It is a new age in college football and NIL is evidently running the show. Every school can have foundations that payout to players for their “name, image, and likeness.” According to the brand-new Athletic Director at Ohio State, the local NIL foundations ponied up quite a chunk of cash to help the Buckeyes in 2024.
Ohio State NIL Foundations Have Paid Out Millions
In an interview with Yahoo Sports, new Ohio State Athletic Director, Ross Bjork, was asked about NIL as well as the eventual implementation of revenue-sharing. According to him, the NIL foundations at Ohio State disbursed “around $20 million.”
Considering the fact that NIL figures are often estimations, Bjorn providing a semi-concrete number is eye-opening. Of course, that does mean some of the offseason speculation about certain players getting heaps and heaps of cash are likely off the mark.
$20 million means that’s an average of just over $235,000 per scholarship player. Naturally, the median number would be lower because the distribution is skewed toward the stars.
Ryan Day mentioned in his own presser that 12 players spurned the NFL to return. Plus, the Buckeyes locked up a handful of transfers who were considered the best at their positions. NIL and the like could have had something to do with their decisions but most of the players who returned mentioned that it was more about unfinished business.
In his bit on Tuesday, senior defensive end Jack Sawyer said, “I felt like I let not only Ryan Day down, but the city down.” Sawyer, much like every non-fifth-year senior, has never beaten Michigan. He said he came back for one more shot at earning those Gold Pants, stating, “they hate us, we hate them, that’s how we want it to be.”
For Sawyer, returning wasn’t about NIL
Ohio State NIL Foundations
The Buckeyes have a number of NIL foundations but the two largest are “THE Foundation” and “The 1870 Society.”
THE Foundation was the first foundation started by former National Championship quarterback Cardale Jones and real estate developer, Brian Schottenstein. They are responsible for facilitating NIL payments to a handful of both football and basketball players.
For football, their list includes Air Noland, Caleb Downs, Carnell Tate, C.J. Hicks, and Denzel Burke. And that was just a small taste.
The 1870 Society is another Ohio State NIL foundation founded by Aidin Aghamiri (who built a groundbreaking, tech-enabled global IT and data center services company), Jason Priestas (founder of popular Ohio State website, Eleven Warriors), and Mark Stetson (OSU graduate in medical technology). They are not only supporting football. The 1870 Society supports 11 other sports that are not often considered when talking about NIL.
NIL is changing the game. It is very much an “adapt or die” sort of change. Thus far, it looks like the Buckeyes are ahead of the curve.
