Putting The Swag Back In Sports
Making It Rain NIL. Gamecocks Drop The Mic. CEBL Takes Flight.
Our thoughts are with the country and people of Ukraine, hoping a peaceful end is near.
On Today’s Agenda:
Tech Collective Offers $25K NIL Deal for Athletes
Gamecocks Head Coach Hops on the Mic
Taking a Nosedive Into The Flair Airlines x CEBL Partnership
Texas Tech Throwing Out The Big Bucks
Tech Collective Offers $25K NIL Deal for Athletes Doing Community & Charity Work
By Caleb Gilligan
It’s been over a year since the NCAA announced its new policy on name, image, and likeness (NIL) for college athletes. The new rule allows athletes to earn money by using their NIL, which was forbidden before last year. Seeing how the U.S. Department of Education valued America’s college sports industry at over $14 billion in 2021, loads of new investors and alumni are eager to get their feet into the new industry. Some of these investors come in the form of school-specific collectives, which are groups of donors, alumni, and businesses dedicated to finding and providing deals for students. Since the legalization of NIL deals, over 60 collectives have been organized throughout America.
Although more money in the pockets of student-athletes is seen as a positive for college sports, many believe that collectives are ruining the industry. Legendary Alabama football coach Nick Saban has previously stated that he is against NCAA collectives and even went as far as saying that rivals Texas A&M “bought every player on their team” thanks to their collective deals. Although Saban acknowledged that Alabama has a collective, he states that every player will receive the same amount. The Athletic reports that Alabama paid over $3 million to 25 players last season.
Despite some negative comments in the media, NIL deals can still be positive for all parties involved. This week, the Lubbock Avalanche Journal reported that Texas Tech’s collective, named the Matador Club, would be distributing a total of $2.5 million to the team. Although this sounds similar to Alabama’s deal from last season, the difference is that each player will receive an even amount. This means that all 85 scholarship recipients and the top 15 walk-ons will receive $25,000.
Furthermore, the deal will also benefit the community in several different ways. Players are expected to complete charity and community work on a regular basis. Although details on the work have not been announced, it is expected that players complete the work in the Lubbock area, the home of Texas Tech University.
The founding member of the Matador Club, Cody Campbell, states that the collective is trying to support the entire Texas A&M program by giving each athlete a base pay, instead of giving much more money to a smaller pool of athletes. However, Campbell is still very much in favour of athletes searching for other NIL opportunities. The deal will not prevent players to search for additional sources of revenue, in fact, the Matador Club will help their athletes find other chances to earn money through NIL opportunities. Being a recipient of the deal may actually increase the chances of lesser-known recruits and walk-ons being signed to other NIL agreements in the future, thanks to the connections through the collective.
Although the NCAA still has work to do concerning collectives, agreements such as the Texas Tech deal are proof that NIL deals can be positive for everyone involved.
Swag Wins Championships
Gamecocks Head Coach Hops on the Mic
By Christopher Nascimento
Anyone who ever told you defense wins championships, lied straight to your face. Hopefully, they didn’t also tell you that Santa Claus is still real. If so, grab a kleenex wipe your tears, and continue reading this.
SWAG WINS CHAMPIONSHIPS!
I’m not kidding either. Gone are the days when athletes are attending sports programs that have the best coach, scheme fit, or opportunity. We’re in the area of making noise, and we want it turned all the way up.
Top college programs in the states are now focusing their efforts on winning top recruits through their work off the field. These future stars are attending programs that have the coolest facilities, nicest uni’s, and the best platforms to blow them up on social media.
A perfect example of this is through content put out this week by the South Carolina Gamecocks Football team...
Dope, no? That video was so swaggy, that I walked to the other room, put on a hat, and turned it backward as I wrote this.
In the past, we would have never seen an SEC coach leave it all out on the stage but now we’re here for it. The reach this video has gained is far greater than a recruiting visit, or on-field performance the team could achieve.
There’s a great book by Jeremy Darlow called Brands Win Championships, and he’s absolutely right. Darlow and the NCAA know how right that statement is, that programs are paying him tens of thousands of dollars to speak to individual teams at a school on how to build up their brands. The pull your brand has will be a direct correlation to the result on the field.
If you want to win a championship in the digital area, get swaggy.
How Brand Activations Can Takeoff
Taking a Nosedive Into The Flair Airlines x CEBL Partnership
By Hiral Patel
There’s something to be said about how fun it is to see a seamless brand activation come to life in the world of sports. Some partnerships make noise based on the sheer size of the brands and dollars involved (as they say, money talks). In a world of dollars and numbers, how can the smaller leagues and brands compete?
If you have had your eyes on the CEBL this season, you might have picked up on the presence of Flair Airlines as a league-wide partner. The partnership was announced at the end of June, and through a specific activation, CEBL fans have the chance to win big. Titled “#ShotFromTheDot”, this halftime activation gives one lucky fan the shot to win a trip to the CEBL Championship Weekend and free flights for a year.
A fan in attendance at the Fraser Valley Bandits game in Langley, BC hit both shots and gave the CEBL and Flair the opportunity to deliver. The activation had all the makings to integrate the Flair brand into a fun and exciting moment at a CEBL game, but how did the execution fare? Have a look for yourself:
The contest itself is a win-win for the branding – the Flair logo’s dot creates a natural spot to shoot from and puts the logo front and centre in the activation. However, the video posted by both the CEBL and Flair Airlines has very limited logo inclusion. With how prevalent the Flair on-court logo is, not seeing it at all in the video is a big miss – especially given this picture from earlier in the year which is everything you could ask for in brand activation. Given the limitations in each arena, the lack of LED or static logo placement is another piece of improvement.
For emerging brands who want to maximize their activations, sometimes simplicity is the key to a great partnership. The details make all the difference when margins and budgets are tight. Often the answers are right in front of you – sometimes you just need to look at things from a different angle.
