The world of NIL within collegiate sports is truly the Wild West.
A plethora of collectives have been formed at virtually all major universities with the hope of compensating their athletes. Big-time donors — and even smaller ones have all come together to try and ensure that their favorite programs will be competitive at the highest level. Some universities have a clear advantage other others, and one example of that involves wealthy alums/fans who have a serious sports fandom.
A perfect example of this premise is Dave Portnoy. Founder of the popular Barstool Sports, Portnoy is a very proud Michigan alum. He’s often seen at their football games — cheering on the team decked out in maize and blue. On Thursday, Portnoy was doing a podcast in which he was speaking about the Wolverines. Thus far in the season, Michigan’s QB situation has been less-than-ideal.
Wanting to remedy that with his deep pockets, Portnoy vowed to give the program $1 million to $3 million every year to get “a top-10 quarterback in the portal.”
We would not put it past Portnoy to go through with this proclamation. He’s shown time and time again that he’s a man of his word. Not only that, but he’s a die-hard Michigan fan. With rival Ohio State presumed to be atop the Big Ten for the foreseeable future, it only makes sense for Portnoy to flex his financial muscles in this capacity.
This also speaks to a larger narrative surrounding the sport. Without any real rules or restrictions put in place. the NIL landscape will continue to evolve in a way that furthers the gap between programs with active alums/resources, and ones that don’t have the same support. Portnoy’s potential involvement is a perfect example of a major university such as Michigan being able to take advantage of the platform it has.
If Portnoy’s plan does come to fruition, that amount of cash should be able to draw some very good players to Michigan — whether from the portal or the high school ranks.
