Category Archives: NIL

A Few Notes from a Busy Fall 2024

31 Thursday Oct 2024

Posted by in Agents, NFL draft, NIL, Scouts

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Today, I didn’t have any topics I wanted to spend 500 words on, but I had a lot of topics I wanted to spend 100 words on, so here’s a bunch of stuff I found interesting this week.

  • Has Pittsburgh cracked the code on how to intelligently integrate former NFL scouts and executives into the organization in a way that helps identify, grade and reward top performers? Maybe. Per this story, the Panthers have brought in former Bills GM Doug Whaley to help in doling out a $6 million NIL budget based on quality of play. Given the team’s success this season (7-0 entering this weekend’s game against SMU), maybe head coach Pat Narduzzi’s plan to pay players based on production rather than promise will be replicated elsewhere.
  • Mark your calendars: the final resolution of the NCAA’s $2.7 billion deal with the plaintiff attorneys seeking NIL compensation in a class action lawsuit (for players dating back to 2016) is set for April 2025. The agreement is expected to clear the way for a $20 million-per-school tranche of money to be shared with players who participated in NCAA athletics from 2016-21. It also clears the way for schools to begin operating in ways that closely mirror a pay-for-play model, rather than the current system (which pretends that players only get compensated for their respective names, images and likenesses). Bottom line, during a time when all eyes will be focused on the 2025 draft, we could see federal and NCAA oversight of NIL representation change in radical ways. The impact of those changes could be immediate. We will do what we can to prepare you, our client, for those changes well in advance. 
  • Based on feedback from new agents this fall, the stories haven’t changed much over the years. One agent was contacted by the alleged uncle of a star player, only the uncle wouldn’t tell the agent who the player was (he would only divulge the player’s school and home location, and offered that the player is a mid-round pick). The uncle said the player’s focus is newly certified contract advisors, for some reason. We’ve also heard of a runner in South Florida who’s tried to solicit members of the 2024 agent class and wants money up front, with a promise of players later. 
  • So far, the only head coaching changes this season have been made at the G5 level. Maybe that’s why no search firms have been engaged so far, at least as far as we know. Last year, 17 G5 schools made head coaching changes. Of the 17, less than half (eight) used assistance. Of the 14 P4 schools making changes, not surprisingly, 11 hired firms.   

One other thing. If you’re a new agent (or a veteran agent trying to figure out how to keep up with the exploding costs of player representation), you should check out today’s Rep Rumblings at ITL. We’re trying to finalize a program that you might find helpful. 

We’ll also discuss it in the Friday Wrap. You can register for it here. 

Gauging the Progress of the NCAA’s Antitrust Litigation Settlement

09 Friday Aug 2024

Posted by in Agents, NIL, Transfer portal

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There isn’t a lot of chatter about it in college and pro football circles — at least none that I’ve picked up — but big parts are moving into place that will determine the future and structure of college football. Late last month, we got a story that was pretty telling about what direction things are going, and until now, I really haven’t had a chance to give it a close look.

This week, however, I did. The lawsuits involve antitrust actions against the NCAA (three of them, in fact, that were resolved collectively). Per the story, the resolution of these lawsuits “outline how past athletes will share the $2.78 billion in damages that the NCAA has agreed to pay, sets up a new system for revenue sharing and outlines new roster limits for a long list of college sports, among other items.” Obviously, $2.78 billion is a lot of money, but that only reflects the back pay previous athletes will receive. It’s just scratching the surface of what’s ahead.

Anyway, no one seems to want to acknowledge what’s ahead and how it will change player representation, so I thought I’d try to comb through the story and draw my own conclusions. Here are a few passages and my comments.

  • “Schools will be permitted for the first time to pay their athletes directly via name, image and likeness (NIL) deals under the terms of the settlement. Each school could provide up to 22% of the average revenue that power conference schools generate from media rights, ticket sales and sponsorships — a sum that is expected to be between $20 million and $22 million per school when the settlement goes into effect at the start of the 2025-26 academic year.” — OK, but this seems like another effort to keep players from getting paid as university employees, which seems completely inevitable. If it is inevitable (and I believe it is), it’s almost stupid to wade through and try to figure out how the terms of this lawsuit will change things, because someone else will sue again soon and tear this agreement down. As for the numbers, $22 million seems a little conservative given that I’ve heard that many schools’ budgets are already north of that number for football only. With the money pouring into football programs, it seems like this number could soar higher quickly. If this is the case, and nothing is done to slow portal movement, the dollars are going to make things even crazier.
  • “Athletes would still be able to make money from NIL deals with third parties, but the NCAA said the settlement will allow them to install a more ‘robust and effective enforcement and oversight program’ to make sure those third-party deals are ‘legitimate NIL activity.'” — I think this is good, but I wonder if there will be real teeth in these oversight programs. More and more, the bigger agencies are signing up the top draft prospects years before they are draft-eligible just so they’ll be at the front of the line when it comes to signing an NFL contract. Sure, the top five percent are getting big national deals, but those are few and far between. 
  • “The NCAA plans to create a database of NIL deals to try to objectively assess whether arrangements between an athlete and a third party qualify as a legitimate endorsement deal.” — Great! But will the results be public? If not, who will have access? Schools? Agents? There’s not an NFLPA-comparable body that can regulate all this, though I presume the NCAA thinks of itself as such a body.  
  • “The settlement allows for the court to appoint a ‘special master’ to rule on any disputes about new rules related to player compensation. . . The two sides have not yet determined who will serve as the new enforcement entity or who will oversee the arbitration process of any future disputes.” — I don’t think this can work through civil litigation processes, which means it will have to be collectively bargained . . . which requires a union. 
  • “It is highly unlikely that football players — who generate the majority of revenue for most schools — will receive 50% of the money that the football team generates. Some of those benefits have to be shared equitably due to Title IX regulations. The settlement does not provide detailed instructions on how to apply Title IX to these new benefits, leaving some potentially tricky decisions up to each individual school.” — This is why this doesn’t seem tenable. Football teams will eventually not want to share revenues. If this isn’t settled promptly, and just left to the schools, it’s going to accelerate football’s pull away from this agreement.
  • “As part of the settlement, the NCAA agreed to remove any limits on the number of scholarships a school can provide to athletes. Previously, NCAA rules dictated a certain number of scholarships per sport. If the settlement is approved, there will instead be a limit on how many total players each team can have on its roster and each individual school will decide how many of those players it wants to put on scholarship.” — This is probably the NCAA trying to throw the bigger schools a bone, but I doubt it works. 

At the end of the day, most agents just want to know what they’ll have to deal with. A nationwide NIL contract database would be huge if contract advisors have access to it. I think most would like to know if there’s going to be some kind of certification process, as well, with most NFL agents I know welcoming that. It’s becoming less necessary, however, as more and more NIL agents pursue NFL certification. They’re a growing part of our exam prep course every year.

Anyway, I may have come across as negative during some of this, and I grant that it’s easy to deride people who are trying to do the virtually impossible, i.e., build a framework for the college game going forward. If the settlement is approved and this 10-year agreement is binding, it will bring some positives. However, it’s hard not to see the overwhelming power and potential of dollars the big football schools would be turning down to abide by this. I just feel like the major conferences will build their own league, and play by their own rules, sooner rather than later.

 

 

2024 Spring Portal Window: Agents Respond

17 Friday May 2024

Posted by in NIL, Transfer portal

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Last week, we spoke to personnel directors at several schools to get their take on the spring portal window, and how it measured up to expectations as well as how it compared to December. This week, as promised, we are passing along what we got back from several agents who had players seeking transfers. Here are our takeaways.

Talent was average.

  • “The spring window tends to be weaker, I’d say this one was particularly weak. (Players) are starting to understand how the portal works, and December is really the best time to go in for them.”
  • “You saw most high-end teams needing 1-2 positions, whereas in December, teams were hunting for a lot of best available players at numerous positions. April was more position-specific, based on team needs.”

  • “You’re not seeing a lot of tenured guys hit the portal as you did last spring or even in the December window. Teams are doing a much better job of roster management.”

The money was not nearly as plentiful.

  • “I saw less of teams being desperate to sign lesser players.”
  • “I felt like more Tier 2 or 3 players were getting in expecting huge paydays based off of what they heard about the December portal, but not everyone was able to get that.
  • “I felt like things were slowing down a bit and teams were starting to settle on ranges for players. There appeared to be a bit more level-headedness when it came to the April portal or a better understanding of the market/what they could do specifically as a team.”
  • “This spring portal window was underwhelming to say the least. You’ve got guys like Josh Pate at 247 hyping this up to be the craziest portal window ever and it absolutely wasn’t.”
  • “A lot of big P4 schools are getting away from the bidding wars. (LSU head coach) Brian Kelly came out and said they aren’t going to overspend on players just because of a need.”

Schools are getting better at all aspects of the portal.

  • “Teams and collectives are getting smarter with roster retention. Coaches are able to better evaluate who is a potential roster defector and collectives are putting language in their contracts that helps from players being tampered with before the portal window opens.”
  • “There’s still players that will slip through the cracks, but now it’s more of your second or third guy in the rotation at a position going to a school where he will be the No. 1 guy.”

It’s not surprising that it’s becoming more of a buyer’s market as the portal era continues and the people writing the checks get smarter about how they allocate their dollars. The ball is in the court of agents who now must figure out how to leverage their players and identify the schools with the biggest budgets. We’ll continue to monitor the development of things.

Five Thoughts About the Transfer Portal

19 Friday Apr 2024

Posted by in NIL, Scouts, Transfer portal

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Here are a few thoughts based on conversations I’ve had with people around the industry during the first week of the April transfer portal window.

  • This is the first time in my two decades-plus running ITL that college personnel staffers have approached me about meeting NFL agents. Personnel directors see what’s happening and they’re getting aggressive. I’m happy to oblige. Honestly, what’s taken so long? I played a (small) role in one agency hiring a portal expert just this month. I hope to do that more often. That agency is now recruiting some of the better players who’ve entered during the April window. It just makes sense that more and more firms will do this.
  • The portal is not so much about who’s in, especially this time of year, as who could be in. This week, I’ve personally spoken to a contract advisor who is shopping a highly touted player who’s not in the portal — yet. He’s had several conversations with schools.
  • We’re at the beginning of the end for collectives. Sure, they’ll still be around as a funding arm — at least for a while — but as far as being a central part of the decision-making process for a key transfer, I see that ending. Once the Tennessee and Virginia AGs successfully sued the NCAA, allowing players to negotiate deals to transfer, personnel directors I’ve spoken to are far more aggressive about wanting to go directly to players (and/or their representatives) to talk numbers. It’s just a matter of figuring out how to monetize things on a grander scale to make up for the donor fatigue.
  • The latest rule change means most players should be looked at as being on one-year deals at all times. There are no longer any barriers (outside of academic eligibility) to player movement. 
  • I do not see a mass buildup of personnel departments involving former NFL scouts: The portal chase is not so much a draft as it is a free agent pursuit. The “haves” are full of money to sign players that might help them. For the most part, the only limit on the number of players they sign is their budgets (not usually a major consideration) and their roster openings. On top of this, there have never been more young, aspiring scouts willing to work for free in exchange for a shot at their big break. Maybe populating a scouting staff will be the next arms race in college football, but I think most teams will pump that money into their NIL budgets rather than into splashy former NFL scouts and executives. Time will tell.

There’s plenty more to discuss regarding the transfer portal, and we’ll be chopping it up in the Friday Wrap, which comes out at 7:30 p.m. Register for it here. 

2024 April Portal Window: More Discussion with a DPP

05 Friday Apr 2024

Posted by in NIL, Transfer portal

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With the April portal window not far off, I continued my quest to learn as much about transferring and the name, image and likeness money that is changing the nature of college football. To do that, I had a lengthy conversation with a Director of Player Personnel at a mid-major not far from me.

We had a lengthy discussion on the ins and outs of the transfer window. Here are a few highlights from our conversation.

Up and down: I asked if it’s harder to recruit a P5 player to come to a G5 school or to lure an FCS player to an FBS mid-major. He said it’s harder to pull from P5 because such a player hates to switch “just because of the logo. Everybody is attracted to a logo at TAMU, so they would be harder to get.” Still, “the deciding factor is their playing time. If they’ve been at PVAMU three years in a row, they’re gonna be harder to get. Playing time at their old school is the determinant. A P5 who has played a lot is gonna be harder to get, unless the FCS guy has played a significant amount.”

Pecking order: The most valuable players tend to be offensive linemen, then pass rushers, he said. For the most part, start on the outside of both sides of the line for the most valuable players, then work in for players of less stature. For example, defensive tackles are valuable, but not as valuable as defensive ends. 

Looking for certainty: I asked if players in the portal might be ripe for a position switch. The response was that not only would a player not be receptive, but the coaches on staff wouldn’t, either. “Position switches would be a hard sell to the position coach,” my friend said. “When you get a portal player, you want him to be plug and play. That’s a one-off experience. If you coached him at your previous school, maybe, but usually no.”

Technology helps: The software packages sold to today’s college football team can be pricey, but they’re also diverse and directed toward every corner of the recruiting game. For instance, when I asked one DPP how he avoids publicizing the offers he makes, he said it’s impossible. “Everything is so public anyway, and there are  services that automatically scrape the Internet,” he told me. “You could get an email every single day telling you who (schools) offered, and it’s all based off Twitter.”

Minefield: It’s a dangerous game when you strategically offer a player, hoping bigger schools will flock to him. “We won’t offer people unless we are interested in them,” said the same DPP. On the other hand, “there might be a guy who may not be interested in us right now, but he might fall to us for academic reasons, so we offer him.” Now, that academic info is something that has to be gathered first-hand, which, again, requires manpower. 

A surprising turn: I asked one DPP at a mid-major if high school recruiting was now solely the bailiwick of schools like his, while big schools could sit back and harvest them once they proved themselves. He said it was the reverse: the Ohio States and Alabamas of the world can spend big dollars on five-star recruits and reap their big seasons from the start, then fill in with transfers when a recruit doesn’t work out. 

An inconsistent workload: Trying to predict how many volunteers the standard mid-major has on the personnel team is really hard. Having spoken to two schools this week, one said his team has 5-6 volunteers, while another DPP said he put together his entire pre-portal board single-handedly. While no two boards have the same level of detail and volume, that’s still a lot of work. 

Transfers won’t be the only thing happening in the football world in April. There will also be plenty of movement in NFL front offices starting in late April and continuing through July. We’ve been talking about that at Inside the League. Want even more? Make sure you register for our weekly newsletter, the Friday Wrap. 

More Notes on the Transfer Portal from the Experts

28 Thursday Mar 2024

Posted by in NIL, Transfer portal

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This week, I got a chance to sit down with the transfer portal team at a mid-major school. Over an hour-long conversation, the half-dozen members of the personnel department had some interesting things to say. Here are a few highlights.

  • There is no ceiling for offensive tackles in the portal. If they’re healthy and have starting experience, there is almost no limit to what schools will pay. This is probably the one recurring theme.
  • Facilities are important, but less important than they were in the pre-NIL days. It will be interesting if schools stop beefing up their locker rooms and field houses and start pouring it into player compensation. “There are fewer kids asking if there’s a barbershop and a waterfall in the locker room,” is how one official put it.
  • Also, players still care about things like food. You better be doling it out if you don’t have mountains of NIL cash. I’ve heard of one West Coast school that feeds all its athletes — from gymnasts to football players — in one cafeteria. Once the food runs out, it runs out, and it doesn’t matter if someone on the rowing team went back for seconds while football practice ran long.
  • One other thing — if you’re at a mid-major and can’t match others’ offers, you better have pretty liberal admissions policies. 
  • There are still no NFLPA-licensed contract advisors — or even non-certified ones — cornering the market. The DPPS and GMs I speak to say they are still not seeing the same faces every time. Reps are also not (yet) common on official visits. This is a tremendous area of opportunity for an NFL agency. 
  • If you’re at a school in Florida or Texas, you have a tremendous advantage, even if you’re not at a P5 school. Players who leave and don’t get what they wanted usually want to return home.
  • Coaches are getting more aggressive about contacting players at other schools. That’s especially true if they have a prior relationship, i.e., the coach leaves one school for another one, then starts trying to lure the kid at his old school to his new school. That’s becoming more common. The problem is, if a school tried to make a fuss about this, the player’s not normally going to go against his coach.
  • Here’s a fun fact. Texas Roadhouse is headquartered in Louisville, Ky. I know this because the Cardinals aggressively court their corporate sponsors, which is one reason they have a well-stocked NIL budget. The school offers naming rights to the film room, the weight room, everything. For almost 20 years, Cards fans have been able to purchase bottles of Maker’s Mark with the Louisville logo. There’s even a Texas Roadhouse Student Center at Louisville; I’ve also heard the chairs in the meeting room have the TR logo.

If this topic interests you, make sure you check out last week’s edition of the Friday Wrap, in which I talked to 10 college personnel directors to get their respective takes on the abuses of the transfer portal. It’s here. To register for future editions of the Wrap, click here.

 

More Updates, Tidbits on the NCAA Transfer Portal

15 Friday Mar 2024

Posted by in NFL draft, NIL

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At Inside the League, we’ve been focusing a lot of our attention on the college football transfer portal. We had a widely attended symposium at the NFL Combine and we discussed it in the Scouting the League podcast with guest Oscar Monnier (former portal boss at five P5 schools) last month. It’s one of the hottest topics in the player representation industry, but it’s still mostly a mystery, at least among the bigger agencies.

It’s got me thinking about the fundamentals of the transfer portal, starting with how, exactly, it all works. As near as I can tell, there’s a process.

  • Player enters the portal.
  • A director or member of the personnel staff, knowing which position(s) the school is targeting, does a preliminary evaluation of the player.
  • The personnel staffer submits his evaluation and any game film he can round up to the relevant position coach, who then makes a determination on whether to pursue him. This normally takes less than 24 hours.
  • The team decides if the player is worthy of an offer. If the offer is made, a visit is scheduled. 
  • At some point, the coaches huddle with the collective (if the school has one) to determine how much money, if any, can be offered.
  • Once the player accepts an invitation to visit and shows up on campus, his height and weight are recorded. At the end of the visit, a formal offer is made, often by the head coach, personally. 
  • The player is not official with the school until he is enrolled and attends class, by my understanding. 

This led me to more questions. For example, we’ve got a portal window opening in April. It’s a shorter one (only two weeks), but will still be a popular one, I’m sure. How will it work, given that there will only be a few short weeks of school left and no chance for transfers to actually enroll? 

I posed the question to an expert on the process, and his response was: “Spring transfers take summer classes 99% of the time, so that triggers it being finalized. It’s also the worst possible time to transfer, which is a big deterrent on its own, not to mention there’s no portal window for undergrads at that time.”

After a week of speaking to portal specialists at schools big and small, here are a couple more notes and takeaways:

  • More progressive schools are using flashy graphics — yes, similar to the ones splashed all over social media when a player gets an offer — to recruit portal players. The only difference is, the schools pass these along via text rather than social media. Like it or not, communicating in this manner is the way to attract today’s top prospects.
  • One school has 16 volunteers committed to doing nothing but evaluating players once they hit the portal or preparing their board with players they anticipate entering the portal.
  • Some schools with big war chests but limited personnel departments simply wait until players get multiple offers, then make their own. 
  • We had several other interesting tidbits in Tuesday’s Rep Rumblings report, including the ratio of dollars spent on retention vs. acquisition for one school, the going rate for a middling QB prospect, how schools of varying size prepare for the portal and more. 

As always, we’ll be chopping it up on the portal and other football business matters in today’s Friday Wrap, which comes out at 7:30 p.m. ET. Register for it here.

 

 

2024 NFL Combine Week: A Few Highlights

01 Friday Mar 2024

Posted by in ITL, Media, NFL draft, NIL, Scouts

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The NFL Combine is a major event for the entire football community and represents probably the biggest week of the year for us at ITL. Here are a few highlights and observations from the week.

  • There were so many highlights of our 15th annual event (the 2024 USI Insurance Services ITL Combine Seminar Presented by The Tatnuck Group) at the Indiana Convention Center, but two stick out to me. One was very selfish: Lions GM Brad Holmes, who accepted the Best Draft Award for Detroit, cited Inside the League for its commitment to the scouting industry, especially crediting the Friday Wrap for its focus on the community. That was really, really humbling, and unexpected.
  • Also humbling was the reaction of Broncos Senior Midwest Scout Scott DiStefano, who accepted the C.O. Brocato Memorial Award for lifetime service in NFL scouting. Scott had to pause to gather himself a couple time during his remarks. It’s awesome to recognize people in front of their peers. Equally awesome: Broncos GM George Paton and virtually the entire Broncos scouting staff showed up to cheer Scott on.
  • Another highlight was spending a little time with the co-winners of the Pro Liaison of the Year Award, N.C. State’s D.D. Hoggard and Illinois’ Jay Kaiser. Both of them are humble men who are deserving of their acclaim. D.D. flew in on his own dime to accept the award in person, which was a “wow” moment for me when he could easily have appeared via video. 
  • By the way, my partner in the presentation of the Eugene E. Parker Award for service to the agent industry, Peter Schaffer of Authentic Athletix, announced that he’s creating an online hall of fame for player representation Wednesday night. At this time, it’s not a brick-and-mortar place, but will live online. I will contribute to Peter’s efforts, and we’ve already got our first member chosen (to go along with the previous four winners of the award). We’ll have further communications about it soon. It’s a great idea and I’m pretty excited about it.
  • Also of interest: our award winners are starting to get social media graphics made about them. Check out this one that Duke University made for David Feeley, who won the Strength Coach of the Year Award as voted on by active NFL scouts. 
  • We also had our second annual NIL-oriented event Thursday. It was a pretty fast 90 minutes with guest speaker Oscar Monnier, who ran the transfer portal at Northwestern, Stanford, Oregon, Duke and Texas A&M. He spoke for an hour about his experiences and recommendations for exploiting this new part of the industry. We had about 80 guests, most of them from top NFL agencies and interested in learning how to get the most out of the portal process. What impressed me the most, however, is how 10-12 people lined up to talk to Oscar after his session, and none of them had questions about what he discussed. They all wanted to explore working with him. Oscar arrived to town a free agent, but there’s a good chance he won’t leave as one. I think the transfer portal is a space that has not been recognized for its potential in player representation, but I think it’s getting there. 
  • One scout I spoke to went on and on about how impressive Ohio State WO Marvin Harrison Jr. was in interviews. His comments came as part of a discussion on how so many players are coached by their agents in interviews. It’s unknown if Harrison has undergone interview prep, but it sounds like his natural personality made it pretty academic if he did. 

For a complete rundown of all the winners and more highlights from the week, make sure to check out the Friday Wrap, which comes out this evening. Register for it here. 

 

 

Meet the Sponsors of Our 2024 Combine Events

16 Friday Feb 2024

Posted by in Agents, NIL, Scouts

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We’re less than two weeks away from the two biggest days of the year for Inside the League. They are Wednesday and Thursday, Feb. 28-29, when we’ll hold our annual seminar and symposium, respectively, in Indianapolis. For all the details, click here. 

However, those dates would not even be possible if not for our partners in these events. We’re excited to work with three companies — USI Insurance Services, The Tatnuck Group, and Vestible — as we celebrate and educate the industry in less than two weeks. 

All three companies are doing exciting things in the football community that have distinct appeal to different facets of the business. I wanted to introduce them today.

USI Insurance Services

USI, which serves as our title sponsor Wednesday, is a national insurance brokerage and consulting firm. The company has approximately 200 local offices connected across the U.S., as well as a leading market position in all core businesses. The USI White Plains office has been serving the local community since 1928.

The company features more than 500 professionals with an average tenure of 25 years and specialists across a broad range of industries, as well as dedicated personal risk management and solutions from the collaborative effort of 200-plus personal risk specialists nationwide. Regional offices are located in Mount Laurel, NJ; New York, NY; Toms River, NJ; Uniondale, NY; Florham Park, NJ; and White Plains, NY. The White Plains office, alone, includes more than 50 insurance professionals specializing in healthcare, personal risk management, construction, real estate, surety and distribution and manufacturing.
 
The USI One Network offers dedicated technical experts connected nationally and embedded in local offices, with over 6,000 professionals nationwide to build integrated client-centered account teams.
 

USI recommends a holistic approach to personal risk management, including an annual review for changes and adjustment to coverages. USI’s representatives provide a summary of coverage while continuously monitoring risk exposure changes in a client’s profile and lifestyle. They also conduct annual pre-renewal reviews to identify areas for coverage changes and recommend specific terms or condition changes to client policies based on review results. 

Check out USI in more detail here.

The Tatnuck Group

Through pre-draft interviewing and consulting, The Tatnuck Group, the presenting sponsor for Wednesday’s ITL Seminar, helps dozens of NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, NASCAR and La Liga Soccer teams select better performers and better people. Since 2019, NFL clubs have partnered with Tatnuck to interview prospects at the Senior Bowl, Combine, and post-combine via zoom. Tatnuck focuses on assessing character, cultural fit, leadership capacity, and the ability to handle the stressors and rigors of being a pro. 

In the 2023 draft, The Tatnuck Group interviewed over 200 prospects for NFL clients, including every player selected in the first round and 60 of the first 63 picks. The team at Tatnuck consists of AJ Scola, the former personnel director of the Atlanta Braves, and Ryan Maid, the former operational psychologist for Naval Special Warfare. For more information, visit The Tatnuck Group’s website.

Versible

Vestible, the title sponsor for Thursday’s ITL Symposium, is an investment platform allowing professional and college athletes to sell equity in their careers directly to their fans in a federally regulated marketplace. In exchange for an upfront sum from their investors, athletes on the platform pay investors a 1% distribution of their on-field income during their professional career.  
 
As the athletes increase their income on the field, the amount distributed to shareholders increases alongside them. This has created a completely new market for select athletes to unlock revenue streams that have never been available to them before. 
 
Founded by former professional and D1 college athletes Parker Graham and Yves Batoba, Vestible empowers athletes to take control of their brands and allows fans to unlock the next level of fandom. For more information, visit vestible.co. 
 
 

Three Things I Noticed or Learned in Mobile

02 Friday Feb 2024

Posted by in Agents, NIL, Scouts

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It wasn’t that long ago that if you were a GM and you skipped the Senior Bowl, you had some serious FOMO and you might be accused of malpractice. That is no longer the case.

I personally saw only one in Mobile (SF’s John Lynch). After a quick survey of 7-8 people across the business that were there, the others on hand were (in no order) NYG’s Joe Schoen, Pittsburgh’s Omar Khan, Dallas’ Jerry Jones, Baltimore’s Eric DeCosta, Carolina’s Dan Morgan, New Orleans’ Mickey Loomis, Buffalo’s Brandon Beane, Jacksonville’s Trent Baalke, Indianapolis’ Chris Ballard, Houston’s Nick Caserio, Miami’s Chris Grier, Cleveland’s Andrew Berry, NYJ’s Joe Douglas, Arizona’s Monti Ossenfort, Chicago’s Ryan Poles, Green Bay’s Brian Gutekunst and Washington’s Adam Peters. These are not all confirmed — some were seen by only one person.

There could have been more that briefly popped in, and it’s harder to find them now that NFL personnel are segregated from everyone else at the stadium. Also, early-week weigh-ins used to give everyone a chance to see all the big names in one room, and weigh-ins aren’t held anymore. Still, GMs were a lot less visible, even if Senior Bowl Executive Director Jim Nagy said most were there, and I’m not calling Jim a liar.

There are reasons not to come, for sure, and as more people have found out about the Senior Bowl, I’m sure a lot of GMs just want to avoid the hassle and the job solicitations, especially when so much can be done from home. Still, it’s a big change to not see them anywhere and everywhere at the Senior Bowl, and kinda sad.

Here are a couple more things I learned about the ‘game behind the game’ in Mobile this week.

  • Jim invited 138 players this year, which is eight more than last year. It’s a concession to the injuries that always happen, no doubt, but also probably has to do with the number of players that beg out of the game after practicing all week. In the old days, it was commonplace to see scouts/executives roll in for padded practices, then head home Thursday night, skipping the game. I heard of two teams who were planning to keep their scouts in town through the game this year, however, and there may have been others. This might also be a concession to the number of QBs that are getting Day 1/Day 2 consideration (teams always want to get an in-person look to see how passers relate to their teammates during game conditions), or could be because the Shrine Bowl encroaches into Senior Bowl week so much these days. However, I hope it curbs the number of players who “opt out” of the actual game. By the way, I asked two former scouts, Rodrik David and James Kirkland, how opt-outs affected their evaluations of players, and their answers are in this week’s Scouting the League podcast.
  • You also used to see dozens of wealth managers around at the Senior Bowl, and to some degree, you still do, especially with Morgan Stanley a game sponsor and so many others trying to get an audience with a player. However, fewer players are using the week to vet financial advisors, and one such wealth manager said he thinks it’s because now that players are seeing six-figure incomes well before leaving college, they’re hiring people much earlier. They no longer wait until they’re on the verge of becoming pros. It makes a lot of sense, but it’s also a big change in the way players do business.

We’ll have more from the Senior Bowl, including Rodrik’s top performers this week, in the Friday Wrap. Register for it here.