I don’t have a war story today, per se. Instead, I hope you’ll permit me to pass along my dissection of a conversation I had with an agent from a top-10 firm today.

• I’m always getting asked by new agents how much money they need to recruit a player. Well, based on the phone conversation I had today, the figure his firm uses for budgeting is $35,000/player after the signing. This firm doesn’t cheat, but I’m still presuming the recruiting costs per player (which probably involve at least 2-3 visits each with probably 2-3 representatives) are around $3,000-$5,000 after you consider plane flights, hotel stays, meals and rental cars. This agency recruits players that range anywhere from 1-50 in the draft (from the first pick in the draft to about midway through the second round). So basically what I took from that is that if you want to recruit a first-rounder, the baseline is a commitment of about $40,000 to get you to draft day.
• I should mention two others related things. His agency doesn’t pay signing bonuses or stipends, which typically run in the five figures. If you’re a new agent with a limited client list, you’re definitely going to need to figure that into the cost, just as a sweetener to get the kid to consider you. That number could range into the tens of thousands, but let’s just say $10,000, for a grand total of $50,000/player.
• The other thing he added is that if the kid falls to the third round, the $35,000 becomes a break-even figure. The kid has to go in the first two rounds just to turn a profit. Now, as you know, a first-rounder in December is just a bad combine, a failed drug test, an arrest or a pulled hamstring on pro day away from the third round (or worse) in April. There are no guarantees in this business, except that bills will come due and you better pay them.
• There’s one other consideration. If you don’t have a client list ranging around 20-30 active players, you have very little shot of signing a player in the top 100. You’ll also need to spend, I would estimate, 100 hours on the phone with him and/or his parents. These are the non-money costs of recruiting.

We’ll get back to other aspects of the football industry in Thursday’s post, but I wanted to write about this while it was fresh. I hope you find it insightful as it pertains to your place in the football world.

A couple years ago, I was having a phone conversation with an agent who’s a longtime friend and supporter of ITL. We often talk generally about the business (he’s an avid reader of this blog, too). In our discussion, he asked me how many of the almost 800 agents in the business I thought were making more than $100,000.

I guessed high and said 100. He laughed and said it was a fraction of that, maybe 20. I’ve often gone back and thought about that. If it were possible to track such things, who was right? My friend or me?

I thought about this when I tripped across this link while browsing the web earlier today. I knew the big movie stars were making a killing and the big directors and producers, too, but it was interesting to learn what agents make. Now, I must caution you that I don’t know anything about how the agent business works in entertainment, or how many agents make this kind of dough, or how long it takes to build to that level. Still, it was interesting stuff.

A couple weeks ago, I texted a young woman who had expressed interest in representing athletes in the past. I wanted to know if she had taken the NFLPA exam this summer, and her response was interesting. “I’m still deciding if I want to be (a sports) agent” she texted. “Our entertainment side has grown so much and is more lucrative.”

She went on to say that her agency was considering “(divesting) wholly of the sports side. 1% with 40+ hours a week is probably not the best business decision for us right now. It’s a bummer because we love it, but the opportunity cost is rough to ignore.”

I subsequently sent her a text on Nov. 2 asking if she’d gone through with the NFLPA exam, and she never responded. I guess that answers my question.

I know I strike a negative tone at times in this space, and I don’t mean to be discouraging. However, I do want everyone considering this business to know the risks, to give themselves time to prepare for this business, and to understand that it takes a special kind of passion to make this career work.

On Monday night, I spent an hour on the phone with a new agent. It was really refreshing.

This agent had lots and lots of questions, and she was clearly taking notes as I discussed the various answers to her questions. There are a lot of people who come into this business thinking they already know the answers. There are still others who’ve spent a little time in the industry and think nothing’s changing. Wow, is that ever wrong. . . .

Here’s an example. There’s a new all-star game added to the slate this year called the College Gridiron Showcase (CGS). This is the fifth game in January and will take place the same week as another game, the Medal of Honor Bowl, which was pretty well-received in its first year (2013). It would be easy to dismiss a new game, and already I’ve gotten lots of questions from clients asking if the CGS is even worth considering. I’m sure lots of agents don’t even know about this new game, and others have already dismissed it as a waste of time. This is where it’s an advantage to stay up to date on the business.

Though the CGS is a new game, the people running it aren’t new. The organizers have spent a great deal of time putting all the pieces in place, and have developed a solid base of sponsors to help give them the resources to do a good job. One of the game’s co-founders is Craig Redd, who’s himself a former NFLPA-certified contract advisor who knows the drill quite well (in addition to being a high-character, standup guy). Among Craig’s smart moves is bringing in John Murphy to run the personnel side of things. In addition to being the Assistant GM of the CFL’s Calgary franchise, John has been involved in more all-star games than I can count. He’s super-familiar with the process and knows what NFL talent looks like.

I haven’t personally checked out the hotel sponsoring the game, but I’m sure it’s more than adequate. They’ve been smart about assembling broadcast partners, and they’ve got a good field for the game. They’ve also been aggressive about reaching out to NFL teams and they’ll have a great group of scouts there. But you might not know that if you don’t read ITL (sorry for the shameless plug), or if you are serious about staying up to date on things.

If you read this blog regularly, you know I feel that you can be successful in the football business, but you must be vigilant about information-gathering to ensure victory. This is just another example of that. Don’t ever presume the learning process has ended and that you know all you need to know.