Valiant CEO Jared Wangler addresses Michigan NIL in extensive tweet
Valiant CEO Jared Wangler attempted to reroute the ongoing Michigan NIL debate with a Friday evening tweet. In Wangler’s eyes, the Wolverines have taken an ‘unfair beating’ as a result of how other universities bend (or just blatantly disregard) the NCAA rules.
“The statements from those who label themselves as insiders, that the administration is holding us back, are highly misinformed,” Wangler wrote.
Clearing up the Michigan NIL approach
Wangler: “Our administration supports NIL. They have invested in resources to help our student-athletes maximize their earning potential. They support the student-athletes using school marks in a compliant manner. They support our collective, on the basis that we curate NIL opportunities for our CURRENT, not prospective student-athletes.
The line is drawn at NCAA violating recruiting inducements. Being a former player myself, I don’t think paying massive sums to athletes that have not played a down at this level is going to be good for locker room chemistry or really be a wise use of dollars in the long term. That said, we wish the university was a bit more progressive around what they could do to help promote and facilitate NIL opportunities alongside us. We believe that paying the guys who ARE HERE, really, really well is the key to long-term success.
Whether people want to acknowledge it or not, NIL has become one of the most important pillars of the recruiting process. I am ALL for ‘getting the bag’ and seizing a financial opportunity of a lifetime, but let’s be clear. This is becoming more about shady advisors/agents, who couldn’t sell their services to successful business people in the first place. Now they are finding success in manipulating high schoolers & their families for their own monetary gain & power grip rather than helping find the best program that will be responsible for what is arguably the most critical development period of someone’s life, both on & off the field.
Champions Circle, the existing Michigan collective, founded by successful UofM alumni, is working to ensure that there are enough compliant NIL deals in order to provide each player on the football team the opportunity to be compensated at the highest level in college football. Instead of worrying about paying a 17-year-old recruit $2m/year, how about we focus on getting our STARTING quarterback 2-3x that amount.
We believe that this is the sustainable model & will breed a culture of leadership at the University of Michigan.”
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