Report: Group of Nebraska football players set to challenge College Sports Commission over rejected NIL deals

A group of 18 Nebraska football players are set to challenge the College Sports Commission over rejected third-party NIL deals, Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger reported. The players chose to go to arbitration over the deals.

The deals in question were rejected by the NIL Go clearinghouse, which launched following House settlement approval and vets third-party NIL deals worth more than $600. All told, the deals are worth more than $1 million. The players – believed to be the first to challenge the CSC – retained law firm Husch-Blackwell as counsel.

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News of the Nebraska football players’ challenge came hours after the College Sports Commission released its latest NIL Go deal flow report. According to the report, 18 deals were in arbitration and were consolidated into a single case. That case, according to Dellenger, involves the Nebraska players and proposed deals with PlayFly, the school’s media rights partner.

College Sports Commission guidelines call for a neutral arbitrator to oversee a case. The arbitrator will be selected by plaintiff attorneys for the House settlement and NCAA lawyers. The process is then to last no more than 45 days after an arbitrator is appointed, unless the arbitrator chooses to extend the timeline.

If there is no resolution, a hearing will take place before the arbitrator. Players’ attorneys and lawyers for the College Sports Commission will then present their arguments.

In total, the CSC said $166.5 million worth of deals have been approved on NIL Go since last summer, and 711 deals with a total value of $29.3 million have been reviewed and not cleared. In addition, 10 deals in arbitration previously reported as of Dec. 31 were all withdrawn by the athletes.

Between Jan. 1 and Feb. 28, 3,704 deals were cleared, with an aggregate value of $39.29 million. Meanwhile, 187 deals were not cleared, with an aggregate value of $14.36 million. The data corresponds with the 15-day college football transfer portal window. 

The College Sports Commission also detailed the impact of boosters in the NIL space. According to data released Tuesday, 63% of all NIL agreements in the last two months are tied to schools’ sponsors and booster-operated companies.

“There’s no question that during the portal, agents were demanding guaranteed NIL for athletes, and schools felt pressure to guarantee those things,” CSC CEO Bryan Seeley told reporters Tuesday.

Pete Nakos contributed.