How much NIL do we need

[Ozone!]

 

[Widget24]

 

[kingtidge]

The correct answer:

All of it.

 

[blust2i3d4]

At lease the same as UConn's.

 

[SU in Hershey]

Damn! I thought Ozone! was going to tell us he just came into a ton of money! Or maybe that whole, long-lost relative with scads of money in the National Bank of Nigeria emails he received were actually legit!

 

[qdawgg]

Not much if we’re just going to hire within the family.

 

[ezbeezy214]

Honest answer is just when the staff really wants a guy, you’d have the ability to raise the money.

 

[OttosShoes]

Infinite. There is no 'good enough' amount of NIL; as the rules are, more is always better. If a school comes up with $1B then some other school will want $1.5B.

Problem is it's still the wild west. Honestly I think the NCAA should set some revenue sharing cap above the $20.5m limit--maybe, 30? And then put something in place to regulate NIL such that it's only legitimately NIL. I mean, what happens if the IRS decides that Bob Valley Chevrolet's $4M expense to pay the Bob State QB wasn't *really* for those five tweets to his 600 followers? They reboot the whole system *again*?

 

[Brooky03]

 

[hoopsupstate]

SU needs $12 million that includes the revenue share.

 

[Newhouser]

Too much to keep doing this year after year. There are going to be tough choices on the hill over the next decade.

 

[llandz]

Infinite. There is no 'good enough' amount of NIL; as the rules are, more is always better. If a school comes up with $1B then some other school will want $1.5B.

Problem is it's still the wild west. Honestly I think the NCAA should set some revenue sharing cap above the $20.5m limit--maybe, 30? And then put something in place to regulate NIL such that it's only legitimately NIL. I mean, what happens if the IRS decides that Bob Valley Chevrolet's $4M expense to pay the Bob State QB wasn't *really* for those five tweets to his 600 followers? They reboot the whole system *again*?

The NCAA cannot regulate the caps or set caps on NIL. They have very limited regulatory powers. Mainly that there is comparable work or something done to warrant the NIL payments. The courts have taken most of this out of their hands. So in some ways your example could be regulated that one commercial for ex. is not worth 2 million. But that is somewhat subjective placing a value on appearances etc.

 

[OttosShoes]

The NCAA cannot regulate the caps or set caps on NIL. They have very limited regulatory powers. Mainly that there is comparable work or something done to warrant the NIL payments. The courts have taken most of this out of their hands. So in some ways your example could be regulated that one commercial for ex. is not worth 2 million. But that is somewhat subjective placing a value on appearances etc.

Oh I totally agree that it's not easy, and I'm sorry to nerd out on you lol, but this is a fascinating topic for me and I think the NCAA is pretty firmly in a "could, but won't" situation.

I'm sure you already know that Pro sports regulate endorsement deals with Collective Bargaining Agreements to ensure there aren't backdoors around the salary cap. IMHO that's the best way to do it, but the NCAA would then have to admit students athletes are employees, and allow them to have a union to negotiate fair wages.

As it is, the free market pretty clearly shows that $20.5M is undervalued at the top level of college sports. But without a players union to negotiate more, the colleges can "hide" behind the $20.5M cap and ask/beg/expect/benefit from fans picking up the difference. I mean, SU had a $133.3M surplus in 2025 and then has to beg fans to make NIL deals? It's not just SU, either, it's the way it's set up.

At any rate, I think this slides because it's all so new, but I don't see how it's sustainable, something is going to have to give. My comment about the IRS was only half-joking; if NIL deals are really just backdoor salaries and companies are writing them off as marketing I don't know that that would hold up to an audit.