,000 signing bonus mark is a pretty good measure of how invested a team is in your UDFA client. The real graduations, Blake said, are $5,000 or more (highly invested), $3,000 (reasonable investment) and $1,000 or less (these players are strictly a dice roll for the team and not at all expected to make the roster).

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