Former Tulane QB Darian Mensah received a deal from Duke that is believed to pay him $8 million over two years, sources tell CBS Sports' @JTalty and @chris_hummer.Full story on the former 3-star prospect who is set to be Duke's QB1 in 2025 🔗 https://t.co/5lx0de9FxE pic.twitter.com/nPmb0NQ9AM— CBS Sports College Football 🏈 (@CBSSportsCFB) December 23, 2024
Just asinine that we are at this point. We have gone so far down this hole so quickly that it feels like we are rapidly approaching a bubble popping. And in my opinion, that bubble can't burst quickly enough.
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Crazy how Duke sees Mensah worth 60-80% of Coach K depending on the yearwhen he was coaching.
Duke paying football players more than basketball. Who would have ever thought we would see the day?
Personally "never" comes to mind first.
The day I found out that Stoops made significantly more than Caliperia (sp?) was the day I knew football was king everywhere.
But do we know that? What are their basketball players being paid?
Good for him! $8m to go to Duke is a no brainer
Now it makes sense how they were able to lock in that transfer so quickly.
This is not true. I have a friend who is part of Tulane's NIL collective and is privy to the details. My friend got the details of negotiations (for lack of a better term) directly from Coach Summerall in a weekly conference call for boosters.
Mensah asked Tulane for an extra $500k (~40% increase I was told) after 'someone close to him' told him 'that's exactly what he would make in the portal.' Tulane collective declined. Mensah was offended and arranged his own travel home from their final game after it ended (without informing Summerall). This was the story I got a couple weeks ago.
So, given this CBS 'report', there's three possibilities:
Which one do you think is most likely? 🤔🤔🤔
Seems super dumb. Mensah is going to see the report and if he's not getting paid 8 mil over 2 years he's going to squeal to other recruits
I've mentioned it before, but I know some people who work in this space as well. There is absolutely ZERO incentive to leak or report any of these numbers honestly. Absolutely none. Every single recruit, school, trainer, NIL marketing agency, family member, etc. leaking any sort of number is doing so to provide themselves some sort of market leverage, advantage or free marketing.
My boss is a big Tulane alum/donor but our office is in durham, will be fun to see the fallout
First, I am a bit skeptical of this (and all) numbers released by "sources".
Its clearly in the interest of the school/collective and NIL "Agent" to inflate these figures as much as possible.
At the same time, if this is anywhere close to what they are actually paying, its insane and the bubble is closer to bursting (like 1-2 more seasons)
Good for him if true. But my question is: Who put this valuation on him? If he's worth that fine. But who is he compared to? How much are they making? What are his measurables? Stats? Experience levels? Does he have to play school? Does his academics get him in to duke? So many questions, so few answers. This is crazy!
Travis Hunter only had $5.2M in NIL this season. Hunter has a social media following comparable to superstars in music and other pro sports. No way this kid has $4M a year value compared to that.
There should never be an assumption of value, just what someone is willing to pay. There are very few examples of college athletes having individual brand value that translates to NIL. Hunter may be one of the few given his exposure at Colorado.
It ain't about value. Never was. Its about how much do you need to bribe someone to put on your jersey for some games. It is straight up pay to play.
Its also funny, as much as these guys are making in NIL, I feel like I don't see any of their names, images and likenesses used in advertising. Funny, that
There is not one damn thing about the whole NIL deal is funny. It's a tragic self inflicted and possibly fatal wound to the beloved and enjoyable (sorta) institution of college sports,
The greed is speedrunning the fall of the sport. And last week it was on full display just how involved ESPN is with this downfall. Every single game was rife with complaints about how unwatchable the playoffs were, how certain schools were more deserving of the teams taking part in the competition we were watching. They didn't get their way so they damn well made sure that everyone they pay a salary to threw a tantrum to make everything as miserable as possible for the viewer as a warning to never disappoint them again.
Quite frankly, all it did was push me further toward never watching again. And its already bad enough having a 60 minute discourse about the playoff and a discussion about teams that aren't even playing when I'm watching a VT game, I don't want that when I'm watching the actual playoff, too.
The ACC isn't doing anything to fight back against ESPN's narrative that we suck and our teams are undeserving. Only Syracuse has managed to win their bowl game. The rest of the ACC is busy losing to ECU, Toledo, and UCONN.
Facts. This is the stuff that has been destroying the conference brand for a decade now.
Almost 2 decades, if we're being honest
Good thing we've never lost to ECU...
I guess we should be glad some ACC schools seem to be taking football seriously.
He's from a lower tier of football, so that means Duke isn't serious about football. They should be getting kids from P4 schools or else they're small-time.
Especially if they are slinging around $4M a year. Push for the starters from SEC schools with that money.
I hope the kid get paid and is an absolute flop so we can continue to laugh at these collectives throwing millions of dolllrs at kids that have no proven value.
Where is all this Carolina money coming from? It's raining cash at Duke and UNC, and not necessarily for the right things.
Expert analysis here...Duke is stupid!
Does anyone have insight to the terms of these deals? Aka is 100 guaranteed? Are there ladders or conditions? When is the money paid? Balloon structure?
I'm curious if the headlines match the actual distribution plan.
As I mentioned above, this 'reporting' is definitely wrong, but to answer your question generally: Typically, in the 5-10% of scenarios where the reported NIL contract is not grossly exaggerated/inflated, outlets still share the maximum money the athlete can make. So it's not 'guaranteed' money by any stretch.
The only contract I've seen widely shared is Nico Iamaleava's - and that had $8m over 4 years as the absolute maximum he could earn from the collective.
You also have a plethora of players at USC who are alleging that they were promised deals they never got, or just never paid.
Some data points I've heard multiple people in the media sharing/agreeing on - Oregon's roster is about $18m, OSU's is about $15m, Ole Miss is at about $12m. There are a few others in the $10-$13m range. That's between $500k and $750k average per starter (if you assume the team is only paying the starting 22). So across the 65 P4 teams, there's probably less than 50 guys making 7 figures from collectives.