Why not more NIL activity from Paige Bueckers?
Paige Bueckers, UConn’s magnetic and mesmerizing guard, was marching through her historic freshman season when her name became attached to a national story.
Name, image and likeness — the term associated with an athlete’s ability to earn money off their own brand through sponsorships and promotions — emerged as the defining college sports narrative of early 2021. States passed laws that would enable college athletes to profit, forcing the NCAA to alter its rules last summer.
And sitting in the eye of NIL chatter was none other than the player known as Paige Buckets, as savvy on social media as she is on the court. Paige was positioned
to capitalize on her name and image, a basketball star for an 11-time national champion, a personality with a brand cultivated in high school.
Line up the sponsors. Yet as Bueckers begins her sophomore season in Storrs, we wait for those mainstream national endorsements. There have been hints of activity: Bueckers filed a trademark for the “Paige Buckets” brand and signed with the powerful Los Angelesbased Wasserman Media Group.
There are estimates that Bueckers can generate upwards of $1 million a year based on her social media following, star power, and exposure as the face of Geno Auriemma’s program.
So why haven’t we already seen more of Bueckers as a product pitcher?
It’s not her. It’s the state of NIL.
With no national legislation, NIL guidelines still fluctuate by state. The NCAA has asked Congress to pass a federal law. Some federal legislators are pressuring the NCAA to construct its own set of rules.
Until there’s one standard, NIL activity may move slowly — especially for the highest level athletes.
“There are a lot of national brands that are holding back right now — brands that want to get involved in name, image and likeness — because of the legislation,” said Florida attorney Peter Schoenthal, CEO of the NIL company Athliance. “Currently, there is no real set of federal legislation creating uniformity. So the rules are all over the place. They vary from state to state, and university to university.
“So a lot of major brands are holding out until there’s uniform legislation, because nobody wants to be the first to violate a rule.”
Schoenthal said his Fort Lauderdale-based company has consulted with national brands that are moving cautiously into the NIL terrain. That could change in the coming months if a national law is adopted or if companies are convinced there is enough overlap between state laws across the country.
For now, though, athletes will still make money on a smaller scale. At UConn, freshman Azzi Fudd has a deal with Chipotle to act as an “ambassador” while also selling her own merchandise online. Senior Olivia Nelson-Ododa promoted a local pizza shop on her social media accounts. Details of those deals have not been disclosed publicly and are not required to be under Connecticut state law..
Across the state, basketball players and athletes at all levels will profit in various ways — selling merchandise or autographs, appearing at camps or providing lessons, pitching themselves on Cameo or promoting a product on Instagram.
Schoenthal believes that’s the most underappreciated part of this change in college sports. For every Paige Bueckers, there are thousands of college athletes pocketing money from much smaller deals.
“I think you’re going to see and hear a lot about going forward are lessons and camps and more localized deals,” he said. “Student-athletes are starting to realize that you don’t have to be the quarterback of your team to participate, and that you could do deals for $100 here, $100 there, free meal here, free meal there, swag … you could also hold lessons in the offseason, you could hold camps when you go home.
“Let’s say I’m at Connecticut and I’m a tennis player. I might not be getting a lot of Chipotle deals, but what if there’s a 13-year-old girl in the area that wants to learn how to have a better serve. Now in the offseason, I can give lessons, I can teach her how to do that and I can charge $100, $200 bucks an hour and I could supplement my cost of living that way. So I think you’re going see kids get smarter kids and get educated and NIL is going to be a lot broader than what we’re seeing now, which is social media deals and product deals.”
Bueckers and Fudd and their teammates represent a new generation at UConn. On the men’s side, players have said they have ideas or even plans in the pipeline for NIL activity. R.J. Cole has introduced his own line of T-shirts.
How do past Huskies view the new world order?
“I think it’s time for the NIL to be happening and for players to profit off their name, image, and likeness,” Breanna Stewart said earlier this month. “I also think that it’s going to be a tricky road just for the process of it and everything like that. I think that guidance is going to be something that’s really important for these players who are making tons and tons of money, but I also think that it’s going to make things even more competitive because you’re going to realize, if you’re not excelling and you’re not doing this and that and the other on the court, you’re not going to get as many deals and opportunities as other players.
“So, I think there’s another competitive side to it, and giving people a sense of reality really quickly.”
Stewart’s old coach talked about the “unintended consequences” of NIL. Geno Auriemma supports players’ ability to earn money, but he cautioned that it could add a layer of tension among teammates.
He also talked about conversations with Bueckers. The tone? None of this matters if she is not performing well on the court.
But the question of inequity — one player generating more revenue than another, a star demanding the ball with the subtext of the next sponsorship deal at stake — is a real concern.
“The biggest problem is the inequity,” Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim said at ACC media day. “One guy gets stuff and nobody else does. … The difference in pro sports — in pro sports the quarterbacks get $30 million but the best tackles get $15, $14 (million). Sp I’m sure those tackles are not that jealous of quarterbacks. They’re getting $15 (million). But when one guy gets $100,000 and the other guy gets nothing, that’s problematical to me.”
Boeheim also urged Congress to pass a national law that will enable international players to participate in NIL activity. As it stands, current NIL rules preclude international players from earning money. The UConn rosters are sprinkled with players from around the world — Nika Muhl from Croatia, Dorka Juhasz from Hungary, Aaliyah Edwards from Canada, Adama Sanogo from Mali, Samson Johnson from Togo.
UConn is retaining the outside firm Opendorse to assist the school and the athlete in NIL activity, whether that means monitoring compliance or advising students on tax ramifications.
Of course, Bueckers has representation beyond the campus. As she embarks on her sophomore season, the visibility will grow and the deals will follow.
For now, her focus is basketball.
“We’re approaching this, I think, with the understanding that the potential is really limitless,” Wasserman executive vice president Lindsay Kagawa Colas told the Wall Street Journal. “It really comes down to: What are the right deals, and how much time does Paige have to spend?”