NIL and coaching pressure

[cr8zyncalif]

There has always been pressure to win; that is nothing new.

And there have always been richer programs with less patience if a head coach does not relatively quickly produce wins with advantages in facilities, budget, crowd size, etc.

But imagine today's increased pressure on AD's to keep fans happy enough to pony up massive amounts of NIL money (way over and above their previous contributions). The alum groups who can arrange that unregulated, unrestricted cash now have an even bigger lever, and I don't think they will hesitate to be obnoxious if the AD is not getting results. As a result, AD's pressure on the head coach to win RIGHT NOW by assembling and getting onto the same page a group of kids who had not played together before has to have increased. And that means that the assistant coaches are now more visible. The pressure to identify and buy talent to win RIGHT NOW has never been higher. As Biggs says, coaching matters. But now you have a grab bag of players with some experience, but that have never played in your program or in your system before. How much do you have to "dumb down" the playbook, at least to start the season? Many, many teams have large numbers of semi-experienced kids (many of whom the team badly needs in order to succeed) who show up on campus for the first time a month or two before fall practice starts. That sounds like a really big challenge for the assistants. The assistant who is all things: a great talent identifier; great recruiter; great fundamentals coach; great scout of the other teams; great game planner; great chemistry builder in the locker room; great amateur psychologist...is a unicorn. There are not many unicorns out there.

I'm wondering how much the average tenure of a P5 football coach will shrink over the next year or two. Especially for the HC's in the top 1/3 of each P5 conference in terms of NIL money available. Those guys better win IMMEDIATELY; after all, the alums will see big roster turnover and will, in fact, be directly paying for that new roster. They will want wins. The AD's won't be much better off; they might survive by firing a guy and making a splashy new hire, but they won't survive two failures in a row.

The AD's will have to find money for assistant coaches, because a flashy new HC will not be able to get there without the right staff. There simply will not be enough time to get the team all oriented in the same direction. And the AD & HC turnstile will spin a bit faster every year to come, at least until somebody does something effective about the NIL corrosion of college football.

 

[Coug90]

There has always been pressure to win; that is nothing new.

And there have always been richer programs with less patience if a head coach does not relatively quickly produce wins with advantages in facilities, budget, crowd size, etc.

But imagine today's increased pressure on AD's to keep fans happy enough to pony up massive amounts of NIL money (way over and above their previous contributions). The alum groups who can arrange that unregulated, unrestricted cash now have an even bigger lever, and I don't think they will hesitate to be obnoxious if the AD is not getting results. As a result, AD's pressure on the head coach to win RIGHT NOW by assembling and getting onto the same page a group of kids who had not played together before has to have increased. And that means that the assistant coaches are now more visible. The pressure to identify and buy talent to win RIGHT NOW has never been higher. As Biggs says, coaching matters. But now you have a grab bag of players with some experience, but that have never played in your program or in your system before. How much do you have to "dumb down" the playbook, at least to start the season? Many, many teams have large numbers of semi-experienced kids (many of whom the team badly needs in order to succeed) who show up on campus for the first time a month or two before fall practice starts. That sounds like a really big challenge for the assistants. The assistant who is all things: a great talent identifier; great recruiter; great fundamentals coach; great scout of the other teams; great game planner; great chemistry builder in the locker room; great amateur psychologist...is a unicorn. There are not many unicorns out there.

I'm wondering how much the average tenure of a P5 football coach will shrink over the next year or two. Especially for the HC's in the top 1/3 of each P5 conference in terms of NIL money available. Those guys better win IMMEDIATELY; after all, the alums will see big roster turnover and will, in fact, be directly paying for that new roster. They will want wins. The AD's won't be much better off; they might survive by firing a guy and making a splashy new hire, but they won't survive two failures in a row.

The AD's will have to find money for assistant coaches, because a flashy new HC will not be able to get there without the right staff. There simply will not be enough time to get the team all oriented in the same direction. And the AD & HC turnstile will spin a bit faster every year to come, at least until somebody does something effective about the NIL corrosion of college football.

People complain about the money these coaches make…I’d argue they earn it more now than ever. Coaches used to have two basic jobs, Coach. And recruit. Now they are expected to be full time GMs too, and understand what’s happening with player compensation from the NIL, replacing veteran pieces of their roster through the transfer portal like an NFL GM must do. The old school coach is a thing of the past, your modern day coach is CEO and GM first, coach second.

 

[Loyal Coug1]

People complain about the money these coaches make…I’d argue they earn it more now than ever. Coaches used to have two basic jobs, Coach. And recruit. Now they are expected to be full time GMs too, and understand what’s happening with player compensation from the NIL, replacing veteran pieces of their roster through the transfer portal like an NFL GM must do. The old school coach is a thing of the past, your modern day coach is CEO and GM first, coach second.

The thing I don't know about NIL is this - is the plan to share NIL with the whole team, or just the skill players? And how do the other players mesh with them if they aren't drinking at the well?

 

[95coug]

The thing I don't know about NIL is this - is the plan to share NIL with the whole team, or just the skill players? And how do the other players mesh with them if they aren't drinking at the well?

There’s no central plan, it’s up to every booster club. Some have set up situations where the whole roster gets paid something. Others are totally individualized and market-based. Some are both, or a mix.

It’s probably going to be a season or two before it really settles into a pattern, but my guess is it’s going to be what the pro sports are - most teams have 1-2 guys that make most of the money. There will be a handful across the country every year who are the really big moneymakers. Returning 4th year players will be the big dollars for the most part.

Nobody from WSU is ever going to be in the top 25 moneymakers. The closer they get talent- and marketability-wise, the more likely they are to get poached by blue blood teams. The top 100 will have agents and publicists working for them, looking for the best deal.

 

[cr8zyncalif]

There’s no central plan, it’s up to every booster club. Some have set up situations where the whole roster gets paid something. Others are totally individualized and market-based. Some are both, or a mix.

It’s probably going to be a season or two before it really settles into a pattern, but my guess is it’s going to be what the pro sports are - most teams have 1-2 guys that make most of the money. There will be a handful across the country every year who are the really big moneymakers. Returning 4th year players will be the big dollars for the most part.

Nobody from WSU is ever going to be in the top 25 moneymakers. The closer they get talent- and marketability-wise, the more likely they are to get poached by blue blood teams. The top 100 will have agents and publicists working for them, looking for the best deal.

Agree with all but only the top 100 will have an agent. High school kids have agents now if they are top QB's. Sure, they might flame out. But the agents want to get in early so they have a shot at keeping the kid until maybe they have a pro contract. I would not be surprised if there are several hundred with at least a nominal agent agreement in any given year.

 

[BiggsCoug]

When Dick talks about “development,” laughable. There is playing and not playing. Kids are not going to sit and burn up years of eligibility standing on the sideline. They’ll come for a year, then transfer down to FCS or G5 if they aren’t playing. Then try to play their way back up to P5 as a grad transfer.

Having a roster limit would help immensely. You will see blue blood teams take kids as walk ons and pay them so they can maintain their 85 scholarships. They can hold onto kids and develop them and add paid walk ons to build depth. Some schools will just not be able to do it.

In regards to scheme, offensively speaking, this could be great for coaching. Imagine being able to both pay kids enough $ to stay AND be able to have the depth you want? Now that you can pay walk ons…. you can be 4 deep at wing, 4 deep at fullback, 8 deep at tight end, 15 deep at wide receiver and truly run a multiple set offense with all the pieces you need. Before, with 40ish guys, you had to pick and choose what you wanted to do.

Defensively, you can be 5 deep at every position with paid players and really develop kids and avoid a drop off if someone gets hurt.

The rich could be wildly better coached and deep than the blue collar or dog collar programs.

My guess is you will see a base pay + incentive. Kids will take down a few thousand per month and the starters and stars will get more.

The days of guys sticking around are over. This is already a turnstile for kids, prob headed that way for coaches too.

It will be interesting to see how many frosh make it to their senior year. If the retention rate is bad for schools, I could see them moving to all portal kids to remove their free transfer from the equation.