1-on-1 with Jamie Pollard: How paying players works at Iowa State
ISU and its athletes must navigate a new world of player contracts and revenue sharing.
ISU and its athletes must navigate a new world of player contracts and revenue sharing.
ISU and its athletes must navigate a new world of player contracts and revenue sharing.
Iowa State is opting in to share $20.5 million of its revenue this season with student-athletes. Athletics Director Jamie Pollard sat down with vlog Sports Director Scott Reister to explain how the deals work.
Pollard declined to reveal what percentage of the pie goes to which program, but the prevailing thought nationally is that football teams have been getting 75%. At most schools, the remainder goes mainly to men's and women's basketball. At Iowa State, all athletes will be getting something.
"We are talking about a small percentage — about 1% of the $20 million, about $300,000 — and all our athletes will participate in some form," Pollard said. "The majority of our athletes will get $1,000, $500 per semester for giving up those rights to us."
Pollard is referring to an athlete's name, image and likeness rights. All athletes in all sports can sign an 11-page contract. "We felt that was really important for the culture of our department that all our athletes were involved in some form or fashion, including walk-ons."
The main takeaway from the landmark NCAA vs. House settlement is that schools are now directly paying players. Technically, schools are paying them for the use of the athletes' names, images and likenesses.
Marquee athletes such as quarterback Rocco Becht or star basketball player Audi Crooks could still do outside name, image and likeness deals, but Pollard says athletes would have to get them approved by the university beforehand.
"The reason we are doing that is twofold. Anything over $600 is required by the court that they have to disclose," Pollard said. "We decided the best practice for us would be to just make all of them have to come to us first. That way, we are helping protect them and also protecting us because we will be held accountable for whether they disclosed or not. Secondly, we want to know what they are doing, because they can't use our (intellectual property), they can't use our logos, our colors, our uniforms in anything they would do externally.
"Deals could be pursued if there was a sponsor that wanted to do a deal without use of ISU's marks. Those NIL deals with outside companies are sounding like they are for way less than what we've seen the past few years."
The Associated Press reports that outside deals between athletes and sponsors worth $600 or more have to be vetted by a clearinghouse called NIL Go, which was established with the help of auditing giant Deloitte and run by the new College Sports Commission.
"We have already had five or six athletes go through NIL Go since July 1, and not one was over $5,000," Pollard said. "What was happening in the past was the donors were giving money to the collective, and then the collective was entering into an NIL deal for a million dollars for a student-athlete. That is not going to happen because it will never pass the litmus test with Deloitte and NIL Go."
The newly formed NIL Go enforcement only approves deals that are for legitimate business purposes and for an appropriate range of compensation.
"The verdict will be out on how well this puts up the bumpers around what was going on, because the last two years were pretty much Wild West. What everyone has to understand: This was just dealing with NIL. This wasn't designed to correct the transfer portal," Pollard said. "The transfer portal issue is a complete separate legal issue that most likely would have to be dealt with through a congressional act of a very limited antitrust. Why we have the transfer portal is you would have a lawyer that would sue, saying you are limiting an athlete's ability to have trade or commerce by restricting where they can go. So, we don't have the ability to create a contract that's enforceable that says you can't leave Iowa State."
Iowa State has seen incredible success across its sports in recent years. Pollard remains confident it will continue in this latest evolution of college sports.
"The culture our coaches have established have allowed us to be better prepared for the choppy waters we are facing right now, and our results show it," said Pollard. "At our time period, most would have said it would be harder to be successful. We've been more successful."
The We Will Collective, which had been a third-party organization facilitating ISU student-athlete business deals, is now reformed and part of the ISU athletic department.
Pollard says there are reserves to help cover the $20.5 million revenue-sharing fund this season. Fundraising and planning for the future have been well underway.
It's an era that used to seem unimaginable, he said: "If anyone would have said that 20 years ago, nobody would have believed it was going to happen. Anyone that says differently is lying."
