Jesse Edwards in portal and transfers to WVU

[TheCusian]

How is it that this thread has more intel on what happened than what Donna was able to dig up?

She got the message “Edwards left because WVU paid more” but missed the “Edwards wasn’t wanted here at the price he was asking for after reneging on his original deal after being tampered with”

Seems like a big asterisk

 

[SP_Gilbs]

Here is my question. Are they interested in my $100 donation, or my $500 donation? Or is it not worth it for them to get the small donations. Because I could pivot some of my athletic donations over to the collectives, but I have seen zero marketing directed towards me. So in the meantime my donations go to sport specific coaches at SU. Wondering if this is a case where thousands of small donations add up or not worth it to the collectives. Anyone know?

This was my thought process and part of why I emailed Mike. If you go to the subscription model for the average fans without a ton of money to spend it makes a lot more sense imo. If you can get a bunch of fans to do $10/month that will add up and help. We average the highest attendance in the country when we have a good team, I'm sure you can get a decent chunk of those people to agree to at least $10/month if you target them properly. Right now, I doubt the average fan even knows we have a collective to contribute to.

 

[MikeSU02]

1- Not reporters jobs to paint a nice rosey picture. They are supposed to be un-biased journalists and give every side of the story. Which Donna did

2- the article tells me we are totally unprepared. Bristol basically says we were not prepared on paying non Americans. That is a lack of awareness and puts us way behind other collectives already.

3- Bristol’s quotes look terrible for Syracuse university. There is a way to say we always need more money to be able to keep our players and get better players. Instead he basically said we’re drowning and way out of our league. That’s not a picture you want to paint to media. Other coaches will run with this.

I continue to hear from insiders that we have the NIL money, but Edwards was not deemed as someone to use that much money on. This article and quotes by Bristol paint a much different picture. Bristol seemed to be pretty involved with the entire situation. Not sure this sounds like a guy I would want leading a collective. Unprepared and sloppy quotes.

OK, we were unprepared based on Bristol's quotes. But who is we?

Did Jesse get literally ***any*** NIL money last year? If so, literally a single dollar, unless he had super secret American citizenship, someone had figured it out last year.

This would have been a natural avenue to explore by Donna to prove or disprove that this claim of incompetence was inherent to Bristol's dealings or systemic to all of Syracuse's NIL groups.

Or, as has been communicated here, Syracuse NIL support got to where Jesse wanted, he changed the end goal to a much higher number and we didn't chase a guy that couldn't set a good screen to save his life... all the while we landed JJ and Chance Westry.

I mean, are we really going to go through these motions and pretend this is a well-written and investigated article? This is chum for sharks.

 

[sutomcat]

For those with thoughts regarding NIL at Syracuse I encourage you to reach out to Mike directly at mbristol@elite-nil.com. I sent him an email about 20 minutes ago encouraging a subscription based option(10$/month, 25$/month, etc.), which many other schools offer, and he responded within minutes thanking me for the idea and encouraging me to email him with any other thoughts.

Good move. Disappointing there is no monthly subscription now.

I believe offering one is the best way to get the average Joes in the fanbase to participate. We have a very big fanbase for basketball and a lot of relatively small donations, received on a monthly basis, could make a significant impact.

 

[SuFTW]

I'm specifically looking at the quotes from Mike Bristol of the 315 collective. His comments seems to suggest that they didn't have a plan to get Jesse paid until they had to counter. They should have been proactive in getting him paid.

But remember that quote from Autry about everyone being back. It didn’t look like they would need a contingency plan and even if they had one, they may not have matched that $800k WV offer.

“Everyone is back that is not in the portal," Autry said. "We’re excited. We’re working hard, they’re showing up every day. Obviously, things can change at anytime but as of right now, we have everyone back that is supposed to be here.

 

[NKR1978]

This is really unfortunate to read. How is it that the school and the collectives weren't preparing ahead of time to make sure they could get Jesse paid? The story seems to indicate that they were reactive instead of proactive.

Screw him. The great thing about NIL - now that they're pros, we don't have to "wish them well" if we don't feel like it.

 

[SuFTW]

OK, we were unprepared based on Bristol's quotes. But who is we?

Did Jesse get literally ***any*** NIL money last year? If so, literally a single dollar, unless he had super secret American citizenship, someone had figured it out last year.

This would have been a natural avenue to explore by Donna to prove or disprove that this claim of incompetence was inherent to Bristol's dealings or systemic to all of Syracuse's NIL groups.

Or, as has been communicated here, Syracuse NIL support got to where Jesse wanted, he changed the end goal to a much higher number and we didn't chase a guy that couldn't set a good screen to save his life... all the while we landed JJ and Chance Westry.

I mean, are we really going to go through these motions and pretend this is a well-written and investigated article? This is chum for sharks.

People in the know say yes.

I’m not thrashing Mike

But I know, for certain, we had money in place for Jesse for the next season that was substantial.

I also know for a fact, we paid him last season

 

[Bayside44]

Here is my question. Are they interested in my $100 donation, or my $500 donation? Or is it not worth it for them to get the small donations. Because I could pivot some of my athletic donations over to the collectives, but I have seen zero marketing directed towards me. So in the meantime my donations go to sport specific coaches at SU. Wondering if this is a case where thousands of small donations add up or not worth it to the collectives. Anyone know?

Remember the good ole days of NIL where you'd spend $50 and get someone's tee shirt or jersey?

 

[Orangezoo]

Good move. Disappointing there is no monthly subscription now.

I believe offering one is the best way to get the average Joes in the fanbase to participate. We have a very big fanbase for basketball and a lot of relatively small donations, received on a monthly basis, could make a significant impact.

Yeah subscription is the way to go. When I last donated to 315 I was wondering about that- didn't mind the lump sum but would be easier to setup a subscription like you see on the influencer sites ( no not that one lol).

 

[NYCCuse826]

Here is my question. Are they interested in my $100 donation, or my $500 donation? Or is it not worth it for them to get the small donations. Because I could pivot some of my athletic donations over to the collectives, but I have seen zero marketing directed towards me. So in the meantime my donations go to sport specific coaches at SU. Wondering if this is a case where thousands of small donations add up or not worth it to the collectives. Anyone know?

I believe your athletic department donations are more beneficial as a whole than a NIL donation. Small donations do add up just look at political fundraising. $5-$50 from a large group is still something.

 

[SUFan44]

The more and more I hear about the issues SU is having with this side of things, the more and more I know that a general manager job for NIL must be created within the AD. This could be completely off because I'm only seeing mainly one side of the story, but I do see value in having someone dedicated fully to this. It is too important to the two most critical programs the AD has.

I don't know what the pay for this position is, I don't know who has the right skill set, but it needs to happen. The person within the AD can be the conduit between these collectives and the programs, provide feedback on what is needed to be effective (i.e. have a plan for international student-athletes, understand who is going to be looking for what, etc.), and assist with the fundraising for these collectives.

This shouldn't be all on the coach, and the athletic director needs to focus his attention on running the program and larger scale projects.

I don't know how it is structured now in terms of who the liaison is between these collectives and the AD - is it through the athletic director's office? Is it the head coach of each program? Is it the operations person with each program? Either way, it feels to me like it's a full-time job and some things could be handled with more foresight and intentionality than they are right now.

 

[JustPherU]

What a poop show all this is!

 

[UpstateSM]

Good move. Disappointing there is no monthly subscription now.

I believe offering one is the best way to get the average Joes in the fanbase to participate. We have a very big fanbase for basketball and a lot of relatively small donations, received on a monthly basis, could make a significant impact.

I'm shocked that they didn't have a monthly subscription option right now. I think I give $25 or $50 to The Massachusetts Collective every month and they have amassed enough to be offering six figure deals to current players. They are also extremely active on Twitter and give almost daily updates through emails.

Like you said, the average fan is much more likely to donate $10 or $20 every month than a larger amount one time when they can directly see the results of their donation. Seems like a very simple way to add a large amount of capital. It starts to add up very fast when the fanbase is as big as ours.

 

[Orangezoo]

Some quick math but just take 35k fans.. say that's a target number for being on a monthly subscription service. You can raise 175k a month with just a 5 dollar a month subscription.

Annualized that's 2.1 million a year. That's 2.5 Edwards'. We know we have 35k fans ( and many more) willing to come to a game...

 

[llandz]

Remember the good ole days of NIL where you'd spend $50 and get someone's tee shirt or jersey?

Yea. I've got a bunch of those tshirts.

 

[llandz]

I believe your athletic department donations are more beneficial as a whole than a NIL donation. Small donations do add up just look at political fundraising. $5-$50 from a large group is still something.

Maybe I would do more if I knew the donations were wanted by the NIL. But like I said, so far no communications or marketing that seems to target me.

 

[SUFan44]

Some quick math but just take 35k fans.. say that's a target number for being on a monthly subscription service. You can raise 175k a month with just a 5 dollar a month subscription.

Annualized that's 2.1 million a year. That's 2.5 Edwards'. We know we have 35k fans ( and many more) willing to come to a game...

Great concept.

I do have a question...

What am I getting for my $5/month? The satisfaction that we will be supporting the program?

Otherwise it's an annual donation - which is fine, but then it's not really a subscription to anything. It's more direct than that.

 

[Orangezoo]

Maybe I would do more if I knew the donations were wanted by the NIL. But like I said, so far no communications or marketing that seems to target me.

Yeah I've seen nothing targeted NIL wise as an alum other than folks sharing things here.

 

[Orangezoo]

Great concept.

I do have a question...

What am I getting for my $5/month? The satisfaction that we will be supporting the program?

Otherwise it's an annual donation - which is fine, but then it's not really a subscription to anything. It's more direct than that.

So I think 5 is just support. Tier up for each subscriber to get something. If you want something then maybe a # identifying you, a monthly email on how much was raised you helped with etc.

You could even go as low as 1$ even. Volume matters and with success you can be upsold.

 

[Cuseball]

I would be absolutely stunned if JB (and Dino) aren't doing what they can to help raise funds.

I know I've been hard as all get out on JB the last few years, but I cannot imagine him not doing everything he can to help the school in every way, shape or form.

Agreed. Boeheim basically pleaded with people to donate more. The last few years are one thing but boeheim would do everything possible for Cuse. He’s a lifer and more invested in the program than anyone here.

I think we are still a bit behind in the NIL game and losing Jesse and these type of articles further that….even if some don’t want to accept it

 

[Fly Rodder]

I figure these collectives are targeting an athletic NIL endowment that can be more or less perpetuated by low-cost ETFs or some such.

 

[Fly Rodder]

Some quick math but just take 35k fans.. say that's a target number for being on a monthly subscription service. You can raise 175k a month with just a 5 dollar a month subscription.

Annualized that's 2.1 million a year. That's 2.5 Edwards'. We know we have 35k fans ( and many more) willing to come to a game...

I think pwong said Cooley wanted a $2m/yr NIL budget to jump to GTown and I'll bet he got that and then some.

 

[oldpinepoint]

Maybe we can get Sally Struthers to do an infomercial. For only 70 cents a day, you can help one of our poor athletes afford proper
Nutrition.

 

[SP_Gilbs]

So I think 5 is just support. Tier up for each subscriber to get something. If you want something then maybe a # identifying you, a monthly email on how much was raised you helped with etc.

You could even go as low as 1$ even. Volume matters and with success you can be upsold.

Look how Rutgers does it here Join – Knights of the Raritan this is simple and lays out all you need to know about what youre getting for your contribution and also allows for one time contributions. I know we all hate Rutgers, but this is a great model and they're apparently doing well in the NIL game currently. Landed a 5-star top 10 recruit for basketball in 2024 who was reportedly going to whoever bid the highest.

 

[Orangezoo]

I think pwong said Cooley wanted a $2m/yr NIL budget to jump to GTown and I'll bet he got that and then some.

Yep. Just think.. 5 bucks a pop with 70k fans instead. That's 4 mil a year just from the average fans before big donors