It's no secret that the landscape of college football has changed.
Nowadays, some athletes choose the school that pays the most or they will transfer programs if they think their performance deserves more pay than their current program can afford.
The Washington Post reported that, following the conclusion of the 2023 regular football season, many college football coaches were asking fans for NIL donations to aid the program's players.
The University of South Carolina is no exception.
Now, head coaches of USC athletics, such as football head coach Shane Beamer, can be seen on video screens at sporting events across campus asking people to donate money to the school’s name, image and likeness trust.
But some people might not know exactly what they're being asked to donate to — that's where NIL collectives come in.
These entities, such as Garnet Trust, attempt to bridge the gap between fans, companies and the student-athletes they want to support, while also working with athletes to build personal brands based on their success on and off the field.
Student-athletes were not previously allowed to profit from their name, image and likeness for as long as collegiate competition existed — until a court case in 2021 made it to the Supreme Court.
Before NIL made its way onto the scene, student-athletes were students first. They could not monetize their athletic performance because the NCAA had laws restricting athletes from receiving money that was not related to academics.
The Supreme Court ruled in NCAA v. Alston that prohibiting student-athletes from profiting off of themselves violated antitrust laws.
The NCAA then instituted a rule prohibiting athletic programs from taking NIL donations directly, instead forcing them to create a trust. The NCAA ruled in October 2022 that the trust cannot be university-led but must be a partnership between the collective and the school's athletic department.
Gamecock Athletics named Garnet Trust as the school’s official NIL partner on July 27, 2023.
“We are grateful for the commitment of the Garnet Trust to our student-athletes," South Carolina Athletic Director Ray Tanner said in the announcement. "As the ‘Official NIL Partner of Gamecock Athletics,’ our student-athletes will be able to build on their positive impact in the community by leveraging their NIL opportunities through the Garnet Trust.”
Multiple collectives arose in Columbia with the introduction of NIL. Declaring Garnet Trust as the official partner lets fans become more familiar with how Gamecock student-athletes can make money from their name, image and likeness, Gamecock Athletics said in the announcement.
The goal of the collective is to compensate student-athletes for their work, which both the university and the media profit from, the Director of Operations for Garnet Trust Jeremy Smith said
“I think there's a lot of misconceptions on both sides, whether it be from the athlete side or from the donor-contributor side, that we have to do a better job explaining and educating on,” Smith said.
Ph.D. student and graduate assistant Grace Davies' research specializes in collegiate athletics.
NIL corporations are like a "clearinghouse," Davies said. This means they connect with opportunities to earn compensation through their name, image and likeness, she said.
Previously, many student-athletes did not have agents like professional athletes because of NCAA legislation that governed how an agent might be in contact with an athlete.
When athletes are typically approached by brands to reach a sponsorship, Garnet Trust helps with negotiating those deals, Smith said.
NIL gave players the chance to hire an agent to connect them to brands and sponsorships. An agent looking to represent a Gamecock must register with the South Carolina Department of Consumer Affairs and the Athletic Department.
“The collective, in theory, has more reach than an agent might,” Davies said. “They already have some sort of community established, and so it seems like the collectives have a broader reach and therefore can connect athletes to different companies and brands in a different way."
The trust is split into two donor pools: the Garnet Trust and the Garnet Trust Foundation, a nonprofit. The foundation can only be used to fund players’ appearances at events for charity, Smith said. While the players are there, they help raise money at events or spend time with the organization's cause.
“All the money that comes through the foundation has to be used for charitable work,” Smith said. “We actually put the athlete inside a charity's brick-and-mortar and spend time with them.”
The group is wary of who they award money to, keeping up with locker room issues that coaches think warrant a decrease in NIL involvement, Smith said.
“We take every dime that we receive very seriously, and we make sure that we only are putting it in the hands of the most deserving student-athletes,” Smith said. “We take a lot of pride in working closely with the coaches to help determine that.”
Freshman wide receiver Nyck Harbor partnered with Beats by Dre headphones before he even played in Williams-Brice Stadium, according to On3. Garnet Trust helped facilitate the deal.
“Up until recently, student-athletes who actually score the touchdowns, catch the passes (and) make the tackles have not gotten to see any of that,” Smith said. “So now there's that opportunity for them to monetize.”
While student-athletes are monetizing from their personal brands, paying collegiate players might not be going according to plan. The NCAA stated it wants to avoid something called "pay-for-play" since it goes against its longstanding recruitment rules, the NCAA said in its first post-NIL interim policy.
"Pay-for-play" is the idea that a player attends a university simply because they can sign the biggest check there.
Whether it was intentional or not, Davies said NIL has progressed rapidly since it began. She said she believes “pay-for-play” has come to fruition since the introduction of NIL.
"Coaches, especially in recruiting, are promising a certain amount of money through NIL, and then it seems like it's the collective’s job to go and find that money," Davies said. “That's kind of where we're in this gray area where no one really knows what's actually going on."
No money is guaranteed to commits, Smith said. He doesn't make contact with an athlete until they are enrolled or on campus, he said. Smith said he wants to work on educating people and clear up misconceptions about the trust going forward.
“We have to continue to educate — not only the student-athlete but the donor, the contributor if you will be — on what it is we do, how we do it and how this really works,” Smith said.
