So to start, just a baseline...the Deloitte Clearinghouse doesnt keep any athlete from making a billion dollars if they could. You would simply structure 100,000,000 $100 deals...thats obviously not a realistic use-case but trying to illustrate that their current structure does not put a cap on what any one athlete can make (as long as they deem those deals "fair"...whatever that means to them) Its also important to note that while the Deloitte Clearinghouse was a byproduct of the House Settlement, it is two very separate things. The House Settlement truly only deals with back pay for athletes who couldnt benefit from NIL. The ruling made it impossible to regulate fair market value so the Clearinghouse was an NCAA attempt to get ahead of that. You didnt bring it up, but often people lump profit sharing into the same discussion and call all of it NIL. Technically, thats fine, but its misleading. VT basketball, for example has somewhere around $3.5 million in profit sharing available for men's basketball. If you give Neo Avdalas $1 million of that, and then also get him ten $10,000 NIL deals, his compensation from VT would be $1.1 million, but actually its just 100k in NIL plus profit sharing. What some schools did to skirt Deloitte was front-load their deals and fully pay out before the purview of Deloitte took place. It basically shined a light on what was very clear from the beginning...teams were going to skirt the rules regardless of whatever limits you placed on NIL. Capping the amounts only makes it impossible to document how much money is being paid and where it comes from. If you made the limit $5, then every school in America would report reasonable amounts of $5 deals and the under the table $1 million deals. So what does this do for regulation? Literally nothing. You could argue its actually a detriment because if the limit were $10 million and we had a better idea of what athletes were actually getting paid then the athletes would lose their bargaining power from unnamed schools who can neither confirm nor deny any offer made over Deloitte's amount. Anyway, I know that's more than you asked for but hopefully makes sense that Deloitte's Clearinghouse is a joke AND the last deals have not even been slightly curtailed

Deloitte's role is not to DENY or invalidate any NIL deal. Deloitte's role is to review and evaluate submitted NIL deals. Deloitte does not say "you can't do this". Deloitte will say "cleared" - which means this deal checks the boxes for fair market value based on a variety of factors. If the deal does not meet requirements, they will outline so and allow for restructuring of the deal so that it does. The NCAA is still responsible for separately pursuing, reviewing and evaluating any deals that may violate any eligibility requirements. Until the NCAA does something about any NIL deal not following the rules, there is still really no strict regulation. As someone who has worked closely with Deloitte for years, they are experts at creating a perceived value/role in your business, and in this case they are giving the NCAA a legal crutch to point to their position and role with NIL GO. The NCAA still hasn't shown they are willing to pursue any potential NIL deals that don't follow guidelines, although I believe almost all submitted to NIL GO have been cleared (or at least restructured to eventually clear). I've spoken directly with Deloitte Sports executives on this matter and I assure you, it's classic consulting/auditing positioning. Again, if your NIL deal is not "cleared", they will tell you it is not, and allow you to revise repeatedly until it does "clear". It's more of a resource for reassurance for both the NCAA and the players (the NCAA doesn't want 1,000 NIL deals that violate any rules, and players don't want to unknowingly become ineligible -not that the NCAA is willing to push that issue right now). To add further nuance to all of this, the criteria used to determine fair market value is so vague and complex, it's almost impossible to not make an argument for fair market value. For example, one of the factors in determining fair market value is explictily stated as previous NIL deals for similar circumstances. So the precedent has been set that a top QB, performing certain basic obligations, is already worth the price set forth. I don't know what that number is, but for example if Carson Beck is paid $2M for x, y and z - that is now the precedent for some of the criteria for fair market value. A bit long here but the summary is this is all mostly for show. It's meant to protect the NCAA, but also the players to some degree (or the scenario of the NCAA needing to deal with 10,000 ineligible athletes). ** Edited by Hokie Trainer at 11/19/2025, 12:49:07 PM ** Edited by Hokie Trainer at 11/19/2025, 1:54:48 PM

is "creating a perceived value/role in your business". Emphasis is further placed on perceived versus actual value. Sounds like Deloitte did a good job of selling a role for themselves with minimal risk aside from potential reputational risk IF they ever take a negative actual stand on anything. Right now they appear to be performing a clerical role for professional rates and providing the same type of service to the NCAA that the NCAA Executive Director provides for the Presidents of its member institutions.

I say gray market because they are not expressly illegal, just against NCAA regs. Am I mistaken that another perk of gray market deals is that the payor could include explicit pay-for-play requirements, such as to discourage transferring? NILs are pretty much all one year deals because who wants to get stuck paying for a transferred player to keep making car commercials, right? And clearinghouse deals cannot be pay-for-play. But a deal the clearinghouse never knows about could include all kinds of terms and conditions. Not only pay-for-play, but even bonuses or penalties for performance, and for as many years as both sides agreed upon. Yes? The obvious downside is that if someone (the player) thinks they've been screwed on a deal and goes public, the only one really at risk for sanction is the school.

10,000,000 deals at $100 to get to $1 billion. 🙂

Until NCAA, or some other governing body with guts start running things, cheaters will not stop. And schools self-policing is a joke.

They could put death penalties on schools for going $1 over the limit and it wouldnt hold up in court They keep losing in court because they have no legal right. It isnt a matter of NCAA being inept. No organization or company or entity would be able to do anything more than the NCAA is doing currently ...until you collectively bargain

more transparent and some level setting (no $5M deals and all they have to do is a car commercial) is a joke despite what people, including Whit Babcock, said. I guess this gives under the table money bags a bit more incentive to return (if it really even left).

Because the NCAA does not have the legal authority to govern people who have not given up their right to the free market You want to make them give that up? Collectively bargain with them as a union. Until then, you will never see anything close to resembling accurate information on what athletes are paid

plenty of bag money was handed out then. ** Edited by JM397 at 11/18/2025, 5:50:24 PM

played for Ohio State. But on his recruiting visit to USCw, he got "favors" from a girl (he said she was more like 30) that was in his hotel room when he checked in. He also got several hundred dollar handshakes.

one day. I don't think that it was a gift from mom and dad.

Trying to exchange a $1,000 bill can be a problem. Unless you eat at Five Guys and get back $145 in change.