Some observations on the league’s 2014 player makeup

10 Friday Oct 2014

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Every year, we compile a detailed report on the league’s active rosters (practice squads included) for our clients, based on the rosters for the first weekend of play. It’s a LOT of work, but always bears interesting info when we get it done. Here are a few things I thought were worth passing along:

  • There are only five players left in the league whose careers started in the 90s. Predictably, two (Adam Vinatieri and Phil Dawson) are kickers. Interestingly, Peyton Manning, coming off perhaps his best-ever season, is the second-oldest player in the league after Vinatieri, at least based on when he started his career (1998). Colts backup Matt Hasselback also launched his career in ’98. The last of the five? Oakland’s Charles Woodson.
  • Of the 2,186 players in the league, 791 (or 36 percent) are undrafted free agents. More than a third of the players on active rosters were not judged to be among the best 250 players in his draft class. That’s something to think about.
  • Among all the first-round picks still in the league, the biggest position group is (surprise) linebackers (37). Quarterbacks, one of the hardest positions to scout, are sixth (26). Running backs are ninth of 13 positions listed with 16; it’s interesting to see how the league has evolved as there are more safeties (20) than rushers or tight ends (10).
  • It’s exciting to hear about small-school players who find a place in the league, but statistically the number of players from outside FBS/Division I-A are minuscule. Less than 15 percent of all players in the NFL are from outside FBS (14.4 percent). If you’re DIII, you can pretty much forget it, statistically, as there are only 15 NFL players from the smallest NCAA division. There are only five from NAIA, which works out to .2 percent of the league.
  • There are 13 first overall picks still in the league. Of that number, nine are quarterbacks.

We’ll go inside the numbers a bit more next weekend. Have a great weekend.

Big firm? Small firm?

09 Thursday Oct 2014

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Earlier this week, I had a lengthy conversation with a young law student who’s dedicated to being an NFLPA-licensed agent someday soon. Among the topics we discussed was internships. He’s worked with agencies before, and wants to continue his learning. His question to me was, should he look large firm or small firm?

The easy answer is to go with a small firm. The opportunity for growth is huge, and there’s no limit to what he’ll be asked to do. In addition, he will have a chance to see, up close, what the firm’s principals do, and measure their success. His first experience was with a small firm, and he got marketing expertise rather quickly due to their handing him several accounts (much to his surprise). The downside to working with a small firm was easy, too. They only had one client who drew draft attention, and when he didn’t make a roster, there wasn’t much to do. For this reason, he said he’s thinking trying to make a run at a big firm next.

I think it’s a good idea, but if you’re in a similar situation, there are a couple things to think about.

The first item is the high barrier to entry. Everyone wants to intern with CAA, Athletes First, Rosenhaus Sports, or whatever. The truly elite agencies have dozens and dozens of applicants. I worked with one top-ten agency this summer trying to find them a new hire, and after sending them the cream of the crop among newly certified contract advisors, they wound up rejecting all of them and starting over, hoping to find a young, hard-charging Ivy Leaguer. Most firms are the same way. They want guys who have a pedigree AND a fire-breathing work ethic, so the first drawback is the difficulty in landing an internship. It’s a serious barrier to entry.

The second negative is that if you go to such an agency, you better burn your ships. The odds of your getting hired will be very long, so you’re going to have to work like you’ve never worked and be able to adapt to any situation (and succeed at it). I know lots and lots of young agents who got their first taste of the sports agent business as interns with big firms, but ultimately weren’t hired. They spend years trying to chase success on their own, but lacking the client list, sizzle and muscle of a big-time firm, don’t get there. The pedigree gained from an internship with such an agency doesn’t translate to success.

So which way is the smart play? To me, if you’re looking to land an internship next semester or next summer, send out lots of resumes to agencies big and small. Just know that, depending on the size of the firm that picks you up, you’ll have to adjust your strategy.

 

WSW: Patriot problems

08 Wednesday Oct 2014

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I was talking today to Brian Woods, commissioner of the first-year FXFL, about the kickoff of his new league and the start of play this weekend. In the course of our speaking, he proudly mentioned several recent signees that were with NFL teams this summer.

“We just signed Jeremy Gallon, who was out of Michigan and drafted by the Patriots this year,” Brian said. “In fact, we have two players the Patriots drafted this year in our league.”

That statement really gave me pause. The fact that both OG Jon Halapio (6/179) and Gallon (7/244) are not only ex-Patriots, but not even in the NFL anymore, was not lost on me. In fact, it reminded me of a conversation I had with an AFC Director of College Scouting at the combine this spring. He was discussing scouting in general, and mentioned that New England, despite the fact the Belichick brand is still one of the strongest in football, has failed to find talent the way it used to.

“Some of the players they took this spring we had as undrafted free agents,” he said. “I mean, in the fourth and fifth round, I had guys calling me saying, ‘can you believe the guy the Patriots just took?’ It’s been like that the last few seasons. It’s going to take a toll on them.”

You’ve probably read a lot about Tom Brady’s struggles this season, and in some quarters it’s become fashionable to ask if he’s done. But let’s look at the receivers the team has put on the field in the last 2-3 years. Just this week, the team cut Kenbrell Thompkins, a player they were starting last season. Aaron Dobson, a second-rounder in ’13, has been a healthy scratch several times this season. Meanwhile, though they’re carrying Josh Boyce (4/102/2013) on their practice squad, he’s far from a contributing member of their offense. Their 2012 seventh-round WR Jeremy Ebert is out of the league.

In the old days, the Pats were finding players like Deion Branch (2/65/2002) in the early rounds and Troy Brown (8/198/1993) in the latter rounds. Things have become so dire that they’re having to plug the holes in their receiving corps by signing castoffs from other teams like Danny Amendola and Brandon LaFell. In fairness, it’s rare that a team has a starting tight sent away on murder charges, and the injuries that have kept Rob Gronkowski off the field have been particularly damaging. 

Still, injuries are part of the game, and when you roll the dice on players flagged for character issues, those decisions could blow up in your face. It will be interesting to see if the Patriots’ scouting department can right the ship in time to give aging Brady one last shot at a title.

What really matters

07 Tuesday Oct 2014

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Tonight I’ll be speaking to parents of 2015 NFL draft hopefuls at a Houston-area hotel on behalf of a client in the financial planning industry. We’ll talk about the entire draft process from A-Z and answer any questions they have. Hopefully I’ll pass along a few things they hadn’t thought of, and they’ll be bold enough to ask questions if there are things I miss.

Usually when I address parents, I want to throw the kitchen sink at them. I want them to leave with every detail, to know things they never even thought about knowing, but tonight I’m taking a different approach. I’ve pretty much condensed things down to the bare minimum. I’m hoping this will give them more takeaways that they can actually use versus just bombarding them with knowledge so I can show what an authority I am.

If you’re in Houston, I hope you’ll join us tonight at 7 p.m. at the Houston Marriott Westchase (email me for more details or leave a comment here). It’s free, of course. If you’re not, here’s the SUPER-condensed version.

  • There is no ‘magic list.’ There are probably 500 players that every NFL team knows inside and out, and who will be given serious consideration in next spring’s draft. However, every year there are more players — it’s hard to put a number on how many — that only a few teams even know about, yet they wind up making NFL rosters. I’m not saying these guys wind up as future all-pros, but some have nice NFL careers. The point is, this is an inexact science.
  • No agent can get you drafted. I don’t care what they say when they’re recruiting you. I don’t care how long they’ve been in the business, or how many NFL clients they have, or how popular they are on Google, or whatever. An agent can help you along the process, and maybe with the right connections he can get a player signed as an undrafted free agent who might not otherwise have gotten that invite, but no one can turn a seventh-rounder into a first-rounder, or a non-draftee into a fifth-rounder. No amount of experience, or promotion, or combine training can do that.
  • If you want to improve your chances of making an NFL team, work on your speed and athleticism. Every year, I get agents who brag on how many reps their clients can do, and how strong they’ve gotten in combine prep. The thing is, that’s something they can do after the draft. NFL teams are seeking explosive players. They want players who can run faster, jump higher, and push past the other guy. Violently. The players that show they can do that consistently at the combine or their pro day wind up going from a late-rounder to a mid-rounder or from undrafted to drafted.

New beginnings

06 Monday Oct 2014

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As regular readers of this blog already know, I’ll be joining sports business icon Leigh Steinberg tonight on his new Yahoo! Sports radio show ‘Behind Closed Doors’ (shameless plug: I’ll be on from 8:30-9 p.m. CST). It got me thinking about Leigh’s career, and perseverance, and to some degree, mine too.

When I was in my early 20s, ESPN’s SportsCenter was in its prime. These were the days of Craig Kilborn, Dan Patrick, Keith Olbermann, Chris Berman, etc. I couldn’t imagine a sports career that could top being on SportsCenter. That was a major goal. But today, I can’t imagine being on SportsCenter, and I don’t know anyone who even watches it anymore. It’s become trite, and anyway, all the highlights you want to see have either (a) been broadcast or (b) are readily available online somewhere. The model has changed completely.

In a similar vein, Leigh’s career has changed completely. Obviously, he’s known for a lot of things. He was one of the fathers of modern sports representation, if not the father of it, and he was the inspiration/model behind the movie Jerry Maguire. The number of legendary quarterbacks he’s represented is endless, from Steve Bartkowski and Warren Moon to Troy Aikman and Ben Roethlisberger. However, after a highly publicized lawsuit and some personal struggles, he fell from atop the sports representation business, and over the last decade, people around the business started referring to Leigh in the past tense.

Now here’s the interesting part: as Leigh showed when he helped Bartkowski land a mega-deal in the 70s, he’s adept at identifying trends and leveraging the market. He’s still an agent — client Garrett Gilbert, a QB from SMU, was drafted in the sixth round by the Rams this spring — but I think Leigh recognizes that the Dodge City environment that made a creative mind such a license for success 40 years ago is not in evidence today. As the agent business has saturated and competition has risen to great heights, he’s leveraging online radio, social media and more traditional methods (he’s authored several books, including one published this year) to tap into what I call the sports education market. It’s the one populated by hard-core football enthusiasts as well as the endless number of students pursuing sport management degrees in universities across the country.

Leigh is uniquely positioned to tap this market. Not only has he represented several members of the Hall of Fame and served in several roles related to sports and entertainment, but he’s indirectly played a role in the birth of several major agencies, including Irvine, Calif.-based Athletes First; Rep 1 Sports, also based in Irvine; and even Chapel Hill, N.C.-based Vanguard Sports Group, which was just launched by Joby Branion. Joby was one of the three agents who left Leigh in 2002 to launch Athletes First, and he’s a top agent in his own right today.

I think the takeaway from Leigh’s career is that the opportunity that everyone else is pursuing is not always the best one. When players were not yet using agents, or barely using them, Leigh found a way to enter that market and make it a success. When others flocked to it, he found another way to capitalize. Keep this in mind as you launch your career. There’s more than one road to success.

Opening doors

03 Friday Oct 2014

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One of the reasons I always encourage people to give the football business a try is because when you make a strong push to do something against the odds, you usually wind up opening doors that would have never otherwise been opened.

Just today, I was talking to a client who’s still new to sports representation, having gotten certified the summer of 2013. While discussing strategies for recruiting this fall, he mentioned that he’d developed relationships that moved him into boxing representation. In that capacity, he manages a handful of pugilists, two men and a woman, all of them with five or fewer pro fights so far, all undefeated. He said that representing boxers involves finding fights as well as sponsors who will put their logo on the boxer’s shorts or signage in the venue.  He indicated that it was already a money-making venture with little start-up capital or heavy investment involved.

This is just one of several collateral professions you might pick up as a result of your work in football. Here are a few others:

  • Mixed martial arts: It’s not always ex-players who branch out into other combat sports like MMA. Sometimes, a client’s brother is involved in the sport and doesn’t have reliable representation. I have some agents who’ve been certified for years who are tempted to leave their NFL work behind because their MMA practice is emerging so steadily.
  • Wrestling: Believe it or not, I spoke to an agent who got certified two years ago who got into the NFL ring only to identify big, angry, physical types that could be molded into wrestlers. Here’s the best part: his business model actually attracted the interest of World Wrestling Entertainment. He invited me to meet with representatives from the WWE at last year’s combine but it fell through at the last minute. I’m still hoping to meet with them, for no other reason than pure curiosity. Also because I gave thought once to going to ‘bad guy school’ to learn how to be a wrestler in my younger days.
  • Sports law: OK, I guess this is the obvious one, but it still bears mention. Two of my longtime friends, Darren Heitner of Heitner Legal (and sportsagentblog.com) and Adam Kenner of Wolfe Law, both based in Miami, started off in representation. Actually, Adam never got certified, but he was a very close advisor/friend/assistant to David Canter of Davie, Fla.-based DEC Management. I’ve relied on both of them for legal advice and as a sounding board from time to time, and I’ve referred them both to my clients facing legal issues. Adam, especially, had my back when one of my reports drew the attention of a high-visibility rapper (Hint: I’ve got 99 problems, but that’s no longer one of them). They’re both excellent, partly because they’ve seen the business up close.

As you know by now, I’m a strong advocate of trying this business out, really going for it and pursuing your dream. One reason I’m so adamant is that even if you shoot for the stars, you might only hit the moon, and what’s so wrong with that?

 

‘Getting’ it

02 Thursday Oct 2014

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I remember early in the ’00s, probably around 2003 or 2004, my parents were over for dinner, and I was most likely lamenting something about the challenges of Inside the League in its early stages. It was just in its second year and I was still trying to find an audience, and maybe I was coming across as whiny. It was at that point that my dad asked me, ‘why are you still doing it?’

I wasn’t really offended by his question. My parents have always been ultra-supportive of me; I enjoy a relationship with them that is closer than most anyone I know, and it’s truly one of God’s blessings. My dad just couldn’t understand why I would pour so much effort into something that took away from my time with my wife (we didn’t have our sons yet), especially when I already had a job. Inside the League was spending my time and money. What was the point?

Today, Dad sees ‘the point,’ of course, and is excited for the (limited) success I’ve achieved. He just didn’t have the vision for where I wanted to go with ITL at the time, and who could blame him for that? At the time, pretty much all he knew about ITL was that I had asked him to go to Washington, D.C., with me to meet with the NFLPA, but that we had been snubbed (a story for a different day); that I had had to significantly reduce my initial price point; that it was taxing to juggle a ‘day job’ and a ‘night job;’ and that what I was doing was very different from what everyone else was doing. For what it’s worth, he wasn’t the only one who had doubts.

So here’s the point. I know it’s a bit of a cliche, but you’re going to have to be true to yourself.

I often use this space to encourage people to take the less traveled path — to look for a place in the market that you can satisfy that others don’t see. For example, my friend Ari Nissim, a former cap guy with the Jets, sees analytics as a great untapped market in football. I have another friend and client, Michael Dean, who specializes in concierge services for professional athletes. There’s Daniel Jeremiah, an ex-scout who had so much success on Twitter after getting dumped by the Browns that he left scouting altogether to become part of NFL.com. There are others out there that I haven’t even thought of.

It’s worked well for me, but it wasn’t a direct path. I had to spend a while searching and figuring out exactly where the need was. Along the way, others were questioning me, but hey, I was questioning myself, so who can blame you?

If you follow your passion and wade into this business, there are people who will ridicule you, but to me, they’re kind of easy to deal with. You just ignore them, or respond indignantly, or whatever. The harder thing is when  someone you know and love questions your path. That’s when you have to understand that not everyone’s going to get you. Don’t apologize for that. That may be what makes your business, your idea, your market, special. There’s value in that.

WSW: How an ex-NFL player got into scouting

01 Wednesday Oct 2014

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For today’s WSW, I ran down a few stories from ex-NFL defensive back (Seahawks, 1989-1993) and ex-NFL scout (Saints, 2000-2007) James Jefferson. He’s now a high school football coach in Texas. To watch my entire discussion with James, during which he talks about his experiences in scouting and the finer points of player evaluation, click here.

He said landing a job with the Saints came from his playing days in Seattle, when he’d developed a friendship with then-Seahawks Vice President of Football Operations Randy Mueller.

“Well, as it came about, I was finished playing ball, so I’d come back (to Kingsville, Texas, where James had gone to college) and wanted to get my degree and wanted to get into coaching. So I was back, and went to New Orleans to visit a buddy of mine. They had hired a new general manager at the time, and it was Randy Mueller, and I knew Randy very, very well. He was one of the reasons, as a player, that I went to Seattle, from Canada. And I just so happened to stop by the office, and didn’t get to see him but left my resume. We stayed in touch and what have you, and it got down to the last week, and they were ready to go, and he called me up and said, ‘Hey, are you really serious about doing this?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I really am, I like to learn.’ And I had kinda told him while I was playing ball that I wouldn’t mind getting in this business. I went out and interviewed and he gave me the job. It was a good deal.

“I was fortunate with Randy. Randy kinda trusted me and I really trusted him. He’s the type of guy that, he believed in what guys around him said. He really took to heart what guys around him said. He made that transition for me (from player to scout) very easy.”

I asked James if it’s different for scouts who, liked him, played in the NFL.

“Oh yeah, easily, especially with the guys who played (in the NFL). It was a brotherhood of scouts, and then inside that, you had a subculture brotherhood of scouts that played the game (on the NFL level), because you already have that anyway. Guys that played the game, there’s a select few that get that opportunity to play the game . . . and guys still respect that. When you got into that, you get in with those guys, and you had that big culture group, which is your scout group, then that subculture in the middle, that you either played (with) or played against them. It was pretty neat.”

I also asked him his thoughts on information-sharing between scouts. Where did team loyalty begin and camaraderie end?

“That was a fine line. That was a very, very fine line of how to do things. You’re told, certainly, you can’t let a lot of information out from your team, but at the same time, maybe it was a guy that could get information from a coach at the school that he knew that was in our area. We could kinda use that and work with that, without giving up any team secrets.

“It’s a very fine line and it’s really kinda hard to explain, I guess, but we’d talk, and I think there’s a line somewhere and you have to know where it is. Every team had one. Do I think that it made the some of the management guys a little nervous sometimes? Probably so, but they do the same thing. That’s just the nature of the business without giving up a lot of team secrets like who you’re drafting, or who you’re looking at. But all you have to do is pay attention. It’s kinda hard to hide anything these days. “

A new start

30 Tuesday Sep 2014

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I try to be encouraging in this space. On Monday, when I talked about knowing when to quit, though I was honest, maybe I wasn’t so encouraging. Today, here’s a bit more encouragement.

I work with four AFL teams. I help them locate players, find their contact info, identify their agents, etc. Finding players is not so hard, but finding good players can be quite challenging. So, one of the teams I work with is an expansion team going into Las Vegas next spring, and I have a friend who will not only be running personnel for the team (the Outlaws) but also helping coach, along with a number of other things. Pretty much, on the AFL side of football, “a number of other things” is always part of your job responsibilities.

So here’s his story. For the last three years, he was with an AFL team, handling personnel and working on the offensive side of the ball. However, his goal was to have a greater role in personnel and, best-case scenario, scout for an NFL team. Given his desire to reach his goals, he saved a bunch of money, then left the team he was working for after last season in an effort to ‘burn his ships’ and sink or swim. I helped him get his name in with a couple NFL teams this spring, but we both knew it wouldn’t be easy finding the right opportunity. Sometime this summer I lost track of him.

Anyway, this week, he contacted me to tell me of his new venture. Obviously, I was excited for him, and I can tell he’s really pumped up by this opportunity. I mean, the chance to launch something, to really put your imprint on a new team, is not only rare but super-cool. I’m psyched that (a) he’s back in the game, (b) we’re back in touch, and (c) he’s got a new, awesome opportunity.

So here’s my point. My friend knew he wanted a new opportunity, so he socked away his money and went for it. He didn’t get his No. 1 pick (working as an NFL scout) this time, but he did get something almost as good: the chance to have a foundation role with a new team.

First, pay your dues. Then, follow your dreams. Be smart about it, but do it. You won’t be sorry. It might not always happen the way you want it to, and you might not get the exact thing you want, but knowing you’re chasing the one thing you always wanted to do, well, there’s just nothing else like it.

Knowing when to quit

29 Monday Sep 2014

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This time of year is always bittersweet for me. On the one hand, lots of newly licensed NFLPA contract advisors are celebrating passing their exams and getting a chance to finally sink their teeth into their dreams. It’s fun to walk with them as they learn the ropes of a new business.

On the other hand, well, there’s this:

  • “I am . . . sitting here looking at the October insurance invoice for $1,400 due by October 1 praying for some guidance on which way to go. Decision time.”
  • “I don’t want to be a part of this culture/celebration of violence anymore. Thanks for all your help, I would have never made it as far as I did without you.”
  • “Just wanted to let you know that I have taken a job as an in-house lawyer with a company up here in Cleveland. They aren’t going to permit me to continue with the NFL stuff, which kinda sucks, but oh well.”
  • “It’s a bummer because we love it, but the opportunity cost is rough to ignore.”

It’s hard to hear this when you’ve worked alongside someone for a year or years, and they are closing the door on a chapter of their lives, however brief. However, I rarely if ever try to talk people out of this decision. Honestly, deep down, I’m often happy when I hear them say these things.

This business is hard, and it’s not for everyone. There are lots and lots of success stories, but there are far more that don’t end so well. If you’ve pursued a career as an NFL agent or tried to be an NFL scout, you’ve come to know and understand the sacrifices, financial and personal, that you’ll have to make. Anyone who takes an eyes-wide-open look at these sacrifices and decides it’s not for them is way better off than the ones who keep hoping for the best in the face of overwhelming odds.

It’s not that I’m saying you shouldn’t take chances. Far from it, in fact. It’s just that the mere fact of taking that faith leap to chase your dreams is a pretty considerable risk in itself, and measuring risk is part of life. Part of success is knowing when to quit and move on to another venture. Who can argue with someone when they’ve determined that they’ve given all they can give?

I often say that people only leave this business feet first — on their shields, so to speak — but it doesn’t have to be that way. I guess that’s my pitch, as a consultant in this business. Give it your very best effort, and I humbly feel that using ITL maximizes your chances for success. But if it’s not happening, and you’ve counted the cost, understand that there are other dreams you can pursue. There’s no shame in laying one dream down to chase another.