This NIL based tournament will be the future of College basketball! | College Basketball

This NIL based tournament will be the future of College basketball! | College Basketball

big headline from norlander on uh Wednesday morning the players era Festival it’s Now official it’s going to be in Las Vegas later this year during the week of Thanksgiving and it’s going to be uh lucrative for the schools that are involved we’re talking about Alabama Craton Houston Notre Dame Oregon Rucker San Diego State Texas A&M each of those schools going to get a million dollars of nil money Just for participating norlander you handled the reporting on all of this so what else do we need to know about this uh first of its kind season event that’s happening later on this year yeah so a few things to dig into with this uh we actually haven’t talked this I first reported on this like five weeks ago or so um but with the I guess the Cadence of how the story rolled out in addition to our podcast schedule we actually haven’t really talked about this on the show yet uh so the the official announcement that this was going to be happening came out on Wednesday and we got a few additional details but there’s a there’s a couple of talking points to touch on with this I’ll get to the basics I want your thoughts and then we’ll get to the skepticism that continues to exist over the uh this event and and its long-term viability which I think are all very fair questions there so GP gave you the uh the eight teams it will be played the week of Thanksgiving this season this upcoming season uh the plan as of now I believe is the Tuesday Wednesday and Friday of Thanksgiving giving those dates have not been finalized uh in part uh I was told because the broadcast partner which has not been announced yet and is going to be on a streaming service I don’t know which one yet um apparently there might be some desire to have basketball on Thanksgiving I don’t know there there was that and then there was a I think a hangup with the MGM Grand Arena which is where the most of the games will probably be played um the building was booked through another promoter for one of those days so they still have to sort all that out but it’ll be happening the week of Thanksgiving this is another huge basketball event scheduled for next season that uh will only increase the amount of col troops the week of Thanksgiving which obviously has huge uh basketball Vibes in addition to all the football stuff that happens that week um the matchups that will start will be out of two four team brackets uh because you’ll notice there’s Alabama and Texas A&M in this thing that’s two SEC teams current mte rules for the NCAA do not allow for teams from the same conference to face each other in an mte barring uh extreme circumstances and so you’ll have Houston playing Alabama which is a huge matchup right off the bat and then ruter playing Notre Dame in one bracket and then you will have kraton versus Oregon you’ll recall those two played an amazing game in the tournament just this past season uh in Texas A&M will play San Diego State the those teams will play two games a piece in bracket play and then the winners of those the teams that go 2 and 0 everyone will play three games but and for the purposes of what we’re talking about here and what matters most which is the nil money that’s a million dollars uh they will play a neutral site event uh that is technically not connected to the mte although again people are like they’re gonna they’re going to let the NCA is going to let them do this apparently so uh because compliance people have been scouring over this thing for months um and the winner of the championship game if you will uh will be given another million dollars in N earnings opportunities for the players um it is a mammoth event um it’s it’s eight teams this season they are planning to bloat this thing to at least 18 if not more starting in 2025 the press release that came out on Wednesday um purported a 5-year plan to play this in Las Vegas seven of the eight teams we mentioned before are signed on for three years um everyone except Oregon which is currently committed to the Maui Invitational in 2025 but Houston ruers Katon A&M Bama all those they’re all committed to playing this thing for three for three years uh other teams that were formally announced to be playing on Wednesday that I had pre previously reported were Gonzaga Michigan Syracuse new teams to the field were St John’s and St Joe’s they’re already in now I think Duke is flirting with doing this more than flirting um Kansas as well and then Virginia those are teams that have been previously in discussions to maybe eventually join this none of them have formally agreed I would I would Express doubt that you’d get all three of them moving forward and then there are other programs behind the scen I say other programs the line for this thing is does GP it’s dozens deep as you might imagine there um so it’s a it’s a yeah it’s huge event first of its kind uh it’s got a clear quite a few barriers just to be NCAA compliant when it comes to this like the players are going to have to do certain things to uh meet the obligations to earn that money through nil so it’s not hey you show up and play and then we pay you you still that many of the rules in the NCA have frayed if not disintegrated that has not that has not been W so there will be things that are tied to this event that the players will be mandated to do um there’s even more but I I’ve given you kind of the basic uh details on it what are your thoughts on the event its viability its Intrigue will there be copycats and we haven’t really talked about it at all but it is uh I’ll tell you this GP it has been a disruptor in the space and understandably so because you are taking a lot of big-time programs and putting them into event that until this year never existed and so by nature of that you are impacting the way the sport is scheduled through the first month months of the season in substantial ways first I’d say to all the players do whatever you want to do don’t do anything you don’t want to do if the in play has a problem just sue them you’ll win it’s is easy all right if if the instant play says something just sue them and you’ll you’ll probably win so do whatever you wanted to um obviously this is um new it’s interesting it’s easy to understand why schools would want to be involved in this it’s like uh a million dooll injection into your nil Collective for lack of a better term um but from the second this has first been reported people read it and they go okay interesting but how is this financially viable for the event organizers now personally I don’t really care because I’m not an event organizer so I don’t care who’s making money or who isn’t but um from uh you know your reporting when when somebody says how is this going to be a money maker for the people who are supposed to be trying to make money off of this thing um what’s your understanding of how this is going to work right so this is the major question in college athletics right now um even yesterday when the story kind of got new life because it was officially announced uh there are many people around College athletics that are downright cynical that this thing will actually go off as it is being promoted um there is allegedly uh you know private Equity money in a in a hedge fund named Redbird IMI which is under a wing of redb bird Capital um that is worth you know billions of dollars and Jeff sucker the former head of CNN runs redb IMI so I guess the Baseline level assumption is that this will be funded in part by that because think about it you got to pay all these schools million dollars and there’ll be another million for the champion and and you talk to anyone in the event space that does this stuff and the idea that you would even be able to profit more than a million and a half dollars off of this is incredible so between the gate that you’ll get right the tickets which these These are decent matchups it’s a solid field but it’s you know Grand Garden Arena I don’t think is going to is going to sell out every single day this thing and even even if it did you wouldn’t clear enough money to pay all these schools back so between that and any kind of sponsorships or ad Revenue if the if the games are on a streaming service you know the financial model there is different so understandably so like there are a lot of questions about all right when we actually get to the time to hold this thing are these schools going to be paid what they should because another aspect of this you know don’t want to get too into the Weeds on this stuff but there have been a couple of like notable Standalone games in the past two years where it was you know team a versus Team B at a neutral sight and especially promoted game Run Run by One of These independent third party operators right and most of the time those games are are you know they’re well attended but they’re well organized they’re well run the teams get paid oftentimes you know like the Gonzaga Duke game a few years ago that was in Vegas that like I think both teams got paid like 400,000 450,000 to play in that now it didn’t go straight to nil but the teams got paid to do it um there have been instances lately although these stories don’t really get out publicly where teams were either not paid full what they were told they would be paid or just barely paid at all and so because that has kind of been a thing that has surfaced it only increases the skepticism around this event and particularly the long-term viability because you talk about going from eight teams okay can you scr up you know the 13 14 million that might be necessary to make this happen and and clear all the checks and all that to going to 18 at least 18 teams moving forward who is funding this you know people are not generally speaking in the uh in the business of of just giving away millions of dollars without the promise of having a return on investment there so it is a major part of this story and the fact that we have gotten to Mid June they made the announcement but we don’t have what they stopped short of was the dates I’m told the MGM Grand Arena is where they’re going to play the games but that technically hasn’t been announced and there might be a little bit of team in there uh with that and and the broadcast partner whichever one it might be whatever streaming service it might be that is still giving people a lot of pause over this but these teams are on it um I’ve been told by a number of teams that have you know they have compliance people and Associate ads who look deep into this that have vetted the whole thing hey they’re on board I’m kind of with you hey this this is a fascinating event if it is successful I think there’s a chance we could have copycat events that are of that won’t have as big of fields that won’t have as much money but you are giving schools and teams an opportunity to be given all this nil money and it’s just less money they have to go and beg super rich people around their programs and that uh more than anything is is the lifeline I mean there are coaches in high major leagues right now that have been begging to get into this event and they there’s just not the room for them and so you know they’re left to their own devices to continue to try and and you know raise as much money as they can and I’m talking like coaches in like the the SEC and the Big 10 like the two conferences that are standing to be the richest in the years to come um so yeah this has been a major disruptor and uh and I still want to see how they can actually afford to wind up paying all these schools and keep a business model that is successful in the years to come but fiveyear plan it is and it will be fascinating to see how this rolls out because if it is somehow successful you have GP I mean if this goes to be 18 plus teams in 25 and Beyond like this is the this is the premere event in the early part of the Season there’s just there’s no denying it they want to do group stage play I’ll FEA World Cup and the and and FIFA World Cup action where you played you know a couple of games and you’d move on to you know a single elimination bracket play like the there’s a there’s a major Vision here where if they if they come through on it if they do then yes you’ll have a uh a sport changing event that uh that you know gets introduced and BEC comes a main stay on the calendar it’s it’s easy to understand why schools would want to be involved in this you you you you talked about at the power conference level even the SEC and Big 10 you know members of those conferences are trying to figure out how to get more nil money um based on conversations I’ve had with people even within those leagues there’s big gaps between one school to the next so like I had one coach in in a you know power conference tell me that he’s operating with an nil budget of around 1.5 million but he knows somebody else in his league has an nil budget of around five and um Seth Greenberg was talking about all of this stuff on ESPN earlier in the week as it pertained to you know Dan Hurley remaining at Yukon and you know H you know how can Yukon continue to compete dollar Ford dooll going forward and you know set that from conversations he’s had with people do you know normal nil budgets have gone just in a matter of a year or two from like $3 million to like7 million like it’s really been um pushed pushed uh pretty high pretty quickly um and so some of these schools aren’t equipped even the ones from the Big 10 in sec to to have all this money to to compete right now and this is a way to to increase that so it’s obvious for me um why schools are lining up as you say to to be involved in this it is less obvious to me how it’s going to be financially viable going forward but like I said I don’t know why I or or you should care about that it reminds me a little bit of the conversations about overtime Elite when it first became a thing and was throwing contracts at people you would hear folks say I I don’t understand how they’re going to make the money back to to cover all of this stuff and then um you know somebody pop up and say okay but who cares if they’re putting the contract in front of you and the checks are going to clear for now just if you want the money take the money and um you you let you know people four years younger than you worry about whether it’s going to be here in four years but the money’s here now take it if you want to this feels a little bit like that I I can’t predict the future but it’s pretty clear the money’s the money’s here right now so uh why not take it yeah it’s uh it it’ll be interesting to see if uh if this thing can continue to go on be planned without a hitch there there’s still a few more bars to clear and I my understanding is some of the other big schools that are hoping and waiting to get in in 25 and Beyond understandably so they’re going to wait until you know and and to be clear like your gonzagasports in existence for more than one year but it’s uh it’s a it’s a biggie for sure and it’s it’s captured the Intrigue of of a lot of people behind the scenes in college basketball and so now we wait for the next steps to be cleared but if it uh if it goes off without a hitch man that is uh yeah that’s a that’s a big time one but if and when it gets played just as a heads up barring something changing in the 11th hour I’m almost positive this will be only viewable on a streaming service that is yet to be determined

#CollegeBasketball #CBB #NCAA #NCAAM #alabama #kentucky #kentuckybasketball #northcarolina #acc #accbasketball #secbasketball

Eye On College Basketball is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts and wherever else you listen to podcasts.

-LEAVE a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/eye-on-college-basketball/id268800565
-STREAM on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2vk8wq9lunf3agEif1kM8T?si=b4e091007c2545c6
-FOLLOW on Stitcher:https://www.stitcher.com/show/cbssportscom-eye-on-college-basketball-podcast
-FOLLOW on Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vQ0JTNTcxNjEzMzExMA
-SUBSCRIBE to CBS Sports variety of other podcasts: https://www.cbssports.com/podcast

VIDEO

-WATCH CBS Sports HQ: https://www.cbssports.com/live
-SUBSCRIBE to CBS Sports HQ on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CBSSportsHQ/

WEBSITE
-READ top-notch College Basketball content from CBS Sports: https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/

SOCIAL MEDIA

-FOLLOW Eye On College Basketball on Twitter: https://twitter.com/EyeOnCBBPodcast
-FOLLOW Gary Parrish on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GaryParrishCBS
-FOLLOW Matt Norlander on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MattNorlander
-FOLLOW CBS Sports on Twitter: https://twitter.com/CBSSports
-FOLLOW CBS Sports on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cbssports/

Check out Eye on CBB merch here: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/eye-on-college-basketball?utm_source=youtube-description&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=eye-on-bball