July 27, 2025 • 39 mins
Impact of NIL and Federal Regulations on Ohio State Recruiting | Skull Session Recruiting Podcast
In this episode of the Skull Session Recruiting Podcast, host Marc Givler and guest Tony Gerdeman discuss their recent experiences in Las Vegas and dive deep into the current state of college football recruiting. They explore the effects of recent NIL rules, executive orders, and the role of legal and government interventions on Ohio State's recruiting strategies. The conversation covers topics like the Big Ten Media Days, the role of agents, the potential impact of new legislation, and the broader implications for Ohio State and college football as a whole. Tune in for an insightful discussion on how these changes could shape the future of recruiting and the sport.
00:00 Welcome to the Skull Session Recruiting Podcast
00:09 Surviving Las Vegas and Big Ten Media Days
03:06 Recruiting Talk: NIL Rules and Government Involvement
06:21 Ohio State's Stance on NIL and Legal Challenges
14:22 The Future of NIL and Player Payments
20:33 The Reality of Recruiting Payments
20:47 Commitment Payments in College Sports
21:40 NCAA Violations and Consequences
23:24 The Role of Agents in NIL Deals
25:35 Regulating NIL Agents and Deals
29:03 Impact on College Football Recruiting
31:30 Ohio State's Approach to NIL
34:30 Future of NIL and College Sports
39:02 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
In this episode of the Skull Session Recruiting Podcast, host Marc Givler and guest Tony Gerdeman discuss their recent experiences in Las Vegas and dive deep into the current state of college football recruiting. They explore the effects of recent NIL rules, executive orders, and the role of legal and government interventions on Ohio State's recruiting strategies. The conversation covers topics like the Big Ten Media Days, the role of agents, the potential impact of new legislation, and the broader implications for Ohio State and college football as a whole. Tune in for an insightful discussion on how these changes could shape the future of recruiting and the sport.
00:00 Welcome to the Skull Session Recruiting Podcast
00:09 Surviving Las Vegas and Big Ten Media Days
03:06 Recruiting Talk: NIL Rules and Government Involvement
06:21 Ohio State's Stance on NIL and Legal Challenges
14:22 The Future of NIL and Player Payments
20:33 The Reality of Recruiting Payments
20:47 Commitment Payments in College Sports
21:40 NCAA Violations and Consequences
23:24 The Role of Agents in NIL Deals
25:35 Regulating NIL Agents and Deals
29:03 Impact on College Football Recruiting
31:30 Ohio State's Approach to NIL
34:30 Future of NIL and College Sports
39:02 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Hello, everyone, Welcome to the Skull Session Recruiting podcast. I
am Mark Givler, joined by Tony Gerdaman. Today, Tony, have
you survived? I'm not gonna power pause you, but have
you survived? Vegas?
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Survived? After walking up and down the strip Thursday night.
My dog's were barking afterwards, but back home, happy to
be home and got about a few days of rest
before camp starts. So looking forward to these next few
days before really getting going on the college football season.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Would you endorse a return to Vegas for the Big
Ten media days?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
I would not. I would not do that. There's there's
a lot of media that doesn't didn't go because it
was so far away, so so cost prohibitive, and you know,
so much of the media that covers Big Ten can
just drive to these things. And there were times that
the Oregon players and the all of the West Coast
players where they're they're tomare Ohio State beat, then other beats,
(00:59):
and so there's there's no point to go out west.
The The interesting thing was that Commissioner Tony Petiti said
the move from Indianapolis this season was a logistical thing
where Lucas Oil couldn't hold it, and apparently the only
other place in the nation or a planet Earth that
could was Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
So Chicago, no, no, Detroit No.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
In fact, too many of those places are like filmed.
There's a lot of movies being filmed and a lot
of those those civic areas. But I was we were
on radio row Tom and I and I was listening
to a Nebraska radio show and they're like, it's so
big now, Like this place is huge. I don't think
Chicago could even hold it anymore. There's no place to to,
(01:50):
you know, to have it, because there's no no football
stadium indoors that could do it or whatever. And I
don't clearly he's never been to the McCormick Place, where
the Big ten media has been before, which dwarfs it's
like one of the largest buildings in America, and it's
a twenty minute walk from one corner to the other,
which this was as well, because there's a lot of
(02:12):
buildings in Las Vegas that are connected and it's it
makes it an easy walk, but there's a there's a
lot of walking.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
No doubt. Yeah, Well, I was kind of joking on Twitter.
I think the only Logistically, I think the only worst
place for this thing would be la because that's even
more expensive and it's even further away for most of
the Big ten beat. But so we'll see. Hopefully it's
back in Indie next year or Chicago even I would
settle for that, but uh, yeah, we'll see. Uh, we'll
(02:41):
see what they decide to do. I do find it
odd that the Big Ten and Lucas Oil and the
fine folks there didn't like they knew, they kind of
know this is every year, Like, yeah, they were on
the same page here.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Somehow, I don't there's a twenty twenty five football.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
That didn't add up to me when I heard that either.
But oh well, we're gonna talk about recruiting because this
is the podcast for Bucky Huddle dot com. But uh,
you were able to talk to Ross b York, you
got you and Tom uh we're able to talk to
Ross Byork in Las Vegas. And it's almost outdated now
because of all the insanity that's going on. But the
(03:23):
theme of this show is to kind of talk about
what is going on with the nil rules and now
the government's involved, which is always all sorts of interesting.
What first of all, where does ross Byork stand on
things right now after you've talked to him, after the
executive order from the president came out, Like, where do
(03:46):
you think Ohio State sits right now? Are they full
go on nil or are they or now with the
executive order or they have to like continue to kind
of wait and see before they maybe deploy all of
their resources.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Right And the executive order one of the parts about
the third party and I thing where uh the the
executive order, which again an executive order is a suggestion
to hey, if you would like to maybe make this
a lot, you know, kind of feel free and please
do so because this is what the president wants. But
the order prohibits third party pay for play payments, but
(04:17):
it does not apply to third party like legitimate fair
market deals for players. So that's now we can all
just kind of roll our eyes at what is pay
for play and what isn't. Like So, if you've got
collectors or third party organizations setting up deals for players
to lure them to your place, I guess long as
(04:40):
long as it's fair market and it's a legit legitimate
business purpose, then things are okay. But we've seen schools
that will this is how they this is how they've
been getting recruits. And so there's this this line between
enticing and telling your crewer, this is what awaits, this
(05:03):
is what our players get, this is what you would
be in line for. And so with Ross like it
is funny because Tom talked to him for about five
or six minutes, and then about two minutes after that
Ross Ellinger story came out that the House Settlement Attorneys
were going to be in the in the the NCAA
(05:25):
were going to relax what a valid business was. That way,
the deals that were getting denied by collectives or from
collectives could maybe not be denied. So Tom talked to
him before that, and I had some questions. After talking
with Tom, I'm like, well, did he tell you this?
Did he tell you that? And so then I was
gonna go get some clarification. And as I'm waiting in
(05:45):
line to talk to Ross about the clarification, I think
Kevin texted us with the with the story from Ross Ellinger,
and so like I'm holding my phone in my hand,
I'm like, Ross, looks like the deal that the rules
on collectives and third parties are going to be relaxed. Like, well,
it's He didn't want to comment too much because it's
(06:06):
just you know, reading something on the phone and it's
not official yet, but he did say regardless of what
you call it, collectives or third party deals like, Ohio
State will be ready to go. They just need to
know the rules. And what he told Tom in that
first interview is Ohio State will always be on the
(06:27):
right side of the equation, meaning the right side of
the rules. And what they didn't want to do through
this whole thing and fans, some fans absolutely hated it.
They didn't want to make a promise to a player
or a recruit or whatever that couldn't be followed through on.
That was another thing that Ryan Day said that it
(06:48):
would be a bad look for Ohio State and they
don't want to ever look bad to make a promise
or kind of like allude to a deal that wouldn't happen.
So that's why they've been so I guess you would
say conservative and how they've been approaching this. But as
I talked with Ross when after this thing came down,
he said, Ohio States we're plugging play. Like the Buckeye
(07:11):
Sports group that they have the media or the marketing
arm is ready to go, and it's been going. They
just needed to clear up the gray area to know
how much more they could go. Kind of like when
you get to I don't know, like out in the
middle of Wyoming when there where there is no speed limits, like,
we just need to know what the speed limit is
(07:31):
and so that way we can know how fast to go.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
It feels like Ohio State has the money, can and loaded,
but they're afraid to pull the trigger right now. That's
what it feels like to me from talking to people
more on the recruiting side of things, is that the
is that the indication.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
You got from Ross York, Yeah, exactly. And one of
one of the other things is, you know, he believes
that the Buckeye Sports Group that they have, which again
this is where kind of they brought the guys in
from the collective and from the collectives to advise on
this marketing arm that Ohio State has where they can
direct or the buckets sportscript can put players and deals
(08:14):
together basically, and he said he calls it a huge
advantage for Ohio State. So they've got all these businesses,
they've got all of these people that want to help.
It's just a matter of what we what you know,
this is like ross, Like what we can't do right
now is just fire that money canon because that's not
(08:37):
a legal thing to do. But as the legality of it,
the definition of of valid business purpose gets stretched a
little to include what collectives tend to do, which is
an autograph, show a charity. Thing like those start to
fall perhaps under this because again all of these deals
(08:58):
still have to be submitted to nil GO. The thing
is the nil GO has kind of been advised to
allow a more more leniency towards these things. Now we'll
see if they get passed and how many don't. But
Ohio State seems equipped to then compete and excel, if
(09:20):
you will, at what what the rules will allow, which
is now a maybe a better understanding until something new happens.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
It used to be compliance that Ohio say you had
to listen to. Now it's legal. Used to be compliance
kind of set the guidelines for the school. Now it's
OSU legal because they've got interpret all this right, I mean,
and and you know, I know people have argued with
me a little bit about this, but you know, you
can show me the organizational chart that shows who's in
(09:57):
charge who's not in charge. But the bottom line is
that if OSU legal says no, the answers no. Whether
you're Ryan Day, whether you're ross Byorke, whether you're the
president of the university. If OSU legal says no, the
answer is no. And if you go against OSU legal
in that way, you very much risk losing your job.
So OSU legal is now deciphering all of this stuff,
(10:17):
but with new information every day, whether it's like new
legislation being introduced, the President randomly putting out an executive
order that seems very much like what we already thought
the rules were, didn't really actually seemed like a lot
of headlines for not a lot of actual new information.
(10:39):
You know, you know how much does OSU legal now
kind of control when os you can fire the money cannon?
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Well, and that was initially you know, why is Ohio
State slow playing things? One of the things that Ross
said was that the settlement came later than expected, like
months later than expected, So then it becomes matter of okay,
let's talk to legal about what we can do and
what we can't do. So then that shrinks your timeline
to go off and load the cannon and fire the
(11:09):
cannon and do all of those things. And now, like
everything that comes down, it has to go right back
to legal. What can we do? What does this executive
Order mean? The Score Act which came after, which is
part of going trying to get through Congress right now,
So you had the House Settlement, which ross called the framework,
but you always need congressional help. The Score Act is
(11:32):
some more of that. You know, foundation and you know, drain,
dry wall and plumbing and electrical so all of these
things are going into building this house. And then the
Executive Order is really very much similar to the Score
Act from Congress. So I think all of these things,
like each of these things looks like the you know,
(11:52):
a portion of the other, but it's like, yeah, that's
if you build a house, you're going to recognize all
of the different steps. Is what are you just building
a house? Yes, it's all of it to build this
and put it together. And then you know, you get
the anti trust stuff that they need to secure the
ability to pay players but also limit payments to players
and things like that, because that's also really that's that's
(12:15):
the entire gist of a lot of why the NCAA
enforcement isn't play forever. And that's why all of these
laws or these score acts and these things. It's like
limiting what players can be paid by unscrupulous people. And
that's really like that's been all of the NCAA probation
(12:38):
things for decades. Is you know, somebody gets caught giving
money or accepting money, and so to be able to
limit that and then keep it within the rules, you
need some sort of legal help. And these are all
different steps to make that happen. And Ohio State, you know,
they just they don't want to be on the wrong
(13:00):
side legal They can be on the wrong side in
terms of well we thought it was going to go
this way, but it went that way. And maybe that's
what's happened here where there they were. They're always going
to be okay with being on the wrong side of guessing.
They don't want to be on the wrong side of
like guessing get gets guessing legally wrong. So like here
(13:22):
rules have shifted, so then we can now you know,
they can now move forward. Whereas if the rules hadn't shifted,
then Ohio States decision would have been in the right
so legally and and then then also practically, but the
legal side of it is always going to be now
kind of what directs them because as Brian Day said,
(13:45):
the gray area, which this whole thing is, drives him insane.
And so any type of clarity you can begin to build,
then you can get out of the legal way because
legal knows and gives you an answer. So legal really
is no longer a part of it because you have
your answer and you know what is legal, so you
don't have to keep going to legal, like, hey, can
(14:06):
we can we recruit this kid? Can we recruit that kid?
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Like?
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Legal has nothing to do with that. You now know
the rules, and that's all they're waiting for us to
know the rules so that they can then move forward
and be the aggressive entity that they want to be.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Here's the risk, though, of waiting. I'm not convinced this
is going to be a quick process because I'm fully
convinced at this point that anything that actually gets through
and gets accepted and gets approved or agreed upon however
you want to look at this, there's gonna be legal
challenges to it coming from like the players, Like you
(14:47):
can't tell me that one trip to a children's hospital
isn't worth a million dollars? How are you going to
tell me that that's too much money for my time
that day, Like that's gonna without them becoming employees, we are,
in my opinion, going to exist in nothing but a
gray area.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
And that's what yeah, yeah, yeah, and that's why you've
got so many like the score Act. And then you know,
whatever players, whatever deals players will eventually sign, they'll have
to probably agree to these things. Yeah right, And and
the other thing is the so many players don't don't
(15:27):
necessarily want to be employees, don't want to be part
of a union because hey, I'm only here for three years.
I don't need like I'm going to be I'm three
and out. Why would I risk a year of striking
or whatever and limit myself. I've got myself to worry about,
whereas all of these other pro leagues, like you're thinking
about five years, ten years, but not just then, but
(15:48):
you're thinking I need pension. Like so you're thinking some
people think forty years down the road. Nobody in college
other than you, like the act. The degree side of it,
you're thinking, you're supposed to be thinking four years down
the road. A lot of these guys, you know, why
why would they because they're going to be jumping into
another union in three or four years. So this is
just one small step, one one little bit of time
(16:11):
where they can make some money. But then the NFL
is the real money. And you mentioned like a player
taking someone taking somebody to court for limiting what they
could make. They're gonna have people trying to give them
money that will join that fight, you know, where we're
trying to give him the money, so you can't tell
him he's not worth it, and that's where you have
(16:31):
to I guess. I guess maybe at that point there
there still can't be a cap because there's no cap
on nil in terms of there's no NFL camp cap
on nil. So I don't know that you necessarily capped.
I think at that point you just let the market
settle itself and then you you maybe just try to
keep up. That's I think really that's all you can do.
(16:53):
But again, the the enforcement arm of it, then the
CSC where they're going to probably be looking harder at
what are pay for play? Like you know, this is
clearly just an inducement. Is there something that they will
do about that? They want to be quicker about all
(17:14):
of these things? You know, the NCAA investigations Michigan. Still,
you know, a couple months away or a month away
from finding out about something that happened back in twenty one,
twenty two, and twenty three. They want to be a
lot quicker with these things, and it's one guy handing
down the punishment. So you would hope they've gone through
all of these troubles to put in rules that they
(17:35):
would take the rule breakers seriously. And now with things
have been so wild West for a long time. Once
the once the law comes to town, it'll be interesting
to see how much things keep going on. Because, as
ross Bjork said, you know, if you can't be paying recruits,
that's the one thing, Like you cannot give recruits money.
(17:56):
If you do, you you've endangered yourself and you've endangered
that rec So any school or any collective that is,
you know, paying a kid money right now can't happen.
It's not supposed to happen, and so there needs to
be enforcement if that is happening. That's the other thing
that people keep talking about. Now that we've got these rules,
that's enforce them, because they don't mean anything if you're
not enforcing them.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
A lot to unpack there. So I'm going to try
to unpack two things. One, I think the dirty little
secret that no one wants to really admit because there's
a lot of play I see a lot of people
on Twitter screaming make them employees, you know, uh, let them,
you know, the players need to unionize all that other stuff.
(18:40):
Here's the dirty, lost little secret to that most of
the players don't want to be employees. They don't, and
I think people assume they do. They don't. They They
kind of like how this is working for them right
now without the hassle of a union. So that's like
the dirty little secret is that I don't think anybody
wants them to be employed. I don't think the schools
(19:02):
want them to be employees. I don't think the players
want to be employees. You'll find some who maybe do,
but I think for the most I think if you
if you did a poll, the majority would side with
we don't want to be employees or we don't want
the players to be employees. And so that's that's the
I think the dirty little secret here that people who
are just streaming make them employees. And it's not that simple.
You can't make someone an employees doesn't want to be
(19:22):
an employee. So there's a lot to unpack there, and
so I don't know what the answer is there other
than again, just some type of waiver, as you alluded to,
where you're agreeing to abide by a certain set of
rules in order to maintain your your eligibility as a
college athlete. I mean, that's that's kind of where we're at.
(19:42):
And you hope, if you're on the Ohio state side
of this thing, you're hoping that this is done sooner
rather than later, because the longer this goes, the longer
this content the wheels continue to spin here in the mud,
the more the schools who aren't really caring about this
and just kind of doing what they're do are gaining
an advantage. And you can sit here and hope that
(20:05):
you know, in two years or six months or whatever,
that people are gonna go back and look at this
and be like, yeah, you guys were clearly like breaking
the rules, like you guys were going one hundred and
fifty and a sixty, like you guys were not just
going ten miles an hour over the speed limit, like
you were going three times the speed limit, flipping off
the cops on the way through, like you would hope
(20:26):
those people get dealt with, but history kind of shows
us maybe not that that may not happen. So that's
an issue for Ohio State. Here's the other thing that
you mentioned that I didn't want to talk about. You know,
you can't pay recruits. I got news for people. Recruits
are being paid right now. They're being paid to commit.
They're being paid monthly payments by certain schools to stay committed.
(20:47):
They're getting checks every month to stay committed. It's unbelievable.
And I do wonder like and people are gonna laugh,
and you know they're probably people are sure that's happening.
More it's happening. Like I told everyone during COVID, I said,
schools are hosting visitors right now and they're not supposed
to be. I said that during COVID. People laughed at me. No,
they're not. No one would be that dumb, no one,
(21:08):
you know, how would they get away with it? And
sure enough, very quickly, we found out that multiple schools,
and there are schools that didn't get busted forward that
we're doing it, but multiple schools that I knew were
doing it got busted for it. Michigan and Arizona State
are two of them that got raped you know, over
the cold by the media the public for doing this.
So like that was happening then, I said it was happening,
(21:31):
and sure enough, like this is happening now, I promise
you this is happening. Schools are paying for commitments and
paying monthly payments to keep those commitments. So it's going
to be interesting to see if this is you know,
something that the NCAA is able to prove and kind
of catch teams or schools red handed on what is
is there going to be real punishment for this?
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Well? And that point at that point doesn't just go
back to the old rules where any money that a
player's received it and makes them ineligible. When we've seen
in years in basketball playing over in the European League,
you are now ineligible. So there are things that they'd
have to pay it back.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
So long to get to this point of like clarity
that many of these situations, those kids you hope are
still in school, I guess, so there could be some
like some of these kids might not even be in
school anymore, or they may have transferred or twice already
before this even like gets figured out. At the snail's pace,
(22:32):
these things moved. I guess that's the thing here is like, Okay,
if a kid in a you know, in the twenty
twenty four class or something, was getting monthly payments to
remain committed and sign with that school, and it's twenty
twenty eight now and we're finally getting around to like
punishing schools, and that kid's already in the NFL or
out of college or whatever, it might be like, how
(22:53):
are we even going to figure this out?
Speaker 2 (22:56):
And the other portion of this with collectives because it's collectives,
I guess that would be the the the folks paying
recruits at that point, because it's one hand away, like
one one degree of separation away.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
From you just do that.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
The collectives did it exactly. But are those considered boosters,
and we know boosters can't pay recruits, So there's that
aspect of it as well. And you know, even even
the ones, even the deals that are probably legitimate to
like like Felix Ojoe right where his was. If the
(23:34):
rules are relaxed, it's a one point three million dollar
deal whatever. If the rules are not relaxed, it's gonna
be about four or five hundred thousand, like that's his
agent is out there talking about these things, which is
it's a wild time to be live. But the fact
that you know, even I guess it's I guess that's
a a good agent, like a a a trusted agent,
(23:56):
like an up. You know, a guy that is on
the the just one you can trust and is following
the rules because he's given you two different deals like
if it's crazy, if it's wild West, here's your deal.
But if it's not, here's your deal, here's our deal.
Because I guess if he was unscreepy list, then it
would just be like, here's the biggest money we can
get and there is no like. But if we follow
(24:18):
the rules, then it's this much lower. And now again
these all of these deals still have to pass through
Ni'll go, so it's not just firing off money can
and stuff like. You still have to I think at
this point now you would have to show up at
least for the autograph signing, which before there are players
who'd never showed up on anything for any of their
(24:40):
nil deals.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
Trusted agent.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
Okay, well, and that was another part of the I
think the Executive Order and the score Act is limiting
how much the agents can make because some of these
agents are pulling ten to twenty percent off of these kids,
which is.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
Some of these people, some of these agents have no
experience in any of this, And there's all ah, I'm
and I'm an nil agent. I'm like what, like there,
did you take a course, did you like have to
learn anything about this? Did you have to pass any
type of test? Did you have to you know, has
your character been tested in a way that like would
make you reliable to a sixteen or seventeen year old
(25:20):
and his parents who have never been through anything like this, Like,
they got to totally overhaul that to start, because when
you say trusted agent, I'm like, I don't know how
many of those are there? Like, there are a lot
of people looking to take advantage of the situation right now.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
Yeah, and in this landscape and a number of different
varieties because this is a brand new commercial market that
is available to like where what can we serve and
serve ourselves doing so? But yeah, the agent side of things,
there needs to be certification yesterday because there are a
lot of people being taken advantage of. And I think
(25:59):
I think if it's the score actor the executive order
wanting to limit the commission and the cut by you know,
to like maybe three or five percent tops, which then
that also maybe cuts out a lot of people who
are like, wow, it's not worth my time to do this,
which is good because the number of people classifying themselves
(26:19):
an agents throughout all of these NIL deals is incredible.
I think it'saw an article where there's maybe like I
don't know, like fifteen hundred two twenty five hundred people
that are now like listed as agents in this thing,
which come.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
On, yeah, they got it. That's almost if it's not
step one, it's step two like that of this Like okay,
I know you have to have guidelines for the actual
distribute distribution of NIL money and what constitutes a legitimate
like I know, you gotta have that under control. You
got to get this agent stuff under control. There are
(26:54):
like so many like the third uncle has become like
legitimized somehow in all of this and is now like
able to legally take a cut without any like proof
that they know what they're doing, that they have you know,
any standard of ethics that they have to abide by,
like nothing, So like that's got to be a huge
thing here too. So these kids in their families aren't
(27:15):
getting taken advantage of, you know, and I know those
schools don't want to be dealing with them. That's the
other he do not want to be dealing with these people,
with a lot of them. I mean, there are absolutely
people who are attached to legitimate sports agencies that I
know are doing the right things here, but like a
lot of these other people that aren't, the schools want
nothing to do with these people.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
Yeah, he checked the words right out of my mouth,
the Urban Meyer third uncle thing, where he would just
lament these as he coined them, the third uncle. And
there's no certification for a third uncle. And a lot
of those third uncles are now listened as agents. So
that gives you an idea of how qualified they are
to be there, and whose interest they have in mind,
and really how shallow the thinking is on what is
(27:57):
best for the player, because a lot of the third
uncles think what's best for the players an extra twelve
thousand dollars from a particular program without looking at what
the other program might bring them exactly.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
And that's that's the other thing. Is you've got people
who are like again, like I get it if you're
if one school's offering you three hundred thousand and another
school's offering you one point two million, that's a really
hard thing to turn down. But you've got agents, agents
squeezing every dollar they can out of these deals, and
(28:30):
it's like, Okay, you've got three schools right in the
same ballpark, and you're just trying to play them against
each other and get one extra dollar here, one dollar.
Look at how about looking at the head coaches on
the hot seat? How about looking like how long the
assistant coach has been there in his track record? How
about looking about the degree or you're the player, the
area of education that the player wants to, you know, explore.
(28:52):
What about the development? What about where how many position?
How many players at your position has that program or
that coaching staff, that position coach sent to the NFL
at the fishing play? Like those are all still important
things here, And I'm I've been pro paying players since
day one. I feel it'd be hypocritical not to in
our position, almost because we we make money covering the sport,
(29:17):
Like shouldn't the players that we cover that we get
paid to cover, shouldn't they get paid like it's kind
of hypocritical for me to sit here and say they
should get paid. So I've always been pro paying players
to something. But there's we got to get this under
control a little bit. And like the NCAA just completely
was content to not do this. They've lost billions of
dollars over the years in legal fees fighting this, and
(29:40):
then when it was clear they were about to take
the final kill shot, they just put their hands up
and said, fie, you guys, take care of it. We're
not even gonna assist in the transition or putting guardrails in,
and we're gonna like almost burn our own house down.
It was the dumbest thing I've ever seen in my life.
And so here we are now and they've just got
to get this back on the rails. And there is
a way to do it. This isn't impossible. This like
(30:02):
this is not we are not trying to cure cancer here.
There is a way to compensate players fairly and also
not completely destroy the sport. Like the idea that it
can't be done is so absurd. I can't even begin
to rant about it. Like it's definitely something that can
be done. So they just need to figure out how
(30:24):
to do it.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, And I've said this on buck Eye tommorrow morning.
I've said this on the book a weekly podcast. You know,
a couple of years ago, Congress said we will help you,
we will not save you to the NCAAA, and so
that you get the house settlement, as I said, that's
like the structure of the framework of the house. And
then Congress comes in and eventually something is going to
(30:45):
happen there to start building that up and kind of
finding everything and legalizing everything, so that the house settlement
lasts for ten years, but the laws would last much
longer than that. And know, will they be challenged probably,
But if if, if it's if, it's law, then you.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
Know that law until it's challenged and changed, and then
you have to from there move forward with how you
operate under a new law. But you're not gonna get
punished for following what was law. So yeah, not to
cut you off there, but yeah, I see exactly what
you're saying there, and and that's probably the practical way
(31:26):
to go about it if you're a school. But gosh,
this all seems to be slow in Ohio state down,
doesn't it it?
Speaker 2 (31:34):
Yeah, And like I said, they the settlement took longer
than expected, and so that I think that allowed a
lot of other schools that were not gonna limit themselves
to go out there. But then, you know, I was
talking with was on a show with a Texas reporter
three and a half weeks ago, and he was talking
(31:56):
about the way he was talking about what Texas was doing.
It was the exact same thing as Ohio State. They're
gonna slow down, they're gonna wait to see what happens.
And then like two days later, Texas just went on
a tear. So it's like they they decided we're done play,
We're done slow playing this. So like it apparently can
go just like that. Now the problem is at least
one or two of those targets that that Texas went
(32:17):
and I think grabbed, we're also an Ohio State's radar.
So then the question becomes how quickly can Ohio State
catch up from this lead that a bunch of people,
but some other schools have had and it's not every
school I know. Ohio State fans like to think this
is every school out in front and Ohio State has
been the only school holding back. That's not the case,
(32:38):
but when you see this school in that school, in
that school, it feels like everything every school when your
targets are going away, And I'm fascinated to see what
happens if Ohio State can suddenly start. You know, somebody
that was committed and to Texas or whatever is like, yes,
I'm going to take a visit in the fall to
Ohio State. And because I think what deals can deals
(32:58):
can't be signed for crew or a recruit cannot receive
money until they are on campus as a student athlete,
I think they can start signing potential deals like future deals,
like maybe August first with with the scholarship stuff that
the offers that are out there. But again, like I'm like,
(33:20):
what is are there buyouts in these things before there doesn't?
Is there is there a penalty because there can't be
a buyout if you've not received anything, So I guess
it just depends on these deals. And then if if
there is a penalty, is that just does the school
pay that the next school pay that? And then I
think there is something where if if there is a
(33:41):
buyout that needs to be paid by one school to another,
that has to come out of the rev share rather
than the third party nil stuff. So there's all like
little intricacies in there where like this is why legal
needs to be sitting on stuff for a month going
through it. And and that's why we're all just waiting
(34:03):
here twiddling our thumbs figuring out, like what's taking so long.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
The lawyers win again, Tony. The lawyers always win. They
always win. It's unbelievable. They're undefeated. The lawyers are undefeated.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
It's like hypothetical SEC matchups that that is.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
And lawyers, yes, and death and taxes are they all
are the are the undefeated things in our society right now?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
So that's that's why I continue to predict that. And again,
I'm not sitting here saying this is necessarily going to
be some like great Ohio State windfall in November or December.
What I'm just saying, in general across college football recruiting
is we are in for an even wilder November December
than anything we've ever seen. And we've already seen some
crazy stuff the last several years, so it's gonna be
(34:53):
even crazier. I think there's gonna be promises aren't to
be able to be kept. Things are going to be
walked back. You're gonna have your normal cold feet from
You're going to have your normal desperation offers that come
into the end. It's like a perfect storm of chaos
that's going to be descending upon college football recruiting here
in November and December, and we'll see if a High
States can be on the good or the bad side
of it. I think they've positioned themselves to be on
(35:15):
to be able to baby benefit from it. But we'll see,
you know, we won't know until we know, so we
will keep an eye on that. Of course, stay locked
on a Buckeye Huddle dot com as we get ready
for fall camp. We are going to be at what
three practices at the end of the week. At the
end of this coming week, those will be open. So
saytuned Buckehello dot com and of course here on YouTube
(35:36):
for coverage of those practices, hopefully some video the practices,
hopefully certainly some analysis of the practices and some observations.
And then obviously we're like we're we're here, man, like
the seasons like here, So we're you know, I'm not
Tom Moore. I'm not going to give you the exact days.
I'm not smart enough to make do that math. But
we're like what we're like thirty four days or something
like that from kickoff. It's something in that ballpark. So
(36:01):
it's happening. So it's here. We're gonna be on top
of things at buckfy Huddle dot com. We're gonna be
on top of things here at the Skull Session Recruiting Podcast. Tony,
any parting thoughts on the craziness we're going we're experiencing
right now with the.
Speaker 2 (36:15):
Government regarding sports.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Yes, we stick to sports on this channel, Tony, Yes, Yes.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I will just say one of the things Brian Day
did say was it can create a culture issue if
some of your highest paid players are the ones that
aren't playing. So that is also something to keep in
mind when it comes to recruits. Now, Mark, you also
know they have made some very large deals to recruits
that fell through, like not that the deal wasn't there,
but the recruits signed elsewhere. So they're willing to put
(36:47):
the money out there. But it's also something that they
take seriously when it comes to the locker room.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
Yeah, no question. I think that's that's the one thing
that regardless of what the rules are, regardless of how
much money you're spending what your budget is. You do
have to and fans do have to realize this. You know,
you cannot bring in a high school kid and pay
him more than your star receiver, your star quarterback, your
star running back, your star safety. Like, it's just not
(37:17):
sustainable to do things that way. So regardless of what
the budget is, that's got to be a constant thing
of culture and everything else. We saw the schools that
I said this on Twitter the other day, the schools
that tried to be the pioneers of NIL failed spectacularly.
That Texas A and m class was a disaster on
(37:37):
the field, it was a disaster in the locker room.
Half those kids have transferred, probably more than half those
kids of transferred. It was an absolute disaster by trying
to be the pioneers of NIL. So I think, and
you know, it hasn't really worked at Miami. They were
better last year, they didn't really beat anybody, and they
because I didn't get in the playoffs because of it.
But they've had their issues as well. You know, we've
(38:00):
seen the kind of the bad headlines that have popped
up around the country over some of this stuff, and
so Ohio State there is something to be said. Obviously,
Ohio States want a national championship. So hey, there's that
if you needed anything else. That high stat's doing okay
the national championship a few months ago. But there's something
to be said that Ohio State hasn't been blasted in
the headlines over their mishandling of an nil situation or
(38:22):
you know, promises they couldn't keep, or paying a bunch
of money and having it blow out, having a class
blow up because of it. There's something to be said
for not being involved in any of those you know
kind of you know, mini scandals. It's not really scandal scandals,
but those types of bad poor negative publicity. So we'll
see how things go here. And yeah, they're not broke folks,
they're just they just seem to be. They just they're
(38:45):
they're like, you know, in investing terms, like they're sitting
on a lot of cash right now, Like they're not invested.
They haven't like they're ready to deploy the cash. They
just haven't found the right stock yet or I guess
I don't know what, I don't know how else to
put it, but the money cannon is loaded. We'll see
when they're able to fire it. Thank you Tony for
doing this. Get some rest after Vegas and we will
(39:07):
be back this week to talk more recruiting, and we'll
get back in like the individual players, and we'll get
out of it. Let the federal government continue to do
what they do. So thanks everyone for watching and listening,
and we will talk to you soon
Hello, everyone, Welcome to the Skull Session Recruiting podcast. I
am Mark Givler, joined by Tony Gerdaman. Today, Tony, have
you survived? I'm not gonna power pause you, but have
you survived? Vegas?
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Survived? After walking up and down the strip Thursday night.
My dog's were barking afterwards, but back home, happy to
be home and got about a few days of rest
before camp starts. So looking forward to these next few
days before really getting going on the college football season.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Would you endorse a return to Vegas for the Big
Ten media days?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
I would not. I would not do that. There's there's
a lot of media that doesn't didn't go because it
was so far away, so so cost prohibitive, and you know,
so much of the media that covers Big Ten can
just drive to these things. And there were times that
the Oregon players and the all of the West Coast
players where they're they're tomare Ohio State beat, then other beats,
(00:59):
and so there's there's no point to go out west.
The The interesting thing was that Commissioner Tony Petiti said
the move from Indianapolis this season was a logistical thing
where Lucas Oil couldn't hold it, and apparently the only
other place in the nation or a planet Earth that
could was Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
So Chicago, no, no, Detroit No.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
In fact, too many of those places are like filmed.
There's a lot of movies being filmed and a lot
of those those civic areas. But I was we were
on radio row Tom and I and I was listening
to a Nebraska radio show and they're like, it's so
big now, Like this place is huge. I don't think
Chicago could even hold it anymore. There's no place to to,
(01:50):
you know, to have it, because there's no no football
stadium indoors that could do it or whatever. And I
don't clearly he's never been to the McCormick Place, where
the Big ten media has been before, which dwarfs it's
like one of the largest buildings in America, and it's
a twenty minute walk from one corner to the other,
which this was as well, because there's a lot of
(02:12):
buildings in Las Vegas that are connected and it's it
makes it an easy walk, but there's a there's a
lot of walking.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
No doubt. Yeah, Well, I was kind of joking on Twitter.
I think the only Logistically, I think the only worst
place for this thing would be la because that's even
more expensive and it's even further away for most of
the Big ten beat. But so we'll see. Hopefully it's
back in Indie next year or Chicago even I would
settle for that, but uh, yeah, we'll see. Uh, we'll
(02:41):
see what they decide to do. I do find it
odd that the Big Ten and Lucas Oil and the
fine folks there didn't like they knew, they kind of
know this is every year, Like, yeah, they were on
the same page here.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Somehow, I don't there's a twenty twenty five football.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
That didn't add up to me when I heard that either.
But oh well, we're gonna talk about recruiting because this
is the podcast for Bucky Huddle dot com. But uh,
you were able to talk to Ross b York, you
got you and Tom uh we're able to talk to
Ross Byork in Las Vegas. And it's almost outdated now
because of all the insanity that's going on. But the
(03:23):
theme of this show is to kind of talk about
what is going on with the nil rules and now
the government's involved, which is always all sorts of interesting.
What first of all, where does ross Byork stand on
things right now after you've talked to him, after the
executive order from the president came out, Like, where do
(03:46):
you think Ohio State sits right now? Are they full
go on nil or are they or now with the
executive order or they have to like continue to kind
of wait and see before they maybe deploy all of
their resources.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Right And the executive order one of the parts about
the third party and I thing where uh the the
executive order, which again an executive order is a suggestion
to hey, if you would like to maybe make this
a lot, you know, kind of feel free and please
do so because this is what the president wants. But
the order prohibits third party pay for play payments, but
(04:17):
it does not apply to third party like legitimate fair
market deals for players. So that's now we can all
just kind of roll our eyes at what is pay
for play and what isn't. Like So, if you've got
collectors or third party organizations setting up deals for players
to lure them to your place, I guess long as
(04:40):
long as it's fair market and it's a legit legitimate
business purpose, then things are okay. But we've seen schools
that will this is how they this is how they've
been getting recruits. And so there's this this line between
enticing and telling your crewer, this is what awaits, this
(05:03):
is what our players get, this is what you would
be in line for. And so with Ross like it
is funny because Tom talked to him for about five
or six minutes, and then about two minutes after that
Ross Ellinger story came out that the House Settlement Attorneys
were going to be in the in the the NCAA
(05:25):
were going to relax what a valid business was. That way,
the deals that were getting denied by collectives or from
collectives could maybe not be denied. So Tom talked to
him before that, and I had some questions. After talking
with Tom, I'm like, well, did he tell you this?
Did he tell you that? And so then I was
gonna go get some clarification. And as I'm waiting in
(05:45):
line to talk to Ross about the clarification, I think
Kevin texted us with the with the story from Ross Ellinger,
and so like I'm holding my phone in my hand,
I'm like, Ross, looks like the deal that the rules
on collectives and third parties are going to be relaxed. Like, well,
it's He didn't want to comment too much because it's
(06:06):
just you know, reading something on the phone and it's
not official yet, but he did say regardless of what
you call it, collectives or third party deals like, Ohio
State will be ready to go. They just need to
know the rules. And what he told Tom in that
first interview is Ohio State will always be on the
(06:27):
right side of the equation, meaning the right side of
the rules. And what they didn't want to do through
this whole thing and fans, some fans absolutely hated it.
They didn't want to make a promise to a player
or a recruit or whatever that couldn't be followed through on.
That was another thing that Ryan Day said that it
(06:48):
would be a bad look for Ohio State and they
don't want to ever look bad to make a promise
or kind of like allude to a deal that wouldn't happen.
So that's why they've been so I guess you would
say conservative and how they've been approaching this. But as
I talked with Ross when after this thing came down,
he said, Ohio States we're plugging play. Like the Buckeye
(07:11):
Sports group that they have the media or the marketing
arm is ready to go, and it's been going. They
just needed to clear up the gray area to know
how much more they could go. Kind of like when
you get to I don't know, like out in the
middle of Wyoming when there where there is no speed limits, like,
we just need to know what the speed limit is
(07:31):
and so that way we can know how fast to go.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
It feels like Ohio State has the money, can and loaded,
but they're afraid to pull the trigger right now. That's
what it feels like to me from talking to people
more on the recruiting side of things, is that the
is that the indication.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
You got from Ross York, Yeah, exactly. And one of
one of the other things is, you know, he believes
that the Buckeye Sports Group that they have, which again
this is where kind of they brought the guys in
from the collective and from the collectives to advise on
this marketing arm that Ohio State has where they can
direct or the buckets sportscript can put players and deals
(08:14):
together basically, and he said he calls it a huge
advantage for Ohio State. So they've got all these businesses,
they've got all of these people that want to help.
It's just a matter of what we what you know,
this is like ross, Like what we can't do right
now is just fire that money canon because that's not
(08:37):
a legal thing to do. But as the legality of it,
the definition of of valid business purpose gets stretched a
little to include what collectives tend to do, which is
an autograph, show a charity. Thing like those start to
fall perhaps under this because again all of these deals
(08:58):
still have to be submitted to nil GO. The thing
is the nil GO has kind of been advised to
allow a more more leniency towards these things. Now we'll
see if they get passed and how many don't. But
Ohio State seems equipped to then compete and excel, if
(09:20):
you will, at what what the rules will allow, which
is now a maybe a better understanding until something new happens.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
It used to be compliance that Ohio say you had
to listen to. Now it's legal. Used to be compliance
kind of set the guidelines for the school. Now it's
OSU legal because they've got interpret all this right, I mean,
and and you know, I know people have argued with
me a little bit about this, but you know, you
can show me the organizational chart that shows who's in
(09:57):
charge who's not in charge. But the bottom line is
that if OSU legal says no, the answers no. Whether
you're Ryan Day, whether you're ross Byorke, whether you're the
president of the university. If OSU legal says no, the
answer is no. And if you go against OSU legal
in that way, you very much risk losing your job.
So OSU legal is now deciphering all of this stuff,
(10:17):
but with new information every day, whether it's like new
legislation being introduced, the President randomly putting out an executive
order that seems very much like what we already thought
the rules were, didn't really actually seemed like a lot
of headlines for not a lot of actual new information.
(10:39):
You know, you know how much does OSU legal now
kind of control when os you can fire the money cannon?
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Well, and that was initially you know, why is Ohio
State slow playing things? One of the things that Ross
said was that the settlement came later than expected, like
months later than expected, So then it becomes matter of okay,
let's talk to legal about what we can do and
what we can't do. So then that shrinks your timeline
to go off and load the cannon and fire the
(11:09):
cannon and do all of those things. And now, like
everything that comes down, it has to go right back
to legal. What can we do? What does this executive
Order mean? The Score Act which came after, which is
part of going trying to get through Congress right now,
So you had the House Settlement, which ross called the framework,
but you always need congressional help. The Score Act is
(11:32):
some more of that. You know, foundation and you know, drain,
dry wall and plumbing and electrical so all of these
things are going into building this house. And then the
Executive Order is really very much similar to the Score
Act from Congress. So I think all of these things,
like each of these things looks like the you know,
(11:52):
a portion of the other, but it's like, yeah, that's
if you build a house, you're going to recognize all
of the different steps. Is what are you just building
a house? Yes, it's all of it to build this
and put it together. And then you know, you get
the anti trust stuff that they need to secure the
ability to pay players but also limit payments to players
and things like that, because that's also really that's that's
(12:15):
the entire gist of a lot of why the NCAA
enforcement isn't play forever. And that's why all of these
laws or these score acts and these things. It's like
limiting what players can be paid by unscrupulous people. And
that's really like that's been all of the NCAA probation
(12:38):
things for decades. Is you know, somebody gets caught giving
money or accepting money, and so to be able to
limit that and then keep it within the rules, you
need some sort of legal help. And these are all
different steps to make that happen. And Ohio State, you know,
they just they don't want to be on the wrong
(13:00):
side legal They can be on the wrong side in
terms of well we thought it was going to go
this way, but it went that way. And maybe that's
what's happened here where there they were. They're always going
to be okay with being on the wrong side of guessing.
They don't want to be on the wrong side of
like guessing get gets guessing legally wrong. So like here
(13:22):
rules have shifted, so then we can now you know,
they can now move forward. Whereas if the rules hadn't shifted,
then Ohio States decision would have been in the right
so legally and and then then also practically, but the
legal side of it is always going to be now
kind of what directs them because as Brian Day said,
(13:45):
the gray area, which this whole thing is, drives him insane.
And so any type of clarity you can begin to build,
then you can get out of the legal way because
legal knows and gives you an answer. So legal really
is no longer a part of it because you have
your answer and you know what is legal, so you
don't have to keep going to legal, like, hey, can
(14:06):
we can we recruit this kid? Can we recruit that kid?
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Like?
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Legal has nothing to do with that. You now know
the rules, and that's all they're waiting for us to
know the rules so that they can then move forward
and be the aggressive entity that they want to be.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Here's the risk, though, of waiting. I'm not convinced this
is going to be a quick process because I'm fully
convinced at this point that anything that actually gets through
and gets accepted and gets approved or agreed upon however
you want to look at this, there's gonna be legal
challenges to it coming from like the players, Like you
(14:47):
can't tell me that one trip to a children's hospital
isn't worth a million dollars? How are you going to
tell me that that's too much money for my time
that day, Like that's gonna without them becoming employees, we are,
in my opinion, going to exist in nothing but a
gray area.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
And that's what yeah, yeah, yeah, and that's why you've
got so many like the score Act. And then you know,
whatever players, whatever deals players will eventually sign, they'll have
to probably agree to these things. Yeah right, And and
the other thing is the so many players don't don't
(15:27):
necessarily want to be employees, don't want to be part
of a union because hey, I'm only here for three years.
I don't need like I'm going to be I'm three
and out. Why would I risk a year of striking
or whatever and limit myself. I've got myself to worry about,
whereas all of these other pro leagues, like you're thinking
about five years, ten years, but not just then, but
(15:48):
you're thinking I need pension. Like so you're thinking some
people think forty years down the road. Nobody in college
other than you, like the act. The degree side of it,
you're thinking, you're supposed to be thinking four years down
the road. A lot of these guys, you know, why
why would they because they're going to be jumping into
another union in three or four years. So this is
just one small step, one one little bit of time
(16:11):
where they can make some money. But then the NFL
is the real money. And you mentioned like a player
taking someone taking somebody to court for limiting what they
could make. They're gonna have people trying to give them
money that will join that fight, you know, where we're
trying to give him the money, so you can't tell
him he's not worth it, and that's where you have
(16:31):
to I guess. I guess maybe at that point there
there still can't be a cap because there's no cap
on nil in terms of there's no NFL camp cap
on nil. So I don't know that you necessarily capped.
I think at that point you just let the market
settle itself and then you you maybe just try to
keep up. That's I think really that's all you can do.
(16:53):
But again, the the enforcement arm of it, then the
CSC where they're going to probably be looking harder at
what are pay for play? Like you know, this is
clearly just an inducement. Is there something that they will
do about that? They want to be quicker about all
(17:14):
of these things? You know, the NCAA investigations Michigan. Still,
you know, a couple months away or a month away
from finding out about something that happened back in twenty one,
twenty two, and twenty three. They want to be a
lot quicker with these things, and it's one guy handing
down the punishment. So you would hope they've gone through
all of these troubles to put in rules that they
(17:35):
would take the rule breakers seriously. And now with things
have been so wild West for a long time. Once
the once the law comes to town, it'll be interesting
to see how much things keep going on. Because, as
ross Bjork said, you know, if you can't be paying recruits,
that's the one thing, Like you cannot give recruits money.
(17:56):
If you do, you you've endangered yourself and you've endangered
that rec So any school or any collective that is,
you know, paying a kid money right now can't happen.
It's not supposed to happen, and so there needs to
be enforcement if that is happening. That's the other thing
that people keep talking about. Now that we've got these rules,
that's enforce them, because they don't mean anything if you're
not enforcing them.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
A lot to unpack there. So I'm going to try
to unpack two things. One, I think the dirty little
secret that no one wants to really admit because there's
a lot of play I see a lot of people
on Twitter screaming make them employees, you know, uh, let them,
you know, the players need to unionize all that other stuff.
(18:40):
Here's the dirty, lost little secret to that most of
the players don't want to be employees. They don't, and
I think people assume they do. They don't. They They
kind of like how this is working for them right
now without the hassle of a union. So that's like
the dirty little secret is that I don't think anybody
wants them to be employed. I don't think the schools
(19:02):
want them to be employees. I don't think the players
want to be employees. You'll find some who maybe do,
but I think for the most I think if you
if you did a poll, the majority would side with
we don't want to be employees or we don't want
the players to be employees. And so that's that's the
I think the dirty little secret here that people who
are just streaming make them employees. And it's not that simple.
You can't make someone an employees doesn't want to be
(19:22):
an employee. So there's a lot to unpack there, and
so I don't know what the answer is there other
than again, just some type of waiver, as you alluded to,
where you're agreeing to abide by a certain set of
rules in order to maintain your your eligibility as a
college athlete. I mean, that's that's kind of where we're at.
(19:42):
And you hope, if you're on the Ohio state side
of this thing, you're hoping that this is done sooner
rather than later, because the longer this goes, the longer
this content the wheels continue to spin here in the mud,
the more the schools who aren't really caring about this
and just kind of doing what they're do are gaining
an advantage. And you can sit here and hope that
(20:05):
you know, in two years or six months or whatever,
that people are gonna go back and look at this
and be like, yeah, you guys were clearly like breaking
the rules, like you guys were going one hundred and
fifty and a sixty, like you guys were not just
going ten miles an hour over the speed limit, like
you were going three times the speed limit, flipping off
the cops on the way through, like you would hope
(20:26):
those people get dealt with, but history kind of shows
us maybe not that that may not happen. So that's
an issue for Ohio State. Here's the other thing that
you mentioned that I didn't want to talk about. You know,
you can't pay recruits. I got news for people. Recruits
are being paid right now. They're being paid to commit.
They're being paid monthly payments by certain schools to stay committed.
(20:47):
They're getting checks every month to stay committed. It's unbelievable.
And I do wonder like and people are gonna laugh,
and you know they're probably people are sure that's happening.
More it's happening. Like I told everyone during COVID, I said,
schools are hosting visitors right now and they're not supposed
to be. I said that during COVID. People laughed at me. No,
they're not. No one would be that dumb, no one,
(21:08):
you know, how would they get away with it? And
sure enough, very quickly, we found out that multiple schools,
and there are schools that didn't get busted forward that
we're doing it, but multiple schools that I knew were
doing it got busted for it. Michigan and Arizona State
are two of them that got raped you know, over
the cold by the media the public for doing this.
So like that was happening then, I said it was happening,
(21:31):
and sure enough, like this is happening now, I promise
you this is happening. Schools are paying for commitments and
paying monthly payments to keep those commitments. So it's going
to be interesting to see if this is you know,
something that the NCAA is able to prove and kind
of catch teams or schools red handed on what is
is there going to be real punishment for this?
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Well? And that point at that point doesn't just go
back to the old rules where any money that a
player's received it and makes them ineligible. When we've seen
in years in basketball playing over in the European League,
you are now ineligible. So there are things that they'd
have to pay it back.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
So long to get to this point of like clarity
that many of these situations, those kids you hope are
still in school, I guess, so there could be some
like some of these kids might not even be in
school anymore, or they may have transferred or twice already
before this even like gets figured out. At the snail's pace,
(22:32):
these things moved. I guess that's the thing here is like, Okay,
if a kid in a you know, in the twenty
twenty four class or something, was getting monthly payments to
remain committed and sign with that school, and it's twenty
twenty eight now and we're finally getting around to like
punishing schools, and that kid's already in the NFL or
out of college or whatever, it might be like, how
(22:53):
are we even going to figure this out?
Speaker 2 (22:56):
And the other portion of this with collectives because it's collectives,
I guess that would be the the the folks paying
recruits at that point, because it's one hand away, like
one one degree of separation away.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
From you just do that.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
The collectives did it exactly. But are those considered boosters,
and we know boosters can't pay recruits, So there's that
aspect of it as well. And you know, even even
the ones, even the deals that are probably legitimate to
like like Felix Ojoe right where his was. If the
(23:34):
rules are relaxed, it's a one point three million dollar
deal whatever. If the rules are not relaxed, it's gonna
be about four or five hundred thousand, like that's his
agent is out there talking about these things, which is
it's a wild time to be live. But the fact
that you know, even I guess it's I guess that's
a a good agent, like a a a trusted agent,
(23:56):
like an up. You know, a guy that is on
the the just one you can trust and is following
the rules because he's given you two different deals like
if it's crazy, if it's wild West, here's your deal.
But if it's not, here's your deal, here's our deal.
Because I guess if he was unscreepy list, then it
would just be like, here's the biggest money we can
get and there is no like. But if we follow
(24:18):
the rules, then it's this much lower. And now again
these all of these deals still have to pass through
Ni'll go, so it's not just firing off money can
and stuff like. You still have to I think at
this point now you would have to show up at
least for the autograph signing, which before there are players
who'd never showed up on anything for any of their
(24:40):
nil deals.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
Trusted agent.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
Okay, well, and that was another part of the I
think the Executive Order and the score Act is limiting
how much the agents can make because some of these
agents are pulling ten to twenty percent off of these kids,
which is.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
Some of these people, some of these agents have no
experience in any of this, And there's all ah, I'm
and I'm an nil agent. I'm like what, like there,
did you take a course, did you like have to
learn anything about this? Did you have to pass any
type of test? Did you have to you know, has
your character been tested in a way that like would
make you reliable to a sixteen or seventeen year old
(25:20):
and his parents who have never been through anything like this, Like,
they got to totally overhaul that to start, because when
you say trusted agent, I'm like, I don't know how
many of those are there? Like, there are a lot
of people looking to take advantage of the situation right now.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
Yeah, and in this landscape and a number of different
varieties because this is a brand new commercial market that
is available to like where what can we serve and
serve ourselves doing so? But yeah, the agent side of things,
there needs to be certification yesterday because there are a
lot of people being taken advantage of. And I think
(25:59):
I think if it's the score actor the executive order
wanting to limit the commission and the cut by you know,
to like maybe three or five percent tops, which then
that also maybe cuts out a lot of people who
are like, wow, it's not worth my time to do this,
which is good because the number of people classifying themselves
(26:19):
an agents throughout all of these NIL deals is incredible.
I think it'saw an article where there's maybe like I
don't know, like fifteen hundred two twenty five hundred people
that are now like listed as agents in this thing,
which come.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
On, yeah, they got it. That's almost if it's not
step one, it's step two like that of this Like okay,
I know you have to have guidelines for the actual
distribute distribution of NIL money and what constitutes a legitimate
like I know, you gotta have that under control. You
got to get this agent stuff under control. There are
(26:54):
like so many like the third uncle has become like
legitimized somehow in all of this and is now like
able to legally take a cut without any like proof
that they know what they're doing, that they have you know,
any standard of ethics that they have to abide by,
like nothing, So like that's got to be a huge
thing here too. So these kids in their families aren't
(27:15):
getting taken advantage of, you know, and I know those
schools don't want to be dealing with them. That's the
other he do not want to be dealing with these people,
with a lot of them. I mean, there are absolutely
people who are attached to legitimate sports agencies that I
know are doing the right things here, but like a
lot of these other people that aren't, the schools want
nothing to do with these people.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
Yeah, he checked the words right out of my mouth,
the Urban Meyer third uncle thing, where he would just
lament these as he coined them, the third uncle. And
there's no certification for a third uncle. And a lot
of those third uncles are now listened as agents. So
that gives you an idea of how qualified they are
to be there, and whose interest they have in mind,
and really how shallow the thinking is on what is
(27:57):
best for the player, because a lot of the third
uncles think what's best for the players an extra twelve
thousand dollars from a particular program without looking at what
the other program might bring them exactly.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
And that's that's the other thing. Is you've got people
who are like again, like I get it if you're
if one school's offering you three hundred thousand and another
school's offering you one point two million, that's a really
hard thing to turn down. But you've got agents, agents
squeezing every dollar they can out of these deals, and
(28:30):
it's like, Okay, you've got three schools right in the
same ballpark, and you're just trying to play them against
each other and get one extra dollar here, one dollar.
Look at how about looking at the head coaches on
the hot seat? How about looking like how long the
assistant coach has been there in his track record? How
about looking about the degree or you're the player, the
area of education that the player wants to, you know, explore.
(28:52):
What about the development? What about where how many position?
How many players at your position has that program or
that coaching staff, that position coach sent to the NFL
at the fishing play? Like those are all still important
things here, And I'm I've been pro paying players since
day one. I feel it'd be hypocritical not to in
our position, almost because we we make money covering the sport,
(29:17):
Like shouldn't the players that we cover that we get
paid to cover, shouldn't they get paid like it's kind
of hypocritical for me to sit here and say they
should get paid. So I've always been pro paying players
to something. But there's we got to get this under
control a little bit. And like the NCAA just completely
was content to not do this. They've lost billions of
dollars over the years in legal fees fighting this, and
(29:40):
then when it was clear they were about to take
the final kill shot, they just put their hands up
and said, fie, you guys, take care of it. We're
not even gonna assist in the transition or putting guardrails in,
and we're gonna like almost burn our own house down.
It was the dumbest thing I've ever seen in my life.
And so here we are now and they've just got
to get this back on the rails. And there is
a way to do it. This isn't impossible. This like
(30:02):
this is not we are not trying to cure cancer here.
There is a way to compensate players fairly and also
not completely destroy the sport. Like the idea that it
can't be done is so absurd. I can't even begin
to rant about it. Like it's definitely something that can
be done. So they just need to figure out how
(30:24):
to do it.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, And I've said this on buck Eye tommorrow morning.
I've said this on the book a weekly podcast. You know,
a couple of years ago, Congress said we will help you,
we will not save you to the NCAAA, and so
that you get the house settlement, as I said, that's
like the structure of the framework of the house. And
then Congress comes in and eventually something is going to
(30:45):
happen there to start building that up and kind of
finding everything and legalizing everything, so that the house settlement
lasts for ten years, but the laws would last much
longer than that. And know, will they be challenged probably,
But if if, if it's if, it's law, then you.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
Know that law until it's challenged and changed, and then
you have to from there move forward with how you
operate under a new law. But you're not gonna get
punished for following what was law. So yeah, not to
cut you off there, but yeah, I see exactly what
you're saying there, and and that's probably the practical way
(31:26):
to go about it if you're a school. But gosh,
this all seems to be slow in Ohio state down,
doesn't it it?
Speaker 2 (31:34):
Yeah, And like I said, they the settlement took longer
than expected, and so that I think that allowed a
lot of other schools that were not gonna limit themselves
to go out there. But then, you know, I was
talking with was on a show with a Texas reporter
three and a half weeks ago, and he was talking
(31:56):
about the way he was talking about what Texas was doing.
It was the exact same thing as Ohio State. They're
gonna slow down, they're gonna wait to see what happens.
And then like two days later, Texas just went on
a tear. So it's like they they decided we're done play,
We're done slow playing this. So like it apparently can
go just like that. Now the problem is at least
one or two of those targets that that Texas went
(32:17):
and I think grabbed, we're also an Ohio State's radar.
So then the question becomes how quickly can Ohio State
catch up from this lead that a bunch of people,
but some other schools have had and it's not every
school I know. Ohio State fans like to think this
is every school out in front and Ohio State has
been the only school holding back. That's not the case,
(32:38):
but when you see this school in that school, in
that school, it feels like everything every school when your
targets are going away, And I'm fascinated to see what
happens if Ohio State can suddenly start. You know, somebody
that was committed and to Texas or whatever is like, yes,
I'm going to take a visit in the fall to
Ohio State. And because I think what deals can deals
(32:58):
can't be signed for crew or a recruit cannot receive
money until they are on campus as a student athlete,
I think they can start signing potential deals like future deals,
like maybe August first with with the scholarship stuff that
the offers that are out there. But again, like I'm like,
(33:20):
what is are there buyouts in these things before there doesn't?
Is there is there a penalty because there can't be
a buyout if you've not received anything, So I guess
it just depends on these deals. And then if if
there is a penalty, is that just does the school
pay that the next school pay that? And then I
think there is something where if if there is a
(33:41):
buyout that needs to be paid by one school to another,
that has to come out of the rev share rather
than the third party nil stuff. So there's all like
little intricacies in there where like this is why legal
needs to be sitting on stuff for a month going
through it. And and that's why we're all just waiting
(34:03):
here twiddling our thumbs figuring out, like what's taking so long.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
The lawyers win again, Tony. The lawyers always win. They
always win. It's unbelievable. They're undefeated. The lawyers are undefeated.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
It's like hypothetical SEC matchups that that is.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
And lawyers, yes, and death and taxes are they all
are the are the undefeated things in our society right now?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
So that's that's why I continue to predict that. And again,
I'm not sitting here saying this is necessarily going to
be some like great Ohio State windfall in November or December.
What I'm just saying, in general across college football recruiting
is we are in for an even wilder November December
than anything we've ever seen. And we've already seen some
crazy stuff the last several years, so it's gonna be
(34:53):
even crazier. I think there's gonna be promises aren't to
be able to be kept. Things are going to be
walked back. You're gonna have your normal cold feet from
You're going to have your normal desperation offers that come
into the end. It's like a perfect storm of chaos
that's going to be descending upon college football recruiting here
in November and December, and we'll see if a High
States can be on the good or the bad side
of it. I think they've positioned themselves to be on
(35:15):
to be able to baby benefit from it. But we'll see,
you know, we won't know until we know, so we
will keep an eye on that. Of course, stay locked
on a Buckeye Huddle dot com as we get ready
for fall camp. We are going to be at what
three practices at the end of the week. At the
end of this coming week, those will be open. So
saytuned Buckehello dot com and of course here on YouTube
(35:36):
for coverage of those practices, hopefully some video the practices,
hopefully certainly some analysis of the practices and some observations.
And then obviously we're like we're we're here, man, like
the seasons like here, So we're you know, I'm not
Tom Moore. I'm not going to give you the exact days.
I'm not smart enough to make do that math. But
we're like what we're like thirty four days or something
like that from kickoff. It's something in that ballpark. So
(36:01):
it's happening. So it's here. We're gonna be on top
of things at buckfy Huddle dot com. We're gonna be
on top of things here at the Skull Session Recruiting Podcast. Tony,
any parting thoughts on the craziness we're going we're experiencing
right now with the.
Speaker 2 (36:15):
Government regarding sports.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Yes, we stick to sports on this channel, Tony, Yes, Yes.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I will just say one of the things Brian Day
did say was it can create a culture issue if
some of your highest paid players are the ones that
aren't playing. So that is also something to keep in
mind when it comes to recruits. Now, Mark, you also
know they have made some very large deals to recruits
that fell through, like not that the deal wasn't there,
but the recruits signed elsewhere. So they're willing to put
(36:47):
the money out there. But it's also something that they
take seriously when it comes to the locker room.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
Yeah, no question. I think that's that's the one thing
that regardless of what the rules are, regardless of how
much money you're spending what your budget is. You do
have to and fans do have to realize this. You know,
you cannot bring in a high school kid and pay
him more than your star receiver, your star quarterback, your
star running back, your star safety. Like, it's just not
(37:17):
sustainable to do things that way. So regardless of what
the budget is, that's got to be a constant thing
of culture and everything else. We saw the schools that
I said this on Twitter the other day, the schools
that tried to be the pioneers of NIL failed spectacularly.
That Texas A and m class was a disaster on
(37:37):
the field, it was a disaster in the locker room.
Half those kids have transferred, probably more than half those
kids of transferred. It was an absolute disaster by trying
to be the pioneers of NIL. So I think, and
you know, it hasn't really worked at Miami. They were
better last year, they didn't really beat anybody, and they
because I didn't get in the playoffs because of it.
But they've had their issues as well. You know, we've
(38:00):
seen the kind of the bad headlines that have popped
up around the country over some of this stuff, and
so Ohio State there is something to be said. Obviously,
Ohio States want a national championship. So hey, there's that
if you needed anything else. That high stat's doing okay
the national championship a few months ago. But there's something
to be said that Ohio State hasn't been blasted in
the headlines over their mishandling of an nil situation or
(38:22):
you know, promises they couldn't keep, or paying a bunch
of money and having it blow out, having a class
blow up because of it. There's something to be said
for not being involved in any of those you know
kind of you know, mini scandals. It's not really scandal scandals,
but those types of bad poor negative publicity. So we'll
see how things go here. And yeah, they're not broke folks,
they're just they just seem to be. They just they're
(38:45):
they're like, you know, in investing terms, like they're sitting
on a lot of cash right now, Like they're not invested.
They haven't like they're ready to deploy the cash. They
just haven't found the right stock yet or I guess
I don't know what, I don't know how else to
put it, but the money cannon is loaded. We'll see
when they're able to fire it. Thank you Tony for
doing this. Get some rest after Vegas and we will
(39:07):
be back this week to talk more recruiting, and we'll
get back in like the individual players, and we'll get
out of it. Let the federal government continue to do
what they do. So thanks everyone for watching and listening,
and we will talk to you soon
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