This is as good a question as any to lay out what is REALLY happening.
I have a few secret log-ins that I use to read the boards of rival schools. And it is pretty clear that what sets Xavier Lucas apart is that Wisconsin fans were led to believe that they had discovered the Northwest Passage, a secret pathway that would allow them to defeat the Portal for TWO YEARS with a simple revenue-sharing agreement. You know, the same revenue-sharing that will be available at all NCAA schools.
So let's title this post "Let's talk about the Revenue-Sharing deal, which is the real issue, and let's ignore 'Tampering', which is the banana in the tailpipe".
Here is the reality. Wisconsin has 25 outgoing Portal football players. Apparently, Wisconsin processed the Portal paperwork for 24 football players within 48 hours. So what is the difference between the other 24 players and Xavier Lucas.
It's a very simple answer. Xavier Lucas signed a mysterious, as-yet-unproduced document that Wisconsin officials and fans BELIEVE will tie Xavier Lucas to Wisconsin for TWO YEARS. The other 24 did not sign such a document. Wisconsin believes that they have invented the kryptonite that defeats THE PORTAL, and now they want to get credit for being an early adopter and they want the Wisconsin name to be associated with a brave (but doomed) effort to destroy the Portal.
Allow me to explain. We all know that "revenue-sharing" is on the horizon. And revenue-sharing is a PIECE of the overall NIL puzzle. For over 100 years, the NCAA has fought against giving a dime of economic compensation to student athletes if that compensation arose from economic deals made by the NCAA or the schools themselves. Revenue such as TV broadcast rights, or the sale of branded athletic merchandise (which can sometimes be as specific as a player's name and number), or the royalties arising from video games (which used to include specifics such as a player's name and number and physical characteristics). This type of revenue-sharing NIL is separate from what a student-athlete can earn in third-party deals, such as signing a contract with Bose to represent high-end headphones.
And what they Big 10 is ATTEMPTING to do (and what Wisconsin has done) is to use a common template agreement to try to get ahead of the issue. Never mind that these deals will have to be approved by the NCAA. NOPE, JUST IGNORE THAT, WE ARE THE BIG 10 AND WISCONSIN AND WE DON'T WANT YOU TO PAY ATTENTION TO THAT. What is actually happening is that players who signed an NIL deal for January-December of 2024 are now wondering "hey, when and how much am I going to get paid in 2025". And because 2025 classes start in January and the House settlement will not be known-with-certainty or effective FOR MONTHS.
The players are effectively saying "save the speeches for Malcolm X, I just wanna get paid" (and that's a paraphrase of a line from the movie "Heathers", so calm down). But this is not an ordinary year. The single-most-significant change in NCAA history is about to go down. And in light of that, the Big 10 and Wisconsin are NOT holding open houses and Q&A sessions to educate the players on the impact of the new rules. NOPE, they are just sliding them "new" NIL deals for them to sign without reading. As if they were just renewal forms for AppleCare or something. But these new revenue-sharing deals are NOT simple contracts. The Big 10 and Wisconsin are using the simple expectation of student-athletes that "hey, I gotta get paid in the off-season too" to CHANGE the payor (from the collective to the school) and make it CONTINGENT on some upcoming unknown event that, as recently as the past week, was found to be impacted by governmental decision-making as well. Whoops. Oh, and while we are describing the massive piece of wool that the Big 10 and Wisconsin are trying to pull over the eyes of their athletes, let's not forget the real Trojan Horse. THE TWO-YEAR GRANT OF RIGHTS.
Yeah, that's right, if you were sick of talking about Grant of Rights on the OTHER omnibus thread, now it rears its ugly head once again. Because the sneaky-little-****-Neidermeyer clause that the Big 10 and Wisconsin have inserted involves a 2-year exclusive grant of NIL rights (the revenue-sharing ones, like TV rights money, merch sales, and video game royalties). And THIS CLAUSE is the one that the Wisconsin administration and fanbase mistakenly believes will enslave athletes to Wisconsin for 2 years, with no hope of transferring.
And THAT is what makes Xavier Lucas "different" from the other 24 athletes who left Wisconsin safely, without being rounded up by dogs and fugitive-slave-catchers. It's not "tampering". It's the "signed contract", silly.
But "tampering" sounds so much sexier in press releases...
Again, I empathize with fans who think 18 year old kids should suddenly be treated as adults, particularly when it comes to contractual bargaining and power equivalence between an 18 year old kid and, say, a Power 2 conference and "one of the most powerful universities in the world" (the way Wisconsin fans describe the University of Wisconsin). People are fond of saying "well, that sumbitch Xavier Lucas shoulda hired an attorney, right Vern?" And these are all wonderful thoughts for a perfect world that we will someday live in. But it's not a fair reflection of what is happening today.
No, what is happening today is that a P2 conference went out and drafted a document...and then shared it with these oh-so-powerful universities...and while I can't vouch for whether every Big 10 university was as sneaky and underhanded as Wisconsin, we can certainly describe what happened with Xavier Lucas. He was presented a document while he was still in school, not back home with his parents and/or advisors. He was led to believe it was "just another NIL deal" and it would take care of his spring semester payments, as he was going home to SoFla for a month for the holidays. And this magical document, which was contingent on an event that had not yet happened, also included a 2-year Grant of Rights, which had never been a part of any prior document. And Wisconsin pressured Xavier Lucas to sign this document on his own, while in Wisconsin, without sufficient legal review.
AND THEN, when Xavier Lucas had the UNMITIGATED GALL to submit transfer paperwork, a Wisconsin staffer tried to call him to tell him what a "huge mistake" he was making. That Xavier didn't understand the document he was attempting to spurn. OF COURSE HE DIDN'T UNDERSTAND IT, YOU NITWIT CHEESEHEADS. NOBODY UNDERSTANDS IT.
And I get it. Wisconsin thought they could be slick and early and start locking up its 2025 roster with 2-year GORs. Interesting approach. Not so sure it's gonna hold up in court (it won't). But the really funny part is when you hear oh-so-brilliant cheesehead legal minds try to convince you that a 2-year GOR will PREVENT A PLAYER FROM PLAYING AT ANOTHER SCHOOL. Look, we all know the deal from discussing GORs ad infinitum. You can leave. But it's expensive.
So let's think this ALL THE WAY through. Does Wisconsin want to insist that they have Xavier's NIL rights for the next two years? Do they want to PAY a Miami player all that revenue-share money for Big 10 TV rights and Wisconsin merch sales? Seems unlikely. And Miami could simply say "Hey, Xavier, you can't get a revenue-share deal at Miami, but let's set you up with a Bose NIL deal. And then a MasTec NIL deal. And maybe even an Amazon Prime NIL deal, we have this new UM student, and I think his mom's boyfriend used to live in SoFla."
THIS is why Wisconsin (and the Big 10) are trying to get everyone to focus on the salacious "tampering" angle. Because the "we pushed a complex and contingent revenue-share deal on an 18 year old kid during his final exam period and forced him to sign it before he went home for the holiday break" does not sound quite as compelling.
So now, if we want to refocus the conversation and have a more reasonable discourse, let's do so. Because the cheeseheads have been deluded into thinking that this magical Big 10 contract template has given them a super-secret Defense Against the Dark Portal Arts for the next two years.
**** 'em.
