In the era of NIL, major donors and boosters have brought in college football and basketball coaches and players to teams at a level we’ve never seen before. For example, in college basketball, after Arkansas hired John Calipari, Jerry Jones, the Dallas Cowboys owner, said that he would pay any player from Kentucky to Arkansas to double what they were making in NIL.
As crazy as NIL has been, something new happened on Friday when FedEx, one of the 50 biggest companies in the U.S., announced that it would donate $25 million to the Memphis Tigers athletic program over the next five years ($5 million per year). This kind of deal has never happened before, or at least to the extent and dollar amount of this deal. Up to this point, big donations have been from individuals, with companies making mostly smaller deals with individual athletes.
It could be easy to think “Good for Memphis” and not think anything more of it, but this deal goes deeper than that…much deeper.
Memphis Football Now In a Position of Power
Memphis Football has been on the fringe of being invited to a P4 league for the last decade. In fact, if not for the Pac-12’s collapse, many believe that Memphis would be the next school targeted by the Big 12 if they decided to continue growing their conference from G5 teams. While the $25 million donation doesn’t automatically mean that Memphis will now be invited to a P4 league, it certainly won’t hurt.
Memphis is already considered one of the best teams remaining in a non-P4/Major conference, and with millions of dollars now being spent to entice players to come play, don’t be shocked if, in a year or two, Memphis is winning the AAC in just about every sport.
Again, winning doesn’t guarantee an invite to a bigger league, but it helps. With the now-known knowledge that FedEx is willing to pay high amounts, they could become a very valuable asset (sponsoring events, etc..).
NIL May (Somehow) Get Even Crazier For College Football
NIL has gotten crazy with the amount of money and deals that players are making, yet with FedEx now throwing $25 million at a G5 school, it puts pressure on other big companies like Walmart, Google, Amazon, and Exxon Mobile to also join in and get behind schools.
Most large corporations already donate millions to colleges and athletics, but college sports are reaching a point where money almost doesn’t matter if the NIL isn’t there. Players don’t seem to care as much anymore about how good the team meal room, locker room, or other facilities are; they care about the money.
Don’t be shocked if, by this time next year, large corporations begin to either fund more money into NIL or transfer their donations from athletics in general to NIL collectives. If and when this happens, watch out for teams like Arkansas (Walmart), Stanford (Apple), and Houston (Exxon Mobile) to become juggernauts overnight, with players transferring in at unprecedented rates to get the most money possible.
The flip side is that currently, dominant teams, including Alabama, start to lose recruits and talent due to a lack of huge corporations donating.
Conclusion
NIL and the transfer portal need to be addressed from a national standpoint. It appears that some states, such as North Carolina, which this week passed an NIL bill, are starting to see the need for regulation, but unless something serious is done, the sport will continue to have more drama and issues when it comes to building a roster, maintaining players, and having NIL be and do what it was actually meant to do.
If you wonder what I mean when I say that, let me ask: Are Memphis athletics going to bring $25 million worth of business to FedEx? If not, by definition of how NIL works in every other industry, this isn’t a good NIL deal.
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