A work in progress. That might be the best way to describe Year Three of the name, image, and likeness era of college sports, where student-athletes who were once prohibited by the NCAA from making money off their own brand are now profiting – even thriving – from the opportunities, exposure and commercial ventures presented to them.

Some still call this ever-changing NIL landscape the “Wild West,” where each state has its own laws about financial compensation. Others say it’s “better” or “evolving” but quickly point to a need for more regulation, whether from the NCAA or federal level.

“It’s better than what it was but I also think we still have a long way to go from a consistency standpoint across the board in all 50 states,” says D’Juan Epps, general manager of Anchor Impact, a collective that supports Vanderbilt student-athletes. “There’s still very much of each state operated differently in this space, which some consider to be the Wild, Wild West.

“I don’t think we’re anywhere close to being consistent across all states. I know there’s been a lot of talks from the Congress level on down to the NCAA level, to the conference level and then to the state level. So our job is to understand the confines of which we can operate in and operate at the highest level.”

Hunter Baddour, co-founder and president of Knoxville-based Spyre Sports Group, which operates Tennessee’s NIL collective and The Volunteer Club, offers a different perspective of where NIL is today.

“There are a lot of people in this industry that are going to D.C. that are telling our elected officials that NIL is going to be the downfall of college sports, and the sky is falling and so forth. From our standpoint, we could not have a more opposite feeling on the direction of college sports,” Baddour says.

“We think NIL has been great for the game. When you look at parity across the board, when you look at viewership and attendance, all those things are up. These players are responsible for generating millions of dollars for their university. Winning can help local businesses as well as help with enrollment. We feel like athletes absolutely should be compensated for all the good works they do.”

The Volunteer Club website states 90% of funds generated by his group goes “directly to athletes.” Anchor Impact GM Epps would only confirm that the majority of money raised goes to the student-athletes.

And then there’s this opinion offered by Nashville sports talk radio host Doug Mathews, who played collegiately at Vanderbilt and coached at both Tennessee and Vandy as well as other schools.

Georgia’s Ladd McConkey and UT’s Joe Milton III are promoting The Dairy Alliance this week.

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“It’s better because now the IRS has kind of gotten involved and let people know what they can do and what they can’t do,” says Mathews, who hosts Football Saturday and Big Orange Sunday on 104.5-FM in Nashville.

“But until the NCAA can get some rules and regulations in place covering this like they do every other facet of college football, you’re going to have people that are going one way and some that are going the other.

“In a nutshell, the biggest problem that the NCAA has right now is the NCAA looks at this as (an issue) that has to be solved through the political arena. And that’s not going to happen in Congress. So until they figure out a way to get whatever those regulations are in place that everybody has to follow, everybody’s just going to be doing their own thing.”

Let’s take a deeper look at some of the other NIL issues facing universities, student-athletes, the collectives and those involved in the facilitation process.

Protect student-athletes

College sports were upended in June 2021, when the Supreme Court ruled the NCAA could not limit education-related payments to student-athletes, a unanimous decision in NCAA v. Alston. Subsequently, the NCAA left it up to states to create their own NIL rules – or to schools in states without NIL rules.

That same year, Athlete Licensing Co., began operations in Nashville and has quickly grown into a major NIL player by partnering with university collectives across the nation, from the Bubba Club at Texas Tech to Kentucky’s 15 Club to Cal’s California Legends and others.

The tech-enabled NIL/Intellectual Property rights management company’s goal is to connect student-athletes, universities, collectives, brands and agents. But the bigger mission is to protect those student-athletes’ IP rights and making sure they maximize their NIL potential, says Bryan Risner, ALC’s vice president of strategic partnerships, and Ryan Miller, CEO of Athlete Advantage and founder of The 15 Club, an NIL collective associated with Kentucky.

Risner played college football at Miami, Ohio, while Miller began his Marshall before transferring to Kentucky.

D’Juan Epps, general manager of Anchor Impact, which aids Vanderbilt athletes.

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“When I was in college, you weren’t even allowed to have a job, and now literally thousands of dollars (are) flowing into many of these kids’ hands, sometimes on a monthly basis,” Risner says with a laugh. He then goes on to explain how NIL was created because “schools and others were profiting off of the student-athletes’ name, image and likeness. So they wanted the student-athletes to be able to monetize that.

“And what happened quickly is the need arose to aggregate all these opportunities for the student-athlete. (ALC) created the execution piece of NIL on behalf of the student-athletes. If you think of collecting all these different revenue streams and being able to put it into a funnel and then appropriately accounting it and sending it to the right source, whether it’s a student-athlete – it could be an agency, whatever that may be.

“The partnership that arose with Athlete Advantage was that we needed a partner that could essentially aggregate all of those revenue opportunities on behalf of the student-athlete. … The model that we thought was going to be the ultimate winner in this whole NIL business from the sustainability perspective really is what Ryan has created (with) his team at Athlete Advantage. That’s why we felt like they were a strategic partner.”

Miller says Athlete Advantage is just that – a full-service company that makes student-athletes their No. 1 priority.

“We really put our arms around the athlete and said, ‘hey, we know what these kids are actually going to need in this world of (NIL). There’s a lot of bad actors out there. There’s a lot of things that go on in this industry,” Miller says, noting they have in-house attorneys for the athletes, who review contracts before they’re signed.

“We knew that if we protected the athlete doing that, the extension from that is we’re making sure that we’re protecting those athletes and their eligibility and all these other things. You’re protecting that university, you’re protecting those businesses involved. So, the north always being, we’re protecting the athlete.”

Miller offers this example of how deals sometimes went down in the earliest days of NIL.

“One of the very first contracts that (came) through for us, literally a month or so into NIL, as our attorneys were going through this contract and really getting into the nuts and bolts of what we were finding – and this was a repeated thing that was happening – was there were perpetuity clauses built into these contracts with existing contracts that was literally switching representation to an agency,” Miller says.

He later noted in the conversation that while things have significantly improved, NIL deals are still “all over the map” – and not always in favor of the student-athlete.

Dog lover and Vanderbilt football linebacker CJ Taylor, shown here with Moozzy at Centennial Park, has partnered with Pawster Nashville.

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“If we can get some more guardrails up from the NCAA, you don’t have bad actors out there actually taking the largest sum of the money from the athletes and the athlete is getting, let’s say, 2% to 4% of the deal. That’s actually out there today. … And I think that’s wrong.”

Anchor drops a rebrand

A new name with a more focused mission. That’s how Epps describes the Anchor Impact collective, which relaunched in January with two main goals: create NIL opportunities for current and future Vandy athletes while helping retain athletes who might use the transfer portal to seek other more lucrative NIL deals elsewhere.

Epps notes the collective has already signed nearly 100 of Vandy’s 350-plus student-athletes, including the entire Vanderbilt baseball team.

“That’s something that’s important to us because that program is one that has consistently, year in and year out, had success. So in this new age of NIL and transfer portal, retention and things like that, it’s important for us to recognize success and reward success from that perspective,” Epps says.

In a news release when the VandyBoys deal was announced in late September, Coach Tim Corbin praised the collective and its contributors: “This partnership … will empower our student-athletes to not only excel in their sport but also in their personal and professional lives. We are grateful for the trust and investment placed in our program, which was earned by these student-athletes.”

Epps says Anchor Impact has partnered with Student Athlete NIL, one of the top collectives agencies, to enhance the brands of Vandy athletes.

“So through this new partnership with Student Athlete NIL, we have rebranded as Anchor Impact. And it’s creating even more opportunities for our student-athletes – from corporate and business sponsorships to content and brand deals, to engaging with our fans and create opportunities for them as our most generous supporters for our membership program.

“We rebranded to Anchor Impact because it allows us that opportunity to continue to grow our brand and grow the opportunities for our student-athletes. Student Athlete NIL has done a great job across the country working with over 35 collectives with P5 (Power Five) level to mid-majors on down.

“We felt this partnership can really help us in that regard because they’ve created a great infrastructure for themselves. So we’re excited about what we’ve done, but we know we can’t be complacent. We’re looking forward to this partnership and evolving as much as possible, as quick as possible as this landscape continues to change.”

Jason Belzer, CEO of Student Athlete NIL, says the Anchor Impact deal “demonstrates our shared vision to equip Vanderbilt student-athletes with the knowledge, tools and support essential for them to optimize their NIL opportunities and establish a robust foundation for a successful future.”

Epps adds that part of the goal also is “to ensure that we’re doing right by our coaches and our staffs to help them retain at the highest level,” Epps says. “There’s a lot of talented young men and women at Vanderbilt that other programs would love to have.

“We feel as if we have a part to play in ensuring that those young men and women remain in a Vanderbilt uniform as these (they) continue to advance their brand and create opportunities for themselves on and off the field. We want to recognize and honor that.”

NCAA Convention may provide clarity

In early October, the NCAA Division I Council passed four NIL proposals that could be adopted at the Jan. 10-3 NCAA Convention in Phoenix. The proposals focus on:

• Developing a voluntary registry of NIL service providers

• Disclosure and transparency on elements of NIL agreements

• Standardized contract terms for NIL agreements

• An education program for prospects, current athletes, providers and licensees

“Division I members support college athletes benefiting from the use of their name, image and likeness to the fullest extent, and in no way intend to limit their potential,” says Lynda Tealer, chair of the DI Council. “It is our hope that these changes will improve outcomes for student-athletes and help campus leaders navigate this issue with greater clarity.”

Baddour and Epps say they agree consistency is what’s needed for NIL rules.

“Whether it’s NIL collectives or the NCAA or conference commissioners or athletics directors,” Baddour says. “I think we’re all on the same page that there should be some sort of uniformity across state laws because some schools are at a recruiting disadvantage and some are at an advantage based on what their state law.

So I think that is something that all parties involved can be agreeable on, is that we should have some sort of uniformity.”

Adds Epps: “Whatever governing body dictates what’s next, I think it’s important for it to be consistent across the board, whether it’s the NCAA level or at the national level … so I think we do have to rely on our leaders and the leaders that are in place to make a best-judgment call here as it relates to the benefit of the student-athlete. And for us, if decisions are made that we agree with and are best for the student-athletes, we’re all behind that.”

Mathews, who has been around college football for five decades as a player, coach and media observer, has an analogy for the state of NIL and college athletics, comparing it to what happens after the IRS spends a couple of weeks passing tax laws.

“And then all the CPA’s and the smart businessmen, they spend the other 50 weeks trying to figure out a way to get around them. That’s the way this is,” Mathews says with a laugh.

“The NCAA passes rules and then coaches and administrators try to figure out a way, ‘OK, here’s the rule – how do we get around it?’ That’s what they’re doing right now. And normally, they’ll figure out a way to get it done.

“So this will all be worked out at some point. I don’t know where this is going. But until then, there’s going to be some things going on out there that are going to be kind of fun to watch, really.”

Mathews points out that he’s talking about NCAA regulations.

“I’m talking about NCAA rules and regulations because there simply are none now, really. ... We’ve been talking about this for well over a year now. Nothing’s changed. Like I said – and this is my opinion – if the NCAA is looking for the political class, which they are, to solve this problem for them, then this problem is probably not going to get solved.”