I feel like everyone is overlooking a key point about the impact of these decisions. Our NIL funds are not unlimited, and for the donors who contribute to the pool, they expect a certain level of commitment and transparency. These supporters aren’t investing for players to unexpectedly decide to sit out a season and transfer to another institution without prior conversations regarding their overall intentions.
Take Jakstys as an example—I would assume that any plans impacting the roster and budget were thoroughly discussed in advance. However, situations like those involving Ty and Sencire could pose significant challenges with donor relations in future years.
Hoping some legal framework or guardrails are coming to ensure stability moving forward.
There's a prevailing thought in industry that just because you pay an employee that they should be 100% loyal and grateful to you, and will bend over backwards to you. And that makes some sense, you're giving them a job. But what happens when the policies you enforce are no longer good or healthy for the employee or simply not competitive to other companies in the field? What if you don't internally promote people or give people raises but instead pay competitively for new hires to fill those positions such that it'd actually be far more profitable for an employee to quit and be rehired in? Or you regularly are laying off full time employees but somehow seem to always be adding more outsourcing? You may desire 100% loyalty, but should you expect it?
And the donors may indeed feel as you say where they feel they're paying 12 guys handsomely so everyone should be 100% happy and loyal. But I think there needs to be an understanding that a player's situation can change after agreeing to said "contract" just based off how the transfer portal now works. Pre-portal it used to be you knew what recruits and new players were coming to your program prior to deciding whether you wanted to transfer. Now, the transfer portal is closed before you have any idea what your roster will look like. And that’s what happened in Ty's case. The donors wanted high end talent brought in and Brad did. There can be fallout from that. And it's a well known consequence. Yes, donors and employers can stick their heads in the sand and say "how dare our employees be disloyal!", but at the same time, should they be surprised that employees leave when the company devalue them?
Let's do a hypothetical example. Say you're a 5th year senior. You bleed orange and blue and played your heart out in the spot minutes you got the past 4 years. First to the gym, last to leave, always gave your all. Great locker room presence, amazing leader, and a skilled player who has improved each year but not as skilled as the older more experienced guys ahead of you. And here in your final season, those players graduated, it's finally your time to show off your skills, take the mantle. Be the guy, the captain, and play for a chance at a professional contract. And the coach tells you, you're going to be that guy and how important you are. And then just 1 month later, post transfer portal brings in 6 new guys and tells you he loves what you bring but you're going to only get clean up minutes. Should you be forced to stay? Never get a chance to start or show off your skills for a shot at a pro contract when many other teams would be giving you that opportunity? Do you not feel taken advantage of and strung along? Should anyone blame you for leaving?
The fact is this is just how the current system and portal operates. Donors can howl at the moon day and night about it, but the players can't be forced to abide by something that is absolutely not in their best interest. The donors believe in bringing in high end talent, and bringing in said talent is thus in their best interest, but it doesn't mean there aren't consequences.
that is going to start to tick off big donors …
