Looming NIL legislation opens doors for crowded marketplace
MOGL/COURTESY PHOTO
When UCF football players took the field for their spring game April 10 wearing jerseys adorned with their social media handles instead of last names, they made national headlines.
It was a bold strategy meant to capitalize on the issues surrounding name, image and likeness (NIL), which has been at the forefront of a changing college landscape.
One person who enjoyed the move was Brandon Wimbush, who played quarterback at Notre Dame from 2015-18 before playing for UCF in 2019 as a graduate transfer.
“I thought it was awesome,” Wimbush said. “That was a pure example of that school and that department being proactive and letting them take advantage of that space. It brought awareness to what is going on in Florida and how UCF is taking advantage of it and allowing their athletes to do so.”
For Wimbush, it was a particularly satisfying moment because he helped co-found a new online agency called MOGL, which helps pair athletes with marketing and business opportunities. Wimbush and his business partner Ayden Syal, a fellow Notre Dame graduate, worked together to create a company that empowers athletes to profit on their name, image and likeness.
While the NCAA has long forbidden athletes from profiting off their name, image
and likeness, the organization had to reevaluate its stance recently after states began introducing and passing NIL legislation.
So far, 39 states have introduced NIL bills, 11 of which already passed regulations. Georgia is awaiting a signature from its governor. California was the first state to pass a NIL law, which goes into effect Jan. 1, 2023, but Florida is among four states where the law goes into effect on July 1.
Each state’s legislation provides different rules and protections for athletes to make money by selling their NIL rights while playing in college.
The NCAA, meanwhile, passed on voting on its own NIL regulations, choosing instead to hope for federal legislation to override those laws at the state level. With no legislation on the horizon and the clock counting down toward the July deadline, plenty of companies are looking to capitalize on the upcoming changes.
Blake Lawrence was a 3-star linebacker out of Overland Park, right outside of Kansas City, who signed to play at Nebraska in 2007. But an injury cut short his playing career, sending him on an entirely different career path.
“I was a starting linebacker my junior year and then one day I knew I could never play the game again,” Lawrence said. “From the time I was done to right now, I’ve dedicated my whole professional career to helping athletes understand that this doesn’t last forever.”
Lawrence helped co-found Opendorse with business partner and fellow Husker football teammate Adi Kunalic. Their company was one of the first to help athletes build and monetize social media brands.
More than 100 athletic departments across the country — including Florida, FAU and UCF — now use Opendorse and its various platforms.
“Social media is becoming such a big part of the sports fan’s experience and the student-athlete experience,” Lawrence explained. “So we started licensing our software to schools so they could share photos and videos and content with their student-athletes and alumni.
“We’ve been working with schools, helping them improve the marketing and brand value of their athletes for the last six years.”
Lawrence’s alma mater, Nebraska, was one of the first schools to use Opendorse.
Institutions can use the company’s Opendorse social program to provide their photos and videos from practices or games to athletes, who in turn can upload them directly to their individual social media platforms, such as Twitter, Instagram, Facebook or TikTok.
“It’s proven to help build them an audience,” Lawrence said. “With NIL, an athlete’s followers account and their bank account are linked. The more followers athletes have in the NIL era, the more NIL earnings they should have.”
Opendorse also works with institutions to provide NIL and compliance education for athletes through the Opendorse Ready platform.
“To be honest, I always knew NIL was not a matter of if but when,” said Jim Cavale, founder and CEO of INFLCR, a software company specializing in sports-focused social media.
INFLCR, which merged with Teamworks in 2019, has been working with college athletic departments since 2017. The company has software agreements with 290 institutions, including Florida State, which recently announced a partnership with INFLCR for its new NIL program called Apex.
Cavale said the uncertainty surrounding NIL legislation over the past two years at the NCAA level has made it challenging for companies like his.
“It’s a series of timelines that have not been met, and for anyone that has a business or is running an institution, you’re living in a time of great volatility,” Cavale said. “I’m not even talking about the pandemic; I’m talking about NIL.
“It doesn’t look like we’re going to have federal legislation anytime soon, maybe by the end of this year, but probably not by July 1. The chaos will most likely continue and that chaos will be the result of 50 different bills from each state that will take flight in July to keep up with Florida until federal legislation overrides it.”
Cavale said programs are making major investments in NIL companies like his, sometimes in the “six-figure” range.
“We have a great responsibility to get this thing right,” he said.
INFLCR provides athletes with an app to promote content like photos and videos on their social media platforms as well, but the challenge has been connecting those athletes with business opportunities that could help them monetize their NIL within the rules of the NCAA and state legislation.
Most legislation, including the NCAA’s proposal, doesn’t allow third-party companies hired by schools to secure NIL opportunities.
Florida’s bill — SB 646 — states: “A postsecondary educational institution, an entity whose purpose includes supporting or benefiting the institution or its athletic programs, or an officer, director, or employee of such institution or entity may not compensate or cause compensation to be directed to a current or prospective intercollegiate athlete for her or his name, image, or likeness.”
Cavale explained: “We cannot broker deals for student-athletes. While we can’t broker deals for student-athletes, we have to figure out how to educate them around their NIL and we have to help connect them and direct them toward the places that can make them money, with solutions that automate the reporting so compliance can oversee it and the student-athlete can follow the rules.”
The INFLCR app has a store inside of it, directing athletes to other apps, marketplaces and platforms on the internet where they can monetize their NIL on sites such as Cameo, where people pay for personalized video greetings, or YouTube, where people can profit from advertising on selfposted videos.
None of this can happen until July 1 in states such as Florida, Alabama, Mississippi or New Mexico, or until the NCAA approves its own NIL legislation, whichever comes first.
MOGL’s model is a little different from some of the other companies.
“We’re founded for athletes by athletes and we’re founded for the empowerment of all athletes,” said Syal, who emphasized the company has no contracts with individual institutions.
That, in turn, allows MOGL to help connect athletes directly with possible opportunities to monetize their NIL.
“We’re providing a service for athletes to leverage in seeking out opportunities, no matter how big or small, at the local community level,” Syal said.
The company already has a reputation in Orlando after working with some Orlando Pride players on a promotional campaign with the Orlando North, Seminole County Tourism group.
“We’ve had direct outreach from several businesses, notably in Orlando, that want to work directly with us,” Syal said.
MOGL has also partnered with Every Kids Sports, a large nonprofit devoted to improving access to local youth athletic programming at a national level, donating a percentage of its revenue directly to the organization.
The biggest concern facing compliance.
Many of the NIL companies on the market provide schools with compliance and regulatory tracking. As soon as an athlete agrees on an opportunity, the compliance department at a school automatically receives a report for approval.
“We built the platform to be fully compliant with athletic programs and with compliance office requirements from the NCAA as a whole,” explained Syal. “Student-athletes will never have their eligibility impacted and they’ll be able to disclose everything they’re doing through the platform.”
Most college athletes don’t fully understand the impact of their brands as it pertains to NIL.
If NIL legislation were around during his time, Wimbush believes he would have taken advantage of it.
“There are a lot of stories,” Wimbush said. “Guys like McKenzie Milton — what a story he has — or guys like Dillon Gabriel, even [former UCF quarterback Darriel] DJ Mack, a guy that played and did well. There are a lot of stories that will be told through this time and, again, I’m excited to play a small part of that.” institutions is