Spyre CEO James Clawson told The Athletic's David Ubben this week that current Tennessee quarterback Hendon Hooker has been presented a "substantial" NIL deal.
Clawson then said that a quarterback at Tennessee (presumably the starting quarterback) should be making at least seven figures a year (over a million bucks).
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Remember when some people were saying Braxton Burmeister was better than Hendon?
That was fun.
Remember when Josh Huepel started Joe Milton over Hooker for the first third of the season, and hooker only got a shot because Milton went down with an injury?
Milton is better than BB too...
I have a theory that Hooker is the worst practice quarterback ever. First Willis and then Milton.
Michigan fans on Reddit saying that Milton is really good at diagnosing plays when he has seen it on film, but when he sees a new look from the defense he crumbles.
I have nothing to back that up, just sharing a random internet user's opinion.
We'll never know for sure who was better, because only one of them got the chance to play multiple years in a system tailored to their strengths.
Appreciate BB and his guts and effort as a Hokie, but he had no business starting over HH ever. Fu and Corn totally botched our QB situation for years and threw the players under the bus to cover for their incompetence.
Who? Hooker has only played one season at Tennessee.
Also Hooker excelled despite being in a system that wasn't tailored to his strengths for multiple years.
We know for sure who is better.
So close, the correct answer we were looking for is Hendon Hooker is/was better
Remember when it was too cold for HH to play in the biggest game of the year vs Clemson. Guess UT has deeper pockets and balmier weather. Good for you HH.
If nothing else, HH can now afford a sideline jacket.
I believe that HH was coming off of Covid. You really don't know the side effects of Covid and also HH never reacted to cold weather like that the season before. JS
Maybe when one has an epiphany that their coaches are horrible and have done horrible things to the potential permanent detriment of your career, one may elicit seizure like symptoms if exposed to the right environmental conditions. I would convulse wildly and uncontrollably if I came to the realization that this staff was composed of morons that could cost me my health and $Ms.
There's a lot of former players who complained publicly about how the previous staff handled injuries...
Saw this on Reddit last night - seems like its in the speculation stage right now, but its interesting that someone thinks the "value" of a starting QB at Tennessee is worth more than a mil.
I mean it's surprising until you realize how massive Tennessee's fanbase is. They might be bad to mediocre but there are a lot of paying fans who support that bad to mediocre team. Kinda sorta like with the Cowboys.
I mean yeah, but Tennessee is even worse in terms of doing less with more.
All of these NIL deals are speculation until someone releases a tax document or a contract. I have a feeling many of them are being very overstated because a $100 NIL deal doesn't do anything for the media or croots
Bingo. I'd love to also see the tax forms of those literally billion dollar soccer "transfer fees". lol right
There literally hasn't been one
Maybe they're counting the decimal place and two digits after as "figures."
Holy deep pockets Batman! Way to go HH, get yourself paid. Might want to send some flowers to FuCorn for all of that foundational "coaching" you got at VT.
Good for Hendon. Good for all these kids...
However, we just need to call this what it is - a minor league situation in which the organizations with the most money, best connections get the best talent while those organizations with less money and without expansive connections fall behind as each year passes. Even professional leagues have a "salary cap" so that things can be somewhat level.
This is the wild wild west folks. Buckle up. VT is gonna struggle in this new NIL world, at least in the short term.
yep it's just a roundabout way of paying players to attend a specific school. The legal concept of NIL income was supposed to be for endorsement deals. This Spyre Sports organization seems to exist solely to pay UT student athletes for simply being UT student athletes
If the NCAA would've sacked up and put some guidelines in place we could've prevented this, but no they punted and now the schools with secret bag men get to just openly pay 18 year olds
I believe this is only a thing in American sports. I believe Soccer and Cricket, for example, do not do this.
Technically MLB doesn't have a cap, but the luxury tax disincentives going above the soft ceiling.
Professional leagues can only have salary caps, because they're professional, and have negotiated them with the player unions. The same thing could happen in college if the schools acknowledged that athletes are more than just your average student, and negotiated some kind of agreement with them.
This seems more of "the starting QB at Tennessee" and not specifically Hendon thing. Either way hell yeah for him get some money.
It's obviously a "used to be the starting QB for VT" thing. Fuente was really good at training transfers to succeed elsewhere.
Good for him. Obviously about one million more than he would have made under Fuente's guidance.
Are we the poorest P5 school?
Define poorest? Don't have smallest football or athletic budget. Don't have smallest donor base. Don't have smallest donor annual giving. But we are in bottom half yes.
I don't have the numbers in front of me but I recall us being in the upper half. But if you're not at the very top dozen or so schools it's a big difference as with everything else.
247 doesn't have us in the top-20 public schools, in terms of total revenue. There's other articles out there by outlets I've never heard of that put us anywhere from upper-20's to lower-40's.
Upper 20s sounds about right/what I remember. You'd also expect the rankings to shuffle a bit from year to year. It's not hard to imagine the numbers to have slid in more recent years as fan enthusiasm also subsided.
So "no" lol
No, not by a long shot.
This has more to do with Tennessee being Tennessee than anything else.
Buckle up. It's going to be a bumpy ride for the non SEC/Big 10/Notre Dames/perennial top 10s.
This was all very predictable.
Yep, and as VTs value increases with Pry potentially being successful, the NIL deals will increase in value, too.
UMD found another avenue to sell recruits: the DC market. They can be their own stars in Metro DC. And they don't have the pressure to win games.
Schools like Ohio State (Columbus), Michigan (Detroit), Georgia (Atlanta), and Miami can sell recruits on potential NIL deals solely on market location.
We don't have that at VT. So we have to be successful on the field to increase our value to recruits' NIL potential.
When your TV deal reduces the need for the Athletic Department to rely on donations, that money can be used in other areas.
This money probably has to come from outside the athletic department, no?
Though ultimately from a similar place (the fan base).
That's alum's point, as I understand it. The TV money being better in the sec allows the fan base dollars to be used for NIL directly to the shelter instead of going to the athletic department
Man, a digit per win is a pretty good deal.
If he stayed with VT Fuente would have literally cost him millions lol
I'm in the wrong line of work.
Gut (as it looks up at me): You missed that boat, bud.
Yea, but can you play quarterback with an ass pocket full of whiskey?
The ass pocket will be used, after all.
You know, a great beard once said the same thing.
Yeah, whoever that was, he really knew what he was talking about
I am honored to receive approval from The Beard of Galifianakis
Beard, you know I love you, man. But how the hell you gonna disrespect Jerimiah Johnson (Robert Redford) like that?
Good for Hooker. If there is a market for it, he should cash in if that is now allowed. Me personally- I don't pay much attention to the DC Go Go of the NBA G League. I hope college football doesn't turn into that.
I am highly skeptical the reported deal is worth over $1 million. The operative word in the statement is should as in, "the Tennessee QB should be making at least seven figures." Either way it sounds like the offer is substantial which is great for him.
100% agree.
Think alot of this is posturing. Started when Saban said Young was getting something like $1.3 mil before season started.
Now, in order to keep up, every other SEC team has to put out an impressive number in the media.
I don't doubt that HH is getting a nice chunk of NIL money, but I bet the actual on paper $$ is less than what is in the media.
It's 100% marketing BS. The guy who takes a cut off of NIL deals he brokers and is a UT fan is absolutely going to inflate the numbers as much as possible at every opportunity. When asked specifically about the NIL deals Hooker has, this guy declined to provide any details "out of respect for Hendon"
translation - Hooker doesn't have a 7-figure NIL deal and is nowhere close, but this NIL broker would love for him to get such a deal.
Or anyone else he represents.
Well, you do have to keep up with this inflation.
"$11.50 for a hamburger. Ya'll must be crazy!"
$5 milkshake was. at one time, expensive.
"Five Guys" has entered the chat...
We need to start a charitable "Key Play Endorsements," which will accept charitably contributions from individuals and small companies in order to compensate Virginia Tech Athletes.
Hardees ain't small
Not that it really matters -- and of course the discussion is still valid -- but in the name of accuracy/clarity: Nowhere in the original piece does it say Hooker has an NIL deal that exceeds seven figures.
Fair - I tweaked the title to be a bit more accurate.
Not trying to get into a thing, but it's still inaccurate, and i recognize no one really cares. But... it's not "expected" to be seven figures. The original piece makes two separate points: (1) Hooker has an NIL deal (terms undisclosed) AND (2) one particular collective thinks its reasonable at some point for the starting QB at Tennessee to have an NIL deal at seven figures. Conflating those two things is understandable and what happens when one site cites another site which is citing another site. :)
This is how internet rumors get started.
Hendon Hooker is a millionaire. FACT! At least I think I read something like that on the internet.
Somewhere, there's a college quarterback wondering where his NIL money is.
/s
No wonder BB hit the portal...
How about now
softer, but still spinning it like Hooker is in line for $1M+ deal, which he is not.
This is a broker/agent trying to talk something into existence. Saying that in his /opinion/ a starting QB at UT with great numbers should be able to get a seven figure NIL deal. He uses Hooker 2021 as a example of great numbers.
Nowhere does he say Hooker is signing a 7 figure deal or is even negotiating a deal in the 7-figure ballpark.
When asked specifically about Hooker's NIL deals, he declines to comment 'out of respect to Hendon' which in my book translates to "Hendon's actual deals are so far from 7 figures it would make me look like a dumbass for hyping the idea of a UT QB getting a million-dollar deal"
Yeah I tried this at work, I was like KingJames is about to sign a 7 figure salary with company XXXX. Then my timesheet manager was like, this is company XXXX, we don't do that so no you're not.
Well, that doesn't stop you from posting it to social media, and forcing them to explain it to your co-workers individually when they request more compensation.
I guess not but my lack of social media seems to be a hurdle
(an example) If HH could (hugely speculative) land $1M at TN to be their QB for a year, why should I donate my measly $50-200/year to Hokie Club-FB? I would say these crazy, outlandish NIL deals have changed the meaningfulness of regular athletic fund donations. With all the money being exchanged, I feel like I am now donating to a semi-pro, for-profit team/players like the Norfolk Tides instead of Virginia Tech. I was all for giving these guys better facilities, etc. but now if they are getting paid why, and does the facilities arms race even matter that much anymore?
A lot to unpack here, but I will respond with my thoughts (because this is the internet and that's what we do):
I believe Dave Ubban reported that Tennessee's NIL Collective allows people to join for as little as $20/year (can't dig it up right now). So maybe you don't want to donate to the university, and instead you want to pay the collective in exchange for a meet & great or autograph or something.
IDK, I never thought of my gifts to the athletic departments as 'donations;' I wasn't giving out of the goodness of my heart, or giving to a charity - at the end of the day, I want my alma mater to be (nationally) relevant, and I hope my gift can help there. I want to spread the gospel of Virginia Tech. I wasn't really thinking about improving the lives of student athletes.
I'm not sure how common/uncommon my viewpoint is. My guess is that a lot of people feel this way to some degree, but won't admit it.
This is a really interesting question that no one is talking about IMO. In a post-NIL world, does it matter if your locker room has a water slide that drops you into a light up massage chair? Or does only the paycheck matter?
^^ Edit: Meant to reply above ^^
These large dollar value deals are likely going to be fairly rare. If you're donating to the athletic program you're donating for all the student athletes, and none of them besides maybe a handful at Tech are going to make anything approaching a reasonable salary.
Facilities still matter in that there's going to be a baseline for programs to need to have in order to attract more sought after athletes, but no school needs to be building facilities with slides, or lazy rivers, or what have you. Instead of schools pretending they don't make any money by spending on coaching salaries, elaborate facilities, some of that money will go to the players now. The money has always been there, it's just going different places.
Good point. Matt Brown talked about this on the Solid Verbal - he said there's one NIL market for the top 300 football players, the top 100 basketball players, and the top few players in other sports. For everyone else, it's a few grand per year tops. That's not chump change (especially when you're a college student) but it's not life changing either.