All Ball - Pt. 2: NBA & NIL Agent Daniel Poneman on NIL Negotiation Intricacies, Enforcing Deals, Market Growth

First, Doug gives his take on the Lakers and Suns disappointing playoff exits, and what’s next for them respectively.

Then, he’s joined by NBA and NIL Agent Daniel Poneman for part 2 of their discussion on the inner workings of an NIL contract negotiations, how to hold schools accountable to fully pay the negotiated deals, the benefit of having an experienced agent in the NIL space, and how the market has grown in the last year.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hey, welcome in. I'm Doug Gottlie.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
This is all BALLU man. We got a lot to
get to today, as we've seen Kevin Durant and Lebron
James and of course Steph Curry all be eliminated either
from the play in or the tournament itself. And then
of course you have the wild, wacky world of an
I l which we'll get to with Part two with

(00:29):
Dan Poneman, who is the most known and respected of
the NIL agents I believe out in space in terms
of landing players. You know, everybody does NIL a little
bit differently. Some of these guys. You know, there's Darren Heidner,
who we've had on before, who does more of the
traditional name moons and likeness deals with the Cavender twins

(00:49):
and others. But anyway, I think that it's been and
Jason Belzer has joined us previously, and of course Dan
Poneman will join us for Part two. I think we'll
have a part three as well. So let's let me
give you a couple thoughts here. At the time that
we dropped this pod, the Lakers have just lost their

(01:10):
fourth game to the Denver Nuggets, and I thought the
Lakers gave the Nuggets all they wanted really do. And
there was a couple of games in the middle where
Lebron didn't play as well high turnovers defense, Like he's
not the defender he used to be. It's not really
close snort should he be asked to be that level defender?

(01:33):
But I mean, I kind of find it hard. You know,
you really sound like a Lebron hater when you're finding
fault with Bron in this particular case as opposed to
the construct of the roster. And you know, the decision,
I frankly think that higher divn Ham like that was

(01:54):
a bad decision. And I don't know Darvin personally. I
know enough about how he runs his ship. But the
idea that you would bring a guy who's that inexperienced
in granted former player, right, So there's the and you know,
with his size, he can legit look Lebron in the eyes.
There's a little bit of mutual respect, but like, look,

(02:14):
Lebron wants to win. And you just got the sentence
over the past two years of playing for him that
you know, whether it's personnel and you know D'Angel Russell
not being good enough for you know, rotations, and I mean,
even who was in in the last shot last night
when Jamal Murray hit the shot, Like just the little

(02:35):
things like substitutions are huge things in everybody's minds, but
especially Lebron James. So you know, somehow I went from
if you go back a decade ago, you know, when
Lebron was winning in Miami. I was trying to tell
people this guy has been maligned and you know, he's

(02:56):
held to a ridiculous standard when he's an unbelievable player.
And since that, in trying to keep it real and
point out some of his clause and the way he
does things, et cetera, et cetera, I've become seen as
the Lebron hater. I just feel like I'm a realistness thing,
and the reality is that Lebron James is an incredible player,
and he gave incredible effort and had a ridiculous season. Yeah,

(03:19):
does he take a lot more plays off shore? Are
there some excuses afterwards? Like afterwards we heard the man
we just had so many injuries, Like what are you
talking about? Game Vincent was hurt. They never got anything
out of Gay Vincent, I'll give you that, and he
probably would have been your starting point guard. That is
a fair assessment. That's fair. But the top four players
and the Lakers played seventy games. You know, the Lakers

(03:42):
seven seed didn't have anything to do with load management,
didn't have anything to do with anything other than they
just weren't that good. And I don't I'm not convinced
the Nuggets are as dominant as they were last year.
Just I don't think their bench is nearly as good.
And I think that's one of the reasons that they trail,
you know, so often, they trailed time of all these games.
As for lebron and where he'll go, you know, he's

(04:04):
obviously going to leverage the fact that he's a free
agent and can be a free agent to get Bronni
with the Lakers. I just think that's a mistake. Just
do you know, I get it. Like, look, if my
dad could have done it, he probably would have done
it too. Get you in the league, give you a chance,
and you can develop in the G League. But like
I think, I think Bronni can have a great college

(04:26):
career and really have a fun college career. Now there
is a world there where Lebron Lebronny goes to Duquane
Right plays for his one of his best friends, and
in year two with the Lakers. There's also a world
where Lebron as a free agent, could sign for minimum money.
None of these guys do it, but he could sign
for a lot less so that they could sign they

(04:47):
could actually build a super team, and he could act
like he's thirty nine. He could chill out some games.
But again, we know the reality of how the Players
Association would react to that, how Lebron would not. That's
that's not something he's ever been down for. I just
don't see it happening. As for Kevin Durant, the Sons,
you know, that's just a bad mix and bad mix.

(05:10):
They they made some poor personnel decisions. I don't think
they needed Brad Deel. I actually think DeAndre Ayton would
have been a good fit, especially playing for a new
coach and in Frank, but it wasn't. They didn't have
a center, they didn't have a point guard, and the
wings didn't all fit together. They didn't seem to buy in,
and Frank seem to struggle to coach. And then you

(05:32):
have the Golden State Warriors and what do they do?
What do they do with Clay. You know again, it's
like you bring Clay back? Sure, well, at what price?
At what price? With all these guys, it's at what price?
And then we wait to see with the Clippers and
the MAVs, losing coach could be the next Lakers at coach.
But also, are you better off playing without Kawhi in
this series? And hope he's healthy for the next series,
and see if you can squeak out two more against

(05:53):
the against the Mavericks more NBA Steff to come. But
let's take back into the portal and Nil, here's part
two with Dan Punter.

Speaker 3 (06:04):
All right, let's just get right back.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
Let's just dive right back in, because you just get
back from Portsmith, which of course is the more traditional
agent place right where seniors are trying to find a
guy to help them and guide them through all of this.
And I know that you were hit up by hundreds
of people in terms of listening to the first pod
questions they had. Let's start with a couple of things

(06:29):
that I get asked, and I just wonder kind of
your immediate response. Let's start with an agent, and so like,
why do you need an agent? Why does a college
player need an agent in the world of an iol.

Speaker 4 (06:45):
Well, I'll answer that question, but first here initial comment.
It's funny. I was at Portsmouth at Portsmuth Invitational, which,
for those who don't know, is the top sixty four
outgoing seniors in college basketball playing in a tournament in
front of two hundred and fifty NBA scouts. So I'm
there because I have some guys in the draft, right,
so I'm going to talk to NBA scouts to push
my guys get information. Almost every NBA scout just wanted

(07:09):
to talk to me about Nil. Everybody's like, oh, yeah, cool,
let's talk about your players, but also what the heck
is going on with Nil? I mean, everyone is fascinated
by this world. It's I'm so entrenched in it. It
seems so normal to me. It's just everyday life. But
I guess from the outside looking in, it is this
whole mystery box of madness that I guess. That's why

(07:33):
there was so much interest in our first episode. I'm
happy to be back, but I guess, yeah, let's jump
into it. Why does a player need an agent? Well,
let's look at any other sport, basketball, soccer, football, where
athletes are making between one hundred thousand and a million plus.

(07:54):
Whether it's olympians or pro sports overseas or here, they
all have agents. If you're a musician and you're making
a million dollars a year touring, you have an agent.
When you're dealing with money at that magnitude, you need
an agent. You need someone who's been through the battles,
you know, hundreds, if not thousands of times, who knows

(08:15):
what to look for in a contract to know, Hey,
is this team going to be able to wiggle out
of paying this money or is this ironclad? You need
someone who understands the marketplace where you're not just I mean,
I've heard stories from coaches recently where parents are doing
the negotiations on nil for their kids and they're just
seeing online these numbers that are sometimes real, sometimes fake,
like we all saw the Jeremy Roach rumors recently, right,

(08:38):
and parents are just walking into coach's office and asking
for absurd numbers and pricing their children out of real
opportunities by asking for money that the market doesn't have
for them. Right, Like, with an agent, initially, yes, you
have someone who's going to protect your money. You have
someone who's going to understand the marketplace and know how
to value you properly so you get the right opportunity

(08:58):
and don't price yourself out of the market. But I
think specifically in an NIL world, maybe the number one
function of an agent is making sure you actually get
your money. Like we've heard all these stories of guys
being promised big numbers and not getting those numbers right
our schools, handing out contracts or handing out promises for
money they haven't raised yet. A lot of them are true.

(09:19):
Like I've heard a lot of kids who got promised
one hundred thousand and got twenty, promise four hundred thousand
and got one hundred. I mean, there are real, real
instances of that that I've seen.

Speaker 3 (09:29):
How do you protect against them?

Speaker 4 (09:32):
Well, first and foremost, it's getting an ironclad guaranteed contract
when a kid gets on campus, and you know there's
always you know, as an agent, you want your contracts
to be as guaranteed as possible. Like an NBA, I mean,
the players use an incredible job of protecting their athletes

(09:52):
where like you can get arrested, you can there's a
lot that can go down where that money is still
going to be guaranteed. Now in college. We're not at
that point yet. Like sometimes there's a give and take
where hey, if a guy's not academically eligible to play,
maybe you know, it's fine to cancel the nil contract.
Or if he gets arrested and he's not on the team,
But if he's injured, we need that guaranteed. You can't say, oh,

(10:14):
he's sprained his angle, he's red shirting. He's not getting
his money right. So you know, as an agent, initially
we have to get the guaranteed contract. But then also
I've seen instances of collectives filing for bankruptcy midseasons so
they don't have to pay their players because they want
to push out a coach. And it's my job to
be a little bit of an enforcer, right to go
to those coaches and say, hey, you promise this kid this.

(10:37):
This collective you know, promises kid this, and if you
don't pay him, I control a huge portion of the
market and I can't trust you again. I can't work
with you again, knowing that the first time or the
second time we've done business together, you made a promise
to a young man and you screwed him out of
his money. We're not going to work together again, and
most of the industry is going to find out that
you don't pay your bills. So I think there is

(10:58):
a checks and balances where there are agents to help
stabilize that system to prevent a coach from promising a
huge number for a grad transfer who, if they don't
pay him, is one year and out and there's no reprofessions.

Speaker 2 (11:10):
Yeah, that's that's the question, right, especially if you know
the easiest way to get rid of a guy is
to stop paying a guy, right, So how do you
I guess it's it's mirror threat of kind of smear
within or exposing within the industry. That's the only kind
of defense you really have.

Speaker 4 (11:29):
Well, I mean, obviously the contract is the defense, right,
Like I've had to use, you know, take a legal
action against collectives who weren't paying money, right. But yeah,
like I've seen one particular instance I'm thinking of with
the same boosters who are funding the collective wanted to
push out the head coach.

Speaker 3 (11:46):
What they do is they just stop payment to the players.

Speaker 2 (11:48):
Right then the players won't play, and the players won't play, and.

Speaker 3 (11:53):
You can't get new players because you don't have any money. Collective,
You're screwed.

Speaker 2 (11:56):
Right.

Speaker 3 (11:56):
I know of a coach, I major coach that happened
to a year ago.

Speaker 2 (12:02):
Okay, so what do you do in that instance when
it's not the coach's fault, it's the boosters and collective's fault.

Speaker 3 (12:11):
What do you do there?

Speaker 4 (12:12):
That's where the contract comes in, right. I had that
instance at his school two years ago where the boosters
wanted to push out the coach. They stopped paying the players.
Most of those players were on handshake deals, or they
were on contracts that were negotiated by the parents that
were very easy to be broken by the collective. Now,
I had a sense going into it that that school

(12:33):
was shake. He didn't trust the boosters. So I not
only put the collective on the contract, but I put
the individual booster's name as a guaranteur on the contract.
So when he wasn't paying anybody else and they said, well,
you can sue the collective or bankrupt we got no money,
I said, yeah, but your name is on the contract,
and my kid got all of his money. So that's
what comes from being through hundreds of these battles, is

(12:54):
you kind of know how to protect against those situations.

Speaker 3 (12:57):
It's a big toll school.

Speaker 2 (12:58):
Yeah, Okay, I think we're talking about the same score.

Speaker 3 (13:05):
I don't know if you heard this.

Speaker 2 (13:06):
No, A lot of the pushback from some of the
donors is like, there's no ROI on this thing at all,
you know, And so I heard that at one is
a football deal.

Speaker 3 (13:17):
But one of.

Speaker 2 (13:18):
The most regarded returning football players.

Speaker 3 (13:23):
You had a booster who just said, like, I'm.

Speaker 2 (13:25):
Going to buy all his rights, by all his true
nil rights. It's like a million dollars, and then he
won't do much of anything and will write it off
as a loss.

Speaker 3 (13:37):
I'll write off of my personal as a loss to
a certain amount.

Speaker 2 (13:40):
That's that's that's one way which around some of the
tax stuff which you don't get any benefit from giving
this money.

Speaker 4 (13:46):
You heard of that, yeah, well there. I know. There
was some controversy last year where a lot of collectors
were promoting to their boosters that these were nonprofit five
to one C three and you can have tax right
off from your donations to the collective, and then like
midway through the year, it turned out to not be
the case all the time, and there were some unhappy
boosters who had donated money and it turned out they

(14:07):
might not be able to write it off. That's actually
the first time I've heard about the buying NIL rights
and writing it off as a loss. It's actually pretty genius.
But one thing I want to talk about when it
comes to ROI is I mean, let's let's take a
side step here, right, We've all seen the conversation online
around like, this isn't true NIL, this is pay for play?
Is this is not this is not nil? This is

(14:28):
pay for play. Well, maybe it's not ANIL in the
sense of, you know, getting an endorsement from Nike or
your local pizza shop, which is what we thought on
IL would be. But I actually do believe in many cases,
in most of these cases, this is players making money
from their name, image, and likeness because these universities are
using college sports as a marketing vehicle for the university.

(14:50):
When Florida Atlantic or George Mason makes the final four,
emissions go up, revenues go up. Right, those players are
acting as a marketing vehicle for universities that bring in millions,
if not billions of dollars.

Speaker 3 (15:04):
So I would I hear here's here'd be my pushback
on that.

Speaker 2 (15:08):
Everybody push back, and I've I've and I understand that
I've lost the true Anil war because I saw this coming,
which is like I love the idea of true nil,
It's just not a reality. There's just there's no way
you can check in balance on everything. And this is
what happens when there's no checks in that the argument

(15:28):
against what you're saying, which is accurate, right when you
when you win the school, usually the emissions go up
and everything goes up.

Speaker 3 (15:37):
But when you win, you also.

Speaker 2 (15:40):
The nil that I experienced as a player, from having
a great career, from being on teams that people liked,
is the rest of my life. I don't really have
to work, you know, I don't, and you know from
guys getting a chance to There's.

Speaker 3 (15:54):
A guy named Matt Davison. Do you ever hear that
name Matt Davison?

Speaker 4 (15:58):
I think so.

Speaker 2 (15:59):
Matt Davison he played basketball and football at Nebraska.

Speaker 3 (16:03):
Okay, but his.

Speaker 2 (16:04):
Claim to fame I think it was I want to
say it was the last time Missouri and Nebraska play,
but I could be wrong because I'm they're in different
leagues now obviously. But he caught a ball between his legs.
He's a tight end dough for balls. Bad pass bubbled up.
I think he caught it between his like some miraculous catch.

(16:24):
He's literally used that to make his life right.

Speaker 3 (16:27):
He's the I think he's the color commentator for football
and basketball at Nebraska, at least he has been. And
the point is that the way it used to.

Speaker 2 (16:36):
Work, which I would I would agree with anybody who said, like, hey,
maybe it's not the actual value of what you brought
to university, but there's other things that university does for
you that we don't give him credit for him. I mean,
most of us couldn't have gotten into the school that
we played for, let alone, you know, gotten through and graduated.
But that that's the real essence of how it used

(16:57):
to be and how it does. It does in fact
even out, which is, yes, when you go to a
final four, admissions go up, everything goes crazy, but you're
also forever part of something special and if you have
any brains at all, you can make a life for
yourself out of it. Now, how that factors into the
NIL world should be, you know, there should be I

(17:19):
don't want to say performance bonuses, but like team collective deals.
The reason it's not nil, Daniel is because we're giving
these guaranteed contracts before there's any ever, any achievement, you know.
So that's why I propose, like, all right, apparently now
the transfer portal thing is just going to keep going on.

(17:41):
But it's the combination of the transfer portal and NIL
which has this thing a mess because you don't have
to stay, you can't build culture and can't really build
a base for yourself for the future. And because we
give money before the kid even played a snap or
you know, on a shot, that it's that you're you're

(18:03):
paying for potential performances. Whereas like again, a real NIL
would be, hey, here's a guy who's had a great year,
he was All League, he hit a big shot, he
should receive, you know, something for all of his hard work.
Like that would be one in which I think you'd
get kind of united front on contracts where if you

(18:24):
I don't want to say backlum, you talked about last
time about multi year contracts. Is there a way to
build these things where there's bonuses for you know, team's success,
where there's bonuses for academic success, where there's retention bonuses
as well, so you get kids that come back for
a couple of years, because that's really what makes the
sport hard to follow.

Speaker 3 (18:45):
Is everybody somewhere else every year?

Speaker 4 (18:48):
Yeah, you're barking up an interesting tree here, Okay, And
I have two points on it. To your first point, like, yes,
if you're Doug duckleebin, you're smart and you can you know, talk,
you know, sell water to a whale, and you have
a good career. Yeah, there's a lifetime of opportunity from
your career. But some of these kids you said, you know,
he said, maybe aren't the smartest, or maybe aren't the
most outgoing, or maybe aren't the most entrepreneurial, right, and

(19:11):
now they might not be able to again. I have
a friend, Matt Mooney played at Texas Tech. He goes
back every summer, runs it camp, makes probably you know,
fifty grand whatever because he played on that four team.
He's entrepreneurial, he's smart, he's savvy. Right. There's other kids
on that team that don't have that gene, right, that
aren't capitalizing in that way. But the school did profit
from their their performance and the name image of likeness.

(19:34):
So to your second point, we would all love for
there to be a system where we could actually reward performance.
As of now, we're not allowed to write into nil
contracts bonuses for performance. But I think, be great if
there is a world where you know, you got a
final four bonus in your contract, right, then all these
kids are motivated to win and play together because we're
all going to get paid if we make it far. Right.

(19:55):
I think there is one tournament that just popped up
next year, Like I think it's like a holiday tournament
where they have like you know, eight to twelve teams,
where every team gets a million bucks and I think
the winner gets two. I mean, I think that's great.
That's a great incentive not just for individual performance but
for team play. And one of the schools or all
of the schools in that tournament are doing much better

(20:15):
at retaining their players because there is this pot of
gold at the end of the rainbow for guys to
stay because you're like, oh wait, if we stay here
and we play in the tournament, we win, we split
two million bucks. So it's great. But right now, the
system we have doesn't allow us to reward for teams
success except for in that instance, right, you can't put
it's harder to put performance bonuses based on the current

(20:37):
contract of the rules. Right. I have talked to one
collective recently that has started putting in a bonus for
a postseason appearance, which is the first time I'd heard that.
This offseason. They said, hey, this is the number, and
this is the number that you know, the bonus if
they make the postseason. I believe that's allowed because as

(20:57):
a marketing company, which is a collective marketing companies, you
can say, if the team you know plays these extra games,
or if the team you're on gets this extra exposure
that gives us, you know, added marketing value to your name,
image and likeness, right, so thus we can give you
a bonus. But the reality is the rules are so gray,
they're constantly changing. No one knows right from left. So

(21:18):
until we do stabilize this and like have some real
rules in a real system, which we all need to
work together to do, You're right, you're going to have
to gamble on the potential anile future of these guys.
But I'll counter that and say most jobs are that.
If you're hiring someone for a sales job, yeah, there's commissions,
but you are gambling that the money you're paying them
is going to lead to profit. That's how most jobs are. Right.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
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Speaker 3 (21:53):
Yeah, and it's like, okay, so, which which job is
this for? For players? Is it their first job?

Speaker 2 (21:59):
I had some it's their first job, you know, like
you're getting nothing and having to earn it, right, and
then if you achieve, then your every job you get
a little bit more. That's where it does kind of
mirror the business world.

Speaker 4 (22:13):
Isn't so unique because again, like in pro sports, the
pro team is the for profit vehicle, right, whereas with
college sports, the college team is a marketing arm for
the true for profit vehicle, which is the university itself. Right,
So this is true, true.

Speaker 2 (22:34):
I would only here, here's one thing that I think,
and your argument is a valid one in that we
use athletics to market and promote the university. My pushback
to this has always been, hey, guess what they do
that with everybody? Right, Like the college, the universities are
they're brilliant businesses because they operate under this tax exempt status.

Speaker 3 (22:56):
They operate as if they're not a business.

Speaker 2 (22:58):
And then what they do is they charge everybody and
then you know, they make money off of basically everything,
and then if you achieve anything science, music, obviously sports
is the easiest to road. But they're going to get
all of the juice out of that orange.

Speaker 3 (23:15):
They can't.

Speaker 2 (23:16):
And then the second you finished, they're like, hey, can
you give something back for the next generation, Like it's amazing,
what's what they do?

Speaker 3 (23:23):
Like the balls on these people? I just got done.

Speaker 2 (23:25):
I just you know, paid for my kid to graduate
from X y Z University. And how they want you know,
undergrand like what it just gave them two hundred fifty
grand over four years.

Speaker 4 (23:36):
I think I think the tip of the iceberg is
the NCAA, and the real iceberg is uh colleges and
universities in America and the scam that that that somewhere.
I mean, I didn't go to college, right and I'm
doing great, but I'm the exception of the rule. But
but yeah, I mean, and to that point, people are
talking about donor fatigue and NIL the nil world, Like

(23:56):
when are they gonna stop? You know, when are people
get tired of donating money for you know, no return
for these basketbas I mean, it's the meaning of time.
Every science building and park bench on. These universities were
built by someone who gave money with no return right,
and this is used.

Speaker 2 (24:13):
To be write offs with it, right, It's used to
be right ups and people like again, I guess rich
people like their names on buildings, that's my building. They're
you know, whereas with a player, they're here, they're gone
so quickly. When people accuse you of proaching the player,
what's the reality to how you view it and how

(24:33):
things actually good?

Speaker 4 (24:34):
Dot So poaching. I don't like this term. Right. Poaching
is a term that is used in the college basketball
marketplace but will never be used in a pro pro context. Right,
if you have a player in Spain playing for Basconia
for four hundred thousand, and Barcelona reaches out to the

(24:55):
agent and says, hey, we're really interested in your player
for next season, we have a million, that is not poaching.
That is a higher level team exploring building their team
next year using players who have overachieved at a lower level.
And similarly, if Basconia is reaching out to the agent
of a bench player on Barcelona about their interest in

(25:18):
moving down a level, that's not poaching. That's the way
the marketplace works. Whereas in college. If there's a player
making zero dollars at a mid major and a high
major uses an agent or someone else to put out
a feeler if that could be interested in moving up
a level to make life changing money, it's called poaching, right,
And I think we need to throw that term out

(25:39):
the window. I do think that we need more strict
guidelines and by laws around when these conversations can happen,
how these conversations can happen, what constitutes tampering and what doesn't.
But you have mid major coaches up in arms that
everyone's poaching my players. No, these guys are leaving for
better opportunity. They're leaving to their lives. And and like

(26:02):
one of my biggest, if not my biggest pet peeve
in this whole economy, this whole anile world, is when
I hear coaches say things along the lines of, Oh,
he's a good kid, he's not worried about money. Oh
he's about the right things. He's not worried about money, right,
or like oh that kid just just wants the bag, right.

(26:24):
It drives me crazy because when I hear a coach
saying he's about the things, the right things, he doesn't
worry about money. I hear a coach saying, Oh, he's
willing to give me his labor for free so I
can profit. I like that kid, right.

Speaker 3 (26:37):
I don't. I don't think.

Speaker 2 (26:38):
I think. I think you're taking it to way too
far of an extreme.

Speaker 3 (26:45):
Because.

Speaker 2 (26:47):
Because the kids that I've talked to that the coaches
gravitate towards it's not that they're not going to get paid,
it's that that's not the driving force behind every decision.
And that's actually a really good life lesson. It's a
hard one that I think all of us learn at
some point, which is like, oftentimes the best jobs are

(27:10):
not the highest paying jobs. You got to find the
right fit for yourself and you know, yes, no, do
you want to go Do you want to go play
for nothing when everybody else is playing for something? Of
course not nobody's nobody is telling you to play for free.
But you know when you have an established role, established identity,
when you have sweat equity in a program, You know

(27:32):
when you care about winning and losing and know that
the money will take care of itself. There is a
difference there between Hey, I want you to play for free,
and you're only concerned about the money, and somewhere in
the middle is that sweet spot that way you're trying
to thread that needle.

Speaker 4 (27:50):
Right, You're right, the sweet spot is in the middle.
And one thing also, you said, oh, the money will
take care of itself. I've heard so many coaches and
collectives say, hey, if you come here and perform, we
could give you more than this. I've heard that every time. Right,
here's your baseline number. If you come here and play well,
you could make way more than this. Zero times out
of what fifty plus deals I've done in the last
two years, zero times getting more from active.

Speaker 2 (28:14):
No, no, no, but but but but again, this is
where this is where having an agent, I want to
be properly compensated for what I'm worth.

Speaker 3 (28:21):
I have Dan Potaman, for example.

Speaker 2 (28:23):
He's negotiate that we get into the window where you
know that you're in in you know, in the right
area financially like that it should then it's just about
like our relationship and I do I want to play for.

Speaker 3 (28:34):
You like because I can?

Speaker 2 (28:36):
Because that should be really the argument, right, Like if
the kid's a two fifty kid, he can get to fifty.

Speaker 3 (28:41):
A bunch of differlaces, all right, so what makes your
program you need?

Speaker 2 (28:45):
Why should I come play here when the money is
the same X, y Z whatever. You know, that's that's
where the coach has to then okay, here's what we
you need. And for a player, you can tell if
he's engaged in that or if it's just dude, listen,
whoever the highest bet or that's where I'm going, which.

Speaker 3 (29:01):
Again you're allowed to do.

Speaker 2 (29:03):
But I actually really understand that because when that mentality
is one which doesn't really allow you to engage with
the players, with your teammates, with the school. And again
it's not an all or nothing thing. They're all going
to get paid. It's just a question of the in

(29:26):
the if you write down the ten most important things,
is it number one or is it number seven? And
I think you know, once you get past like three
through ten, now you're okay.

Speaker 3 (29:40):
But if it's the number one thing, it just doesn't
work for someplace.

Speaker 4 (29:45):
Yeah, And honestly, when I sign a new client, we
do an intake interview where we ask them rate one
through ten, how important are each of these things? Do
you money? Academics, winning player development, conference, location, So we
let the client tell us what they value and it's
our job as an agent to find something that fits

(30:05):
the buckets that they value most. Right, kids this year
that are grad transfers that said I need a really
good MBA or a law program at my grad school. Right,
that's important to them. There are other guys who say, hey,
I want a grad school where I can take ballroom
dancing and not actually have to take real classes. Right.
So every kid has a different Every young man has
a different set of priorities. But if a kid says, look, Dan,

(30:30):
I know I'm probably not a pro. My family is struggling,
my mom is sick. I need the biggest bag possible,
that doesn't make him a bad person. Who is a
coach to tell you what your values should be? Right?
If you are different, kids have the luxury of saying
money doesn't matter that much. I have a trust fund,
my family makes money. I'm middle class, whereas other kids
know that luxury and this money is life changing for them.

(30:53):
And if they say this is my number one priority,
they are not to be judged for that. It is
not a coach's place to say, oh about the wrong things.
But to your other point, I.

Speaker 3 (31:02):
Would say, why why can't he Why can't he make
the judgment.

Speaker 4 (31:06):
Why can't a coach make the judgment that he's about
the wrong thing? Yeah, because you.

Speaker 3 (31:11):
Know what I mean, Like like, listen, if he if
he if he is.

Speaker 2 (31:14):
If you bring a kid on campus and you literally
can't get in a focus because all he's doing is
chasing ass, you know.

Speaker 4 (31:21):
It's about the wrong things. But I'm saying in the instance, specifically,
if the kid's life circumstances dictate that money can and
should be a priority in this decision making process. As now,
for a coach to say, oh, you should be more
worried about player development or tell a kid what he
should be concerned about, right.

Speaker 3 (31:40):
And well, you only do that if you don't have
the money.

Speaker 4 (31:42):
You do you do that if you have the money
that right?

Speaker 2 (31:46):
Right?

Speaker 3 (31:47):
Or fifty short? Yes, but we have great player development.

Speaker 4 (31:50):
Great player Oh yeah, he's about the wrong things. No,
you don't have a big enough budget. But having said that,
other guys are represented, probably like only twenty percent end
up taking the highest financial offer. My goal is generally
to get multiple schools in the same range, so a
kid can make a decision based on other factors. Right,
if you have four schools than four to four fifty. Great,

(32:13):
Now you can just pick the best one, right. There
are situations where there's schools that have outlier offers that
are hard to turn down, but kids and my experience
rarely actually take those.

Speaker 3 (32:24):
I agree. I know of several of those from last year.

Speaker 2 (32:28):
Biggest deal per year, biggest deal you've done so far
this year?

Speaker 4 (32:33):
Well, I don't know if I should. I don't know
if they can tie it back to an individual I've done.
I've done multiple five hundred plus. I haven't broke a
million yet this year.

Speaker 3 (32:48):
What is What is the market like this year as
opposed to last year?

Speaker 4 (32:52):
The market is a lot more robust this year last year,
last year.

Speaker 2 (32:56):
In terms of a number of deals or the actual
deals selves.

Speaker 4 (33:01):
Both Like last year. If you heard of someone getting
last year, you heard of someone getting five hundred plus
thousand outlier this year, it's completely normal. That's happening all over.

Speaker 3 (33:13):
The place, but mostly one conference, no multiple conferences.

Speaker 4 (33:20):
Oh yeah, I can think of right now, guys making
five to seven and the ACC, the Big twelve and
the Big ten. I don't know about big I know
I can think of a couple in the Big East.

Speaker 2 (33:35):
But yeah, yeah, generally the SEC has the most money,
that spends the most money.

Speaker 4 (33:42):
Yeah. Yeah, But I'm thinking of a couple of Big
East teams right now, a couple of Big ten teams,
a couple of ACC a couple of Big twelve that
are consistent.

Speaker 2 (33:51):
A couple of big twelves that have big money. But
I would say across the board, in the SEC you're
either in like you're you're you got to be in
on some level. Otherwise it's just it's stupid.

Speaker 4 (34:03):
And the sec of your budget less than three million,
you're in a bad spot.

Speaker 2 (34:10):
Here's a question that I have that I wont okay.
So a lot of these guys you're at Portsmouth, A
lot of those guys are going to go sign their
first overseas deal, right What has the adjustment been like
for college players adjusting to the fact that sometimes you're
going to make more money now in college than you
are when you're a professional player in your first contract.

Speaker 3 (34:31):
What are those conversations like in the agent side.

Speaker 4 (34:35):
Yeah, I mean, I like to have really real conversations
and lay out clear expectations ahead of time and make
sure that these guys are making their current their college
decisions knowing three four steps ahead. So you know. Recently,
for instance, I had a client turned down upwards of
six hundred thousand to take about a third of that

(34:57):
because he really liked the school. I said, great, I
support you, but like I want you to, let's game
out the different paths you could be in your financial future,
and then you can make the decision if this extra
you know, four hundred thousand dollars is how important it
is to you, because there might be a point when
you're twenty five years old playing in the G League
making forty five thousand when that extra you know, three

(35:17):
hundred grand to buy a house could be really useful.
If you want to turn it down, that's fine, but
let's let's you know, let's talk about these different paths
because if for these guys, if you're not in the NBA,
this is your peak earning, right Like G League salaries
are forty you know, if you're depending onf you're getting
an exhibit ten or not, like you're making between like
forty and one hundred and fifteen thousand, you know, pre

(35:39):
tax in the NBA. You know, rookies overseas are generally
even if you're a high end rookie, you're making you know,
fifty to seventy net your rookie year, So most of
these guys are going to be taking pay cuts if
you're not in the NBA now. It could work a
few different ways. On one hand, it could be pissed, like, hey,
I'm used to making this amount of money, why am
I making this now? But on the other hand, it
makes it a little more palatable because if you've saved

(36:01):
your money now, you can live a little more comfortably
and climb that European ladder, right or fight it out
in the G League because you've got some savings, right,
It makes life more livable. For making a forty thousand
dollars salary in the G League and you've got two
hundred thousand saved from your college career, you don't have
to train guys in the off season to make up
that income. One thing I think we're going to see though, actually,

(36:22):
but I've noticed this year is college players being less
likely to go to the g LE route because they're
so used to making so much money. Right, Sure, you're
accustomed to making three four hundred thousand dollars a year
and you're like, wait, my salary is gonna be what
forty thousand all right, let me go to let me
go to Asia and get this bad because I've become
accustomed to this quality of life and I can't go

(36:44):
back to, you know, that lower income bracket. So I
do think it's it's going to make guys go overseas
quicker rather than going to the G League because they
want to continue earning at the level they have been.

Speaker 3 (36:57):
Where is the portal now?

Speaker 2 (36:58):
So right now we're in, uh the end of April,
and when I say where is the portal now, because
you have this is my interpretation of it, you're actually
living in on a daily basis.

Speaker 3 (37:09):
Right.

Speaker 2 (37:10):
So you had the initial thrust of portal guys, most
of them weren't going to be welcomed back at their
school anyway. You know, as soon as the season's over,
they put themselves in them.

Speaker 3 (37:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:21):
You also had you know, coaching changes or whatever. And
then as the dust settled, you could see which players
would go in and probably ask for you know, a
rate increase. Coach would say no, or we don't have that,
and then you'd see those players leave, and now the market.

Speaker 3 (37:35):
Kind of gets a flushed.

Speaker 2 (37:37):
You've seen some high end players, a couple of them
have committed a couple of them happened. A lot have
declared for the NBA Draft, and I believe again this
is me outside of your insider is that's just delaying
the portal thing because it doesn't put you in the portal,
but it puts you in the portal to declare for
the for the NBA. And so uh, it's it's kind

(37:58):
of chaos right now because you have over a thousand
guys in the portal, but you also have you know,
over one hundred guys with their names declared.

Speaker 3 (38:06):
For the draft.

Speaker 2 (38:08):
And then you have you know, the grad transfers that
are there's untold grad transfers and you know they're on
the market. They don't have to put themselves in the portal. Right,
what am I missing anything? I'm missing any kind of
group of players that's out there.

Speaker 4 (38:23):
Actually, grad transfers do have to put themselves in the portal.
This year, they change that because they had last chaos
like last year, the are people picking off grad chansers
from other teams when they're already in school on campus.
So they did change. And for NBA players, if you're
testing the waters, you still have to put your name
in the portal, but where we've reached right now is

(38:44):
coaching season. And again, I know I just said I
don't like to use that word, but that's that's the
terminology we're we're working with here, like the point where
where the guys in the portal or the guys in
the portal, there's a few more entering every day, but
a lot of the guys that are entering now are
entering with a destination in mind. Right, we've reached a
point where schools with big budgets have struck out on

(39:05):
guys that are currently in the portal, and they're looking
at the roster saying we have to figure something out,
and they're calling agents to ask about guys that are
currently on other rosters. And people can say it's unethical,
it's wrong, but everybody's doing it to each other. So yeah,
you're getting a guy poached off your roster, but you're
trying to poach somebody off someone else's roster. So until

(39:26):
we get to May first, we have about a week
left of people throwing insane offers at guys who are
on other people's rosters, and everyone's doing it to each other.
So no one can be holier than now. Because I
don't I mean, that's what the name of the game is.
Until we have a set of rules that we can enforce,
that set guidelines around what's allowed and what isn't. This

(39:48):
is the name of the game. So I think the
first wave of the portal was the guys who knew
all year they were entering. The second wave was Oh, crap,
everybody's leaving my team, or prap, my coach got fired,
or crap, I don't like this new coach. I'm mean
under the portal, right, and then it's oh crap, they
brought in someone at my position, So writing's on the wall.
I got to get out of here, right, And now

(40:09):
we've passed that phase, and now it's oh crap, I
don't like I can't get the best guys in the portal.
Let me go find a guy on someone else's roster
to pick off. And I think that's a final wave
of the portal. So we're going to probably see some
interesting names this week, just like we saw last week
that no one expected to jump that that that already
have a spot in mind.

Speaker 2 (40:29):
What about what about when you commit to a school
and then that school. I saw this yesterday at school
took like one school took two point guards yesterday. I
thought that was interesting. How binding are these agreements when
you commit to a school.

Speaker 4 (40:47):
They're not. They're not, I mean straight up, like most
of these collective contracts are like tied to being enrolled
in an institution in a specific geographic region and parameters
like that. But if you don't go to that school,
like generally penalty to breaking it again. I suggest that
on the last one there could be buyout clauses. I
could prevent that right now. These agreements really aren't binding.

(41:09):
So if you know, I think you know from my perspective,
if you commit to a school and you give your
verbal agreement and you handshake or a sign with the
collective and before the period's over, somebody else, another school
makes a bigger offer, I do think it is unethical
and I would never advise a client to back out
of an agreement for a higher offer. If you've already
made an agreement, I think your word, you should stick

(41:30):
with your work. Right. However, if you agree to something,
you agree to a role, and they say you're gonna
be the only point guard, and we make an agreement
and they bring another point guard, they put themselves in
a position where now you might need to look around
for an opportunity that suits you better, if that makes sense.
Like I think it's it's not right to break a

(41:50):
handshake or written agreement if everything is as they promised
it would be. But if you're really change and they
lie to you, and I think a kid should have
the right to shop around and find something that suits
them better.

Speaker 2 (42:04):
Okay, Uh, the least one least one for for this
for this part we're talking about.

Speaker 3 (42:13):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (42:14):
Then there's also a bit of a waiting game here, right,
because you have let's just use the term we use
the term mid major waight too loosely, right, because there's
actually low major, the major minusment mallior plus all right,
So in the in the mid major world, like you
have players, a lot of them grad transfers. They're sitting
out there and you've established what their value is, right well,

(42:38):
what you believe it should be, and schools that are
recruiting them are somewhere in that area. But you know
in the back of your head that that after poaching
season probably comes panic season. We hang out anybody we
got to go, and we'll be willing to overpay guys
that we previously thought were at you know, at fifty.

(43:01):
Now we're willing to give them seventy five or one
hundred because now we're high major as opposed to fifty
or seventy five is really kind of topping out at
the mid major level. But that's like a delicate balance
for you, right, because you have the player and you
want to put them in a place where they can play.
You want to make sure you don't want to because again,
it hurts your relationship with the team. If you send
a kid who can't play at a high major level

(43:22):
to a high major you know, yeah, you got over
on them for a year, but your relationship is everything.
And because you've done the evaluation thing, go back to
when you're fourteen. So what's that waiting game like where
the balance of Hey, I have a bird in the hand,
but I potentially have two in the bush. Do I
take this deal? Do I not take this deal? Knowing

(43:44):
that the high majors are going to panic when some
of them need to fill roster spots here late late
in the portal game.

Speaker 4 (43:50):
Yeah, I mean we've already reached panic season peak panic seas,
and I'll tell you that much. But again, my philosophy isn't.

Speaker 2 (43:58):
The best part about You're talking about peak panticsies as
you're doing so with no facial effect at all, like
you're like they're panicking.

Speaker 4 (44:05):
I'm not panicking the school, right, I just have to
sit here and navigate the changing marketplace and understand what
phase of the portal we're in. But again, my philosophy
as an agent is, when you find something you like,
you take it. You don't wait to get an extra
twenty or fifty that might be out there on the horizon.

(44:27):
You find something that suits you, right, you take it.
And maybe I have the luxury as an agent to
say that because these the difference of commission is not
materially affecting my life.

Speaker 3 (44:36):
Right.

Speaker 4 (44:36):
If you're an agent where you've got four guys and
your whole income for the years depending on these four commissions,
maybe you drag it out to get every single penny
and you put them in bad situations. But my business
is doing well enough that I don't need the extra
two thousand dollars here and there for myself. I can
tell a kid, hey, yeah, maybe you can get an
extra five or ten grand if you wait. But this

(44:59):
is a really good situation where you're really valued, and yes,
someone could come out of left field and offer you
a crazy bag, but this wool has been recruiting you
for a month and done a really good job. Kind
of go where you're valued, right. But having said that, yeah,
there are gonna be some guys that were getting offered
forty fifty sixty all through portal season and someone's going
to come off for one twenty because they're desperate. Of course,
that happens all the time. And additionally, there are going

(45:22):
to be situations where people are tapped out on budget
and they don't like their roster and they're going back
to boosters being like, yo, I need another, I need
another one, one, five. There's this really good kid on
this other roster. I need a million form right now.
And that's when kids get really overpaid. There are a
few schools last year that late in the period paid
absurd sums for guys who averaged you know, four points

(45:42):
a game, and uh, and those coaches got fine.

Speaker 2 (45:44):
Then yeah, and then you have to pissing enough the
boosters and then you get yourself and they get yourself fire.
If you were going to establish a couple of basic rules,
basic rules, I put you in charge how do we
calm the chaos?

Speaker 3 (46:00):
What do you do?

Speaker 4 (46:02):
First off, we have to have a mutually agreed upon
uh governing body for collective contracts where if there's non payers,
late payers, liars that there are repercussions. We can't have
schools out here, uh not you know, promising one thing
and not paying it, or or giving contracts for money

(46:24):
that hasn't been raised yet. And I've seen that a lot. Right,
They're they're they're they're promising three million in contracts with
one to five in the day. Right, So we need
something to put parameters on on uh you know what
happens when when the kids aren't getting paid with their
own Additionally, we need heay.

Speaker 3 (46:41):
So so let's let's start with that. So how do
we do that?

Speaker 2 (46:44):
Because because right now, the I'm sure the NCAA and
the NCAA in parness to them is they're just really
made up of the schools and the issue that I
think most of the school the high major schools have
is like, look, we're handling this like this is the Senate.
Everybody gets a We want to be more like that.
If anything, in the House representatives where things are more

(47:04):
skewed in our favor because we're making more of the
money and we should determine how all this stuff goes
and so the end, So all these schools like what's
the difference with the past rule? You can get a
shot down in a court anyway, none of it can
stand up. So how do you how do you handle
that element to it well?

Speaker 4 (47:21):
And we're far away from this, but I think, you know,
players having some sort of union where we can work
together with the NCAA where they're not just making rules
on the player's behalf, but that we're working together collectively
bargaining to find something that works for everybody. Like I
have friends at the NBA, at the NCAAA. I just
hung out with two of them at Portsmouth this week
and we talked about potential solutions. We're so far away

(47:45):
from those actually being able to be put in put
in to reality. But again, I think the problem to
this point has been ncage is arbitrarily making rules that
everyone has to follow, where the players don't get a say.
The institutions are the only ones that get to say.
When we get to a world where the players and
the institutions can work together to create as system that
works for everybody, then we're going to be in business.

(48:05):
But I think we're pretty far off from that because
the NCAA has been i think hell bent on putting
the toothpaste back in the tube. It's not going back
in the tube. The toothpaste is on the table or
the toothbrush whatever, and now you want to use let's
call it what it is and let's figure out how
to work together to move forward instead of putting that
toothpaste back in the tube. So in the NCAA is

(48:27):
going we're going to start working together to create a
sustainable system.

Speaker 3 (48:32):
Okay, so we have.

Speaker 2 (48:35):
There's other obviously a bunch of other kind of things
that hoops to jump through before you get there. Okay,
So but in the in the short term, some sort
of accountability where people have to pay what they contract
to pay, and what else.

Speaker 4 (48:53):
Rules around when contracts can be signed, how they can
be negotiated, when they can be negotiated right there should
the portal seasons would be called free agency, right it
should be for transfers, you can negotiate from here to hear,
this is when contracts can be negotiated and signed. These
are the rules around when a player can ask for
an agent can ask for an extension, you know, just

(49:14):
like we have in the NBA, right, Like, there needs
to be some parameters around what's acceptable and what isn't
so we can have a little bit of guardrails on
this chaos. Right. I think this system is not sustainable
of these external anile collectives again, like, let's call them
what they are, and let's you know, tie them to

(49:35):
the institutions and have situations where there can be like
we talked about performance bonuses and postseason bonuses and schools
directly raising money to give to the players. Sharing the
TV revenue, Like I was speaking to some of the
other day who proposed what if the conferences shared some
of their TV revenue with the collectives? Right, Hey, there's

(49:56):
two million a year to each collective from our TV
our TV revenue is as a conference, right like starts
taking the burden just solely off the shoulders of the boosters, Uh,
bringing some of that TV revenue in and tying the
collectives to the schools. I think that's the problem with that.

Speaker 2 (50:13):
The problem with that is that money is generally all
spoken for, so you can get it, but something's going
to come up short, and we all know what that
we we all know what that is, right, That's the
only place they're going to cut is in the non
revenue generating sports.

Speaker 3 (50:31):
That's where the that's where the cuts at.

Speaker 4 (50:33):
Yeah, in theory, yes, but like also we have you know,
these It's funny I see schools raising one hundred million,
five hundred million for these crazy practice facilities and you know,
building new arenas and like maybe some of those luxuries
aren't quite as necessary with a kid.

Speaker 3 (50:49):
Rather, I listen, I agree with you.

Speaker 2 (50:51):
Most of these coaches will tell you, like I don't
want a new facility, don't want any of that shit.
But that all that in the collector, all that in.

Speaker 4 (50:57):
The collect Northwestern. But I think they built like a
nine one hundred million dollars nine hundred and thre hundred
out of practice facility on the lake. I'm sure some
of those players would have rather had a slightly less
a beautiful practice facility on the lake and a little
more money in a pocket.

Speaker 3 (51:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:12):
Well, it's it's always amazing. They all they all do things.
And some of it they do because they get grants
from the state, you know they can, and they get
some academic money as well. There's okay, So so UH,
guardrails for contracts in terms of timing and UH and

(51:32):
some some fine print issues.

Speaker 3 (51:34):
You got to have accountability for non payers. What else?

Speaker 4 (51:40):
Well, one thing I would theoretically like to say is
sometimes a certification program for agents, right like the NBA
has You have to pass a test and pay dues
to be an NBA certified agent, and and the NCAA
anybody can just pop up and call themselves an Anisle agent.
And there are people who are sabotage and play's career
is ruining. I mean, it's it's it's it's tragic. But

(52:03):
the question is who's in charge of certifying those agents.
In the NBA, it's the players Union that certifies those agents.
It's it's a it's an organization that is created to
protect and defend their players, so they want these agents
to be qualified. So it's not the NBA certifying the agents,
it's a players union. So if the NCAA is in

(52:25):
charge of certifying agents, their incentives are different than if
it was if it was the players. And we don't
have a union yet, the players aren't even employees yet,
so we're so far away from that, and so I
don't know how we can get to a place where
there's a vetting process for agents. Until we have that,
I mean, I've talked to the NCAA about their agent

(52:45):
certification program for players who are testing the waters the
NBA waters right, and I think they want to create
something for an il agents, but they really can't because
if they're marketing deals, these are marketing companies that are
giving marketing deals, not the institutions themselves. So the NCAA
really their hands are tied. But I think we need

(53:08):
to get to a point where there is some type
of vetting process for agents, because there are some people
who are doing some criminal things to kids' careers by
just not knowing what they're doing.

Speaker 2 (53:17):
Right, You have guys who are kind of the old
school runners and they're you know, moving pieces around and
just to make a quick buck. And those people, some
of them even actually it's not that they have anything
any bad intentions, They just a little there. It's just
a little too old school.

Speaker 4 (53:35):
I'll actually say some of those old school guys are
better agents than some of these pop up agents. Like
some old school AAU coaches know this market better than
anybody know how to price a player cut a deal.
Because They've been doing it for twenty years now. Some
AAU coaches and runners for years have been doing deals
in pocketing the money, which is criminal, right. But there

(53:55):
have been guys who have been helping kids families keep
their lights on with you know, shoe box money for you,
and they know this market better than anyone. But some
of the worst actors I've seen in this place are
actually like college kids or recent grads who read about
NIL and call themselves an Nile agent, or reach out
to kids on Instagram. And I get dms all the
time because people will see my tweets or listen to
our podcast, right. And I've had people say, hey, I've

(54:18):
signed these five players, they're in the market, but I've
never seen an anile collective contract. Can you send me
one or can you tell me how to talk to
a collective. I'm like, you're representing a player in the
biggest decision of his career and you've never seen a
collective contract. You don't know how to have the discussion.
They're like, hey, do we talk to the collective now

(54:38):
or when they get there? Like they don't even know
how the process goes. There's no education in this other
than listening to us talk on this podcast or reading
me and Darren Heidner and Mitt Winner's tweets, and I
think some of the worst actors I've seen are just
like young people who call themselves agents and reach out
to people on Instagram. And because you've got ANIL agent
in your bio, you seem official and you are ruining

(55:00):
people's careers.

Speaker 3 (55:01):
Sure, all right, let's do this.

Speaker 2 (55:03):
So we have basically one week left until the portal closes,
so we'll see. As you point out, there's going to
be probably some big names here. I'll throw out here
that if you listen to this and you have any
any sort of nil question, feel free to tweet us
or hit us up on Instagram to d m us
and we'll work it into a part three. And in

(55:26):
the meantime, like you get hit with these questions all
the time, as do I like you, and I got
to keep like a better text chain going of it.
We get the add that I think we're going on
something else. But it's going to be an interesting week
because you've had I know, there was one player. There's
one player that everybody said he told people was a
million dollars and he committed to a place, So I'd

(55:48):
love to know if that was in fact a million
dollars at the end of the day, and then let's
let's have a part three kind of wrap up discussion.
But yeah, so my my original rules that I thought
would work would be that you didn't get nil you

(56:09):
didn't get nil money until you played a game for
your program. That that was my and I believe that
you have to have retention bonuses like the whole way
to use this to quote unquote save the sport and
propel the sport because I think that there's a there's

(56:29):
a window there where you can make it so that
it's better than it's ever been because guys will stay
there two or three years and they're not going to
be a second round or undrafted draft pick.

Speaker 3 (56:40):
Right.

Speaker 2 (56:41):
But uh, but you gotta how do you create that window?
What do people want to see? They want to see
the best players play at the biggest schools, but they
want to see and for as long as possible they
kind of fall in love with these kids, if you will.
I thought that more tell your deals and you know

(57:02):
it's with the new rule, it's not going to happen,
so it doesn't even work. Bring it up I have
thought that not sitting out on the second transfer is
a mistake, like when you you don't have to be
fully engaged mentally because you can transfer and play anywhere.
But again, that's not the path that they're choosing to
fight right now. So I think the way to do
it is you have to have some sort of retention bonuses.

Speaker 3 (57:24):
And I'm with you on.

Speaker 2 (57:26):
The buyouts, like, hey, you want to leave, sure, bye
and go ahead, I'll be a buyout. I think those
two things along with some sort of delayed gratification.

Speaker 3 (57:36):
Where you have to perform for your getting paid.

Speaker 2 (57:38):
And I understand the other side to it, right, The
other side to it is, hey, they offer me this
gargantuan some money, everybody says they don't have it, and
if I don't get it July first, or you know,
July fifteenth, when I've been on campus for a month,
I'm out. So that's the other side to it, right
that you have to you have to protect the student,
not just protect the school. But there has to be
some form of balance in protecting both sides.

Speaker 4 (58:00):
Absolutely, I think retention bonuses are great. Graduation bonuses are great.
Team performance bonuses are great. Multi year deals with biolts.
Now biots have to go both ways. If you run
a kid off, you gotta pay him. You got to
buy him out of the right. And those are great,
And I think it would be fine if you don't

(58:23):
get paid unil you play for the school. If we
talked about there was some type of governing body where
if the money doesn't get paid, there's legal repercussions and
you can collect on that money like we have in overseas.
We have FEBA that you know, can can enforce that.
So I think me and you are having these conversations,
and everyone should be having these conversations. Who are you know,
stakeholders in the sport to move these things forward? You

(58:44):
know again, what we're doing right here is trying to
think of ideas and no one has all the answers.
But we get instead of his complaining about the way
things have changed, let's continue having no one has answers.
I am knee deep in this thing every single day
up to my eyeballs. I'm going to pick up my
phone and have fifty calls. But I don't have all
the answers. All I have is some ideas and a

(59:05):
desire for this thing to stabilize because I love college
basketball and I grew up doing some fourteen years old.
My best friends in the world are all college coaches,
and I just want to move this thing forward, just
like you do. We've created built our lives on this sport,
and I think instead of just complaining and bitching about
how everything's bad, like, let's just continue having these conversations

(59:27):
between me and you, between college coaches, between the NCAA,
between the agents, between the players, between the AAU coaches,
so we can all put our ideas together and fare
out how to move this thing forward. Because there is
a path forward, like you said, where there can be
a better future than there was before. No one, I
don't think anyone thinks the past was great, where coaches
are making millions of dollars and kids' families can't afford
to fly to see him play, and the only way

(59:48):
to do it is for a coach to illegally give
part of his salary and risk going to jail to
help keep that kid's lights on. No one thinks that
was the right system, but we all know that this
isn't the right system either.

Speaker 2 (59:59):
No, No, I do, but I do wonder like whenever
we put any even even if we get a collectively
bargain upon agreement, right, and again your years down the road.
Basketball has been an under the table pay sport forever, right,
So it's like, hey, we can.

Speaker 3 (01:00:18):
Only pay a kid two fifty, Like, do we really
think that that's what it's going to be. So that's that.

Speaker 4 (01:00:24):
But look, you're right, but the more the salaries are,
the less the under the table is relevant. When the
salaries are zero, that fifty grand in the shoe box
means a lot. When the salaries are four hundred thousand,
that fifty grand in going. It's funny. I noticed this.
I had this observation in the agent game recently. So
it used to be some agencies would pay huge upfront

(01:00:45):
sums to players to sign with them for the draft, right,
two hundred grand to get you a late first round pick. Well,
now players are late first round picks are coming out
with five hundred thousand in the bank. The agent can't
buy them anymore. They have to pick. They're generally in a.

Speaker 3 (01:01:00):
Pick energy, so it affects It affects the pro world
that they already have money, so there's not the desperation
in once once they get to the pro world. Just
to side with an agent.

Speaker 4 (01:01:10):
It's a lot harder to buy a draft pick, which
is great for me because I've never had the resources
to buy a draft pick in the first place. So
now guys are picking based much more based on, you know,
all things being equal, because you know that money doesn't
go as far. And I think to your point, the
shoe box money, Yeah, when there's a collectively bargained you know,
a system, Yeah, there might still be cheating, but the

(01:01:34):
cheating is going to have much less of an impact
because that you know, the under the table money is
going to be so much less than you know, in theory,
than what the salaries will be. So again to your point,
your earlier point, there is a brighter future here where
things could be great. We saw, you know, Armando Baycot
stay in college five years because he could have been
a two way player, but he kept coming back to
North Carolina. We've seen this with a few guys who

(01:01:57):
have stayed in college longer because that that money is
good and they can stay and developed. That's great. They're
gonna be got more guys graduating. There's going to be
there's so much upside.

Speaker 2 (01:02:07):
I mean, honestly, like even the Kofe Coburn story is
a terrible story for him, but it's a great story
for other big guys. Right, Like he leaves Illinois, could
have played one more year, doesn't play for a year
because he thought, you know whatever, he was making an
Illinois like that's what he should be playing for, and
that's like not the reality. And now I think he's playing.

(01:02:27):
I think he went and played the Philippines whatever. But
it's more. And you know, you hate it for Kobe,
but you like it for the best, Like, hey, dude,
you could stay here and have and have a hell
of a have a five year run where you're valued
as opposed to going out in the real in the
pro world, where you're not nearly as valued anymore because
of your position.

Speaker 4 (01:02:45):
I had this conversation this morning with the recruit and
his mother where he has two years left and he's
signing a one year deal for two hundred K, and
I'm like, hey, buddy, you played well. Next year, you
could make three hundred. He's like, oh, no, next year,
I'm gonna go pro no matter what I said, No,
no you're not. Because if next year you could stay
there and get your degree and your other best option

(01:03:07):
is going to Finland for thirty K. You're going to
take that three hundred and you're going to get your degree.
We're not just I know in your head you think
that's a good idea, but it's not a good idea.
And I think we're going to see more and more
guys staying, staying longer, graduating now that. On the other hand,
there's the multi transfer progress towards degree conversation of credits transferring.

(01:03:27):
But that's I think two in the weeds for this
audience for now. Even though every college basketball coach listens
to this podcast, I had no idea everybody listens to
the podcast. So hey, all my friends listening to this,
I know you all know what I'm talking about with
the progress towards degree issues we're dealing with right now
with multi time transfers. But I guess we can get
into that next time.

Speaker 2 (01:03:46):
Well let's say that next time, okay, because you also
have the progress or agree you have the online online classes,
which is an issue at some of these schools right
they don't want to take online classes and anything else that
comes up in this last week and a half in
the portal, and then we'll get to you get to
part three.

Speaker 4 (01:04:01):
Yeah, we never want to get into the weeds of
the academic Yes, Black Cities. I'm not the foremost expert.
We should bring on like Brandon Goebel or someone or
maybe just like a college coach, because there is we.

Speaker 3 (01:04:13):
Can bring on Geobal.

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
I think Goble has been on before. We can bring
on Goobal. I got no issue with that.

Speaker 4 (01:04:18):
With Goebel's my transcript. Man, I'm like, yo, Gooble, look
at this. This is this kid going to be able
to transfer. He's got to stay put. He's a wizard
with it. I don't know how he does it.

Speaker 2 (01:04:28):
All right, brother, I appreciate you joining me. Now you
get both phone calls to make. Thanks for being my guest.

Speaker 4 (01:04:32):
All right, thanks so much for having me again.

Speaker 2 (01:04:36):
All mine. Thanks to Dan Paraman. What a talented guy
with a great presence and way of presenting all his answers.
Truly appreciate his time. My thanks to you as well
for listening. Reminder, if you want to listen to the
Doug Gotlib Show, do so daily three to five Eastern
twelve to two Pacific, or listen. We have an hour
pod that is unfiltered, unedited and it's really cool. It's

(01:04:57):
called in the Bonus check it all out. Where we
download this find, you can download that one as well.
I'm Doug, gotta leave.

Speaker 4 (01:05:02):
This is all ball

Speaker 2 (01:05:20):
H