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The buyout fight between Arkansas Edge and Madden Iamaleava could set the tone for the future of the transfer portal

Andy Staples head shotby:Andy Staples•05/01/25•

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Madden Iamaleava AFI

Quarterback Nico Iamaleava’s departure from Tennessee to UCLA got most of the attention. Younger brother Madden Iamaleava’s departure from Arkansas to UCLA may have a more interesting and lasting impact on college football if the saga detours into a courthouse. And it seems to be headed that way.

Though most college football fans who haven’t attended law school may be unfamiliar with the phrase “liquidated damages,” the concept plays a major role in the sport’s discourse every year. Every time we discuss a football coach’s buyout, we’re talking about the liquidated damages clause in that coach’s contract. The moment a coach’s seat starts burning slightly, we dive into their deals, find the liquidated damages section and report what it will cost to fire said coach. Or, conversely, the moment a coach at a less prestigious school starts winning big, we find that section to learn how much a school higher on the food chain will have to pay that coach’s current employer to hire him away.

Players now routinely have liquidated damages clauses in their deals with collectives as well. And if the House v. NCAA settlement gets approved, they’ll have liquidated damages clauses within deals that come directly from schools.

So when players leave, their deals may require them to pay the school or collective they left behind. In fact, some already have. Several basketball players who moved in this portal cycle have been required to pay back collectives attached to their old schools. But those paybacks have been handled privately. The players’ deals aren’t public records like the deals of coaches who are employees of public universities. Either they paid the amount required or quietly negotiated a settlement and moved to the next school.

What makes Madden Iamaleava’s situation so interesting is that it’s already public thanks to Arkansas athletic director Hunter Yurachek’s announcement the day after Iamaleava decided to leave for UCLA after spending one spring in Fayetteville. 

If Arkansas Edge, the collective that made a deal with Iamaleava when he agreed to sign with Arkansas out of high school, decides to sue for the money it claims Iamaleava owes, then it will provide a very public window into the process. And the rest of college football will be watching. A win at trial for Arkansas Edge would embolden other collectives (or schools after the settlement clears) to try to force players who leave to pay contractually obligated buyouts. It also likely would make players think twice about entering the portal if they could be on the hook for significant money.

Arkansas Edge is seeking about $200,000 from Iamaleava, which is half the remaining amount of a deal originally worth about $500,000 that has yet to be paid to him. Tom Mars, the attorney Arkansas Edge hired to represent it in this matter, declined comment, but he has made his feelings clear on social media. (Oddly, Mars once served on the same side as the Iamaleava family when representing Tennessee-based collective Spyre Sports as it defended Nico’s deal against NCAA scrutiny.)

A player’s buyout from an NIL deal differs from the buyout in a coach’s deal in one critical way. Arkansas Edge can’t prevent Madden Iamaleava from playing somewhere else. Arkansas could prevent football coach Sam Pittman from coaching somewhere else unless he paid a $1.5 million buyout to the school, and Pittman’s deal* contains unique-to-Arkansas language that also would prevent him from taking any other head-coaching job in the SEC unless Arkansas fires him first.

*Obviously, the more topical piece of Pittman’s liquidated damages clause is what Arkansas would have to pay him if he were fired without cause (“for convenience,” in the parlance of his contract). That section is unique to Arkansas as well, because the buyout figure changes depending on his record. If he’s .500 or above since 2021 when fired, he would get 75 percent of the remaining amount of his deal. If he’s below .500 since 2021 when fired, he’d get 50 percent. He’s currently 27-24 since 2021. So if he were to finish 5-7 or better and get fired, he’d be owed about $12.9 million. If he went 4-8 or worse and got fired, he’d be owed about $8.6 million.

Because the schools continue to insist in court that players are not employees, they cannot hold the players to a non-compete as they can coaches. And because schools insist players are being paid for their publicity rights and not for actually playing football, it’s difficult to insert any performance-based language into deals.

So Arkansas could not stop Iamaleava from leaving, and it can’t stop him from playing at UCLA or from getting paid by the collective attached to UCLA. But Arkansas Edge can demand money back.

The liquidated damages aren’t necessarily limited to what the player has already been paid. The amount Arkansas Edge seeks is more than twice what Iamaleava has been paid. The reason for that is it is an estimate of how much damage the player breaching the contract would do to Arkansas Edge. This could include the cost of trying to find another quarterback, costs associated with the coaching Iamaleava received while at Arkansas and any money-making opportunities lost because Iamaleava is not in Fayetteville playing QB. 

Iamaleava’s camp will try to argue that the clause is either unenforceable or more severe than necessary. If the parties don’t agree on a number, that argument would be made first in court filings, and — if the parties take things to the extreme — in a courtroom.

Players, agents, school officials and collective leaders will watch closely. A win by Iamaleava would reinforce the current landscape, which features almost zero negative incentives for transferring. If Arkansas Edge collects a significant amount of money — either by trial win or settlement — it might make players think twice about breaking existing deals. The best players in the portal likely would get new deals that would allow them to easily cover any amount they would owe. But players who don’t command top-level deals might find themselves in a similar financial position after paying the buyout. That could negate the reason for transferring in the first place.

Florida-based attorney Darren Heitner represents receiver Dazmin James, who spent two seasons at Arkansas and then transferred to Cal after he was named the most outstanding offensive player in the Razorbacks’ Liberty Bowl win against Texas Tech. Heitner also represented former Wisconsin defensive back Xavier Lucas, who transferred to Miami even though Wisconsin refused to enter his name into the transfer portal. Wisconsin officials claimed Miami violated NCAA tampering rules and that Lucas had breached a “binding two-year NIL agreement.” Heitner wrote to On3 that some of the agreements he has reviewed act essentially as non-compete clauses because of the severity of the financial penalty.

“Traditionally, non-competes are applied to employees but can sometimes be extended to independent contractors. Yet, such restrictive covenants must be reasonable in scope, protect a legitimate business interest, and not impose an undue hardship on the athletes or violate public policy,” Heitner wrote. “The scope in the agreements I have reviewed tend to be unreasonable, the undue hardship is usually extreme, and the public policy favors athlete mobility through the transfer portal.”

But public sentiment, which had swung in favor of the players as schools and the NCAA dug in trying to keep players from getting a larger share of a multibillion dollar business, has swung back as players repeatedly leverage schools for raises or bounce from one school to another seeking the biggest check. The hope is a happy medium where players can move reasonably and get paid fairly but where schools have some recourse when a player does leave.

The most logical version of that is deeming the players employees and collectively bargaining rules and possibly a salary cap. But the schools seem determined to keep fighting against that logic. So their next best hope is to try to claw back some cash from players who leave.

Will Arkansas Edge — and by extension, Arkansas — get cash back from Madden Iamaleava? The college football world is waiting to find out.