The Rashada case in Florida highlights NIL and recruitment problems

Broken promises and unrealistic expectations have been part of college football’s recruiting process since coaches set up their programs in living rooms across America.

Opportunities for game time and a path to the NFL are offered as always, but now potentially lucrative endorsement deals being handled by booster-led collectives are also in the mix. There is even more potential for potential customers to feel cheated after signing a national memorandum of understanding.

When college football’s traditional winter signing period begins Wednesday, Jaden Rashada will be among the top unsigned players. The four-star California quarterback signed with Florida in December but asked for his release and received it after a sponsorship agreement with a collective worth potentially more than $13 million fell through.

The ill-fated deal between Rashada and the Gator collective — one that helped convince him to withdraw a previous verbal commitment to Miami and a name, image and likeness offer from a collective that works with Hurricanes athletes — should be a cautionary tale recruiting in the NILE era.

“NIL and the presence of collectives and promises to prospects create a facet of the recruitment experience that is 100% outside of the school’s control and what is reinforced by the situation in Rashada are the promises of independent third parties that impact where to go kids choose to go to school,” said Blake Lawrence, the CEO of Opendorse, a company that works with schools and collectives on NIL compliance and other services.

The NCAA lifted a ban on athletes cashing in on their fame in 2021. While the federation has still issued rules disallowing the use of NIL as an incentive for recruitment, patchwork state laws and fears of legal challenge have prevented the NCAA from having detailed, uniform rules in place.

The rise of collectives that operate outside of a school and its athletic department, but ideally in their best interests, prompted the NCAA to clarify that collectives — like individual boosters — cannot be included in the recruitment process.

But the lines have been blurred as trainers try to present recruits with potential NIL opportunities without giving any guarantees.

“The trainers who are well trained on NIL say things like, ‘I can’t promise you anything. But what I can share is that a player who is in your position on our campus is currently receiving XYZ,'” Lawrence said.

Coaches and athletic department staff can publicly support collectives that support their athletes, but they cannot raise funds directly. This allows recruits to easily identify the collectives most closely associated with the schools they are pursuing.

Nevertheless, many collective operators are reluctant to contact recruits.

“You can contact us. Honestly, I avoid these conversations because there’s such a fine line between information sharing and enticement,” said Gary Marcinick, president and CEO of the Cohesion Foundation, a NIL collective that works with Ohio State athletes.

Mike Caspino, a NIL attorney who has worked with numerous college athletes on collective deals — including Rashadas with Miami — disagrees.

He said the difference in recruiting in- and outside-of-the-rules pitches is one of semantics. Ideally, schools would be directly involved in NIL deals rather than having an external entity with little accountability to represent their interests.

Caspino said the situation in Rashada, Florida points to systemic problems with NIL and recruitment.

“Like a lack of proper representation on both sides, like a lack of documentation, so we have to treat those for the deals they are,” Caspino said. “And every time we do business, we will have a contract that spells out everyone’s obligations and the benefits everyone gets from the contract. And we don’t.”

Lawrence also said the reality behind the rhetoric is that most collectives are not well enough funded to meet the demand for NIL deals.

Todd Berry, executive director of the American Football Coaches Association, said coaches are concerned about collectives dictating which players they can recruit.

“You have no control over some of the ongoing processes and who you get. And so you don’t even get the[players]you want,” Berry said.

Berry said most coaches would prefer to work with established players who are already on campus.

“So now you’ve got this outside entity that’s basically putting value on the players, and you don’t even really have control over the value of what’s going on,” he said.

Mit Winter, a Kansas City-based sports attorney, said the fallout from Rashada’s uncommitment should prompt schools to scrutinize the collectives they support.

“I think the moral of the story is the collective, you need to focus on your deals with current athletes and help them with their NIL opportunities,” Winter said. “And you leave the recruiting to the trainers.”