For the last five days, more than 300 college athletes worked out in earnest for scouts and team officials with the goal of running and jumping their way into the NFL via next month’s draft.
The athletes represented large, medium and a few small universities. All of the institutions are members of the NCAA, whose headquarters is a brisk 15-minute walk from the convention center where the NFL scouting combine was held from Feb. 29 to March 3.
I’ve always found the juxtaposition to be ironic because, until three years ago, the NCAA was responsible for perpetrating one of the great illusions in North American sports: It operated a highly commercial sports enterprise under the guise of higher education to avoid paying athletes for their labor. Not only did the NCAA avoid compensating athletes — especially football and basketball players — but the organization refused to allow athletes to profit from their names, images, and likenesses, which the schools freely exploited.
The arrangement changed virtually overnight in June 2021 when the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that NCAA restrictions on NIL activity violate antitrust laws. The court found that enough was enough: The NCAA could no longer masquerade as a nonprofit enterprise. Effective immediately, college athletes would be free to profit from their name, image and likeness. The era of NIL was upon us.
In the opinion, one justice wrote that the ruling was “an important and overdue course correction” and that it “raised serious questions” about the NCAA’s existing compensation rule.
Most of the athletes participating in last week’s NFL combine were college freshmen in 2021 when the walls came tumbling down. A few instantly capitalized. Players such as USC quarterback Caleb Williams and Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders earned millions in endorsements. Others such as LSU quarterback Jayden Daniels quickly learned how to use their popularity to strike lucrative NIL deals.
There were stories upon stories written about the athletic version of this emancipation proclamation with athletes signing lucrative NIL deals. Lost in all the attention placed on high-profile, high-priced NIL deals was how impactful, indeed necessary, NIL money was for a number of players who used the money to help out struggling families they left behind when they went off to college. These were stories about how NIL made college life enjoyable without athletes having to take money under the table and risk the embarrassment of being discovered by NCAA investigators for receiving so-called extra benefits.
One such player is JC Latham, All-SEC offensive tackle from the University of Alabama. Charismatic and personable, Latham is an NIL outlier because he is not a quarterback, wide receiver, running back or defensive back. He is a lineman who grasped the implication for NIL through playing at a legendary college football program and using the platform to build a brand.
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On Saturday, I asked Latham about his approach to securing NIL deals. He said he never lost his focus on football, but he was also in a business state of mind.
“You don’t want to have it interfere with your day-to-day life and your routine, so you definitely gotta prioritize it behind the main thing, which is getting an education and playing ball,” Latham said.
He also said he was carrying the torch for offensive linemen who tend to be far more understated than their skill position counterparts and were often content to stay behind the scenes.
“I wish there was more representation for the big guys in NIL,” he said. “We’re kind of distanced from all the fame and the glory because we play in the trenches, and we live in the trenches. The game is won and lost in the trenches. No knock on Shedeur or Caleb Williams — all those guys are amazing players, one of a kind — but any guy in the league will tell you that the battles are won and lost in the trenches.”
“When you tell me that I can play the game that I love, and you’ll pay me $10,000 to appear on something or whatever the case may be, I’m thinking immediately I can help my family with this, I can do that. I’m not necessarily thinking about fame and glory, but more or less building up revenue within my family.”
— Alabama offensive lineman JC Latham
Latham was born in Meridian, Mississippi, and describes himself as coming from humble beginnings as the second oldest of five children.
“I grew up with my mom, three brothers, two sisters, with our grandma and great-grandma and a niece in a two-bedroom apartment,” he said.
Latham played in 14 games as a backup for his freshman year at Alabama in 2021. Two weeks after the Supreme Court decision, Latham and several other Crimson Tide players signed a deal with CrisP Clothing.
“When you tell me that I can play the game that I love, and you’ll pay me $10,000 to appear on something or whatever the case may be, I’m thinking immediately I can help my family with this, I can do that,” Latham said. “I’m not necessarily thinking about fame and glory, but more or less building up revenue within my family.”
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In August 2023, Latham and other members of the Crimson Tide offensive line partnered with Roll Tide Natural Jerky in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, to create two new flavors: “Big Man Barbeque” and “Mean Mesquite.”
The greatest benefit of NIL is that the enterprise has introduced athletes to the business of sports at much earlier ages and created more sophisticated athletes who know their value.
“It definitely has you grow up,” Latham said. “You gotta understand that you’re getting more money now, so there’s gonna be a bigger target on your back.
“If you want to create more wealth for yourself and your family, you gotta really understand how to maneuver it and manage it. Definitely puts you in the mindset to really understand what’s going on around you and how you can create your wealth early.”
Like Latham, University of Texas offensive tackle Christian Jones was able to cash in on an NIL deal. Jones was one of the Longhorns’ offensive linemen who signed a deal with The Pancake Factory. Beginning in 2022, the deal would pay the linemen $50,000 annually for use of their name, image, and likeness to support charitable causes.
“I feel more lucky and blessed to be in this opportunity and be a college football player at the right time,” he said. “There’s been a lot of great players who didn’t get any NIL and if you go back in time, they’d probably be millionaires at that time. So we’re just lucky. Perfect timing.”
The 2021 Supreme Court ruling ended years of uncompensated servitude and a system in which only coaches could reap the benefit of their work.
The NCAA’s broadcast contract for the March Madness basketball tournaments is worth $1.1 billion annually. The television deal for the FBS’ College Football Playoff reportedly is worth $470 million annually.
There’s more: The president of the NCAA earns nearly $4 million annually. Commissioners of Power 5 conferences take home between $2 million and $5 million a year. The compensation for Power 5 athletic directors is more than $1 million annually. Salaries for top Division I college football coaches approach $11 million. Alabama coach Nick Saban, now retired, earned $11.1 million last season. Steve Sarkisian, head coach at Texas, earned $10.3 million.
As one justice wrote in the Supreme Court decision: “The bottom line is that the NCAA and its member colleges are suppressing the pay of student athletes who collectively generate billions of dollars in revenues for colleges every year. Those enormous sums of money flow to seemingly everyone except the student athletes.”
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Predictably, there has been pushback. After three years of seeing many young athletes make hundreds of thousands of dollars, politicians are looking to put them back in their place and restrict their ability to earn substantial sums of NIL money.
On Friday, the Utah state legislature passed a bill mandating that college athletes in the state looking to profit from their name, image and likeness must now receive written approval from their institutions for any deal exceeding $600. The new policy effectively allows universities in Utah to exercise more control over student-athlete partnerships.
According to published reports, the idea for the bill was triggered in December 2023 when an NIL leasing arrangement between the Utah Crimson Collective and athletes resulted in some athletes driving to their classes in new Jeeps and trucks.
The bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Jordan Teuscher, a Republican, said the purpose of the bill was to tame what he called “the wild, wild west of student-athlete endorsements.” On the contrary, the intent is not so much taming the wild west but turning back the clock and restricting the ability of college athletes to benefit from their labor.
The reality is that things will never be as they once were in college athletics, and politicians, coaches — and fans — had better get used to it.
Athletes who were in high school in 2021, when the Supreme Court issued its ruling, are entering college with NIL deals already. They expect better deals at the next level. The new NIL landscape has created a more sophisticated athlete.
As Jones said, athletes have more than a dream.
“I have a dream, but I also have a plan,” he said.
“You have to have both. I’m doing both.”
