NIL
Paris Saint
It is as familiar a sight as any, be it on a live stream of choice or on a social media platform — soccer players walk down a corridor of a stadium hours before an upcoming match, frequently in uniform. They are not clad in the kits that they will be wearing in a few short hours on the pitch, though. The outfits are usually something more formal, a look more sartorial than the polyester jerseys they are famed for wearing – and oftentimes supplied by a luxury apparel brand.
The name recognition of the players on the pitch has matched that of the fashion houses that have flocked to dress them in recent years, both for matches big and small. Look no further than this season’s edition of the UEFA Champions League, when Hugo Boss partnered with Stuttgart and Zegna outfitted reigning champions Real Madrid. High fashion will have a place at Munich’s Allianz Arena for Saturday’s final, too — finalists Paris Saint-Germain and Inter hail from two of the world’s fashion capitals and will likely turn up to the venue with an unofficial nod to their cities’ stylish roots in Dior and Canali, respectively.
Formalwear and sports may feel like an unlikely combination but years after NBA players began to earn comprehensive coverage from GQ for their pre-match looks, luxury fashion brands have found a happy home in the professional sports landscape. It is not merely a matter of personal expression from individual athletes, though – these companies are striking actual partnerships with sports teams and especially so in soccer, the world’s most popular sport. The collaborations are a mix of wants and needs for all parties involved, naturally coming with plenty of financial incentive and the most coveted intangible of our times – brand awareness.
“It wasn’t just a question of style,” Paris Saint-Germain chief brand officer Fabien Allegre told CBS Sports, “but of expanding our universe, connecting the new generation of fans from different universes and creating those essential links to be recognized as an innovative brand.”
Luxury brands’ new frontier
The business of luxury brands is built on catering to a very elusive group of wealthy clientele, but there is one very obvious problem with that strategy — the customer base is always going to be incredibly small. These companies have been slowly forced to abandon a strict definition of luxury and expand their audiences in a variety of ways, including opening stores in smaller American cities like Troy, Michigan, and Naples, Florida.
“When they have capital structures that are very capital-intensive to operate, they need to find a new area of growth,” Thomai Serdari, the director of the luxury and retail MBA program at New York University, said.
That is where popular sports teams — and their supporters — come in. Sports fans serve as ideal customers through their psychographics, a marketing approach that categorizes people based on their attitudes rather than traditional demographics. Formal partnerships with major sports teams during popular events marks an attempt for luxury brands to capture a slice of some very large audiences, and those brands have been showing up in droves – Louis Vuitton has partnered with several major sporting events like the FIFA World Cup and the NBA Finals to make trophy cases, while Burberry and Gucci have partnered with individual athletes like Tottenham Hotspur’s Son Heung-min and Manchester City’s Jack Grealish, respectively, in the past.
The financial incentives go both ways. While luxury brands gain recognition with new audiences, teams and individual players have new revenue – and more creative revenue streams open to them.
“I think a crucial part of the whole equation is the athletes themselves and how they are, in essence, placed in the front lines,” Serdari said. “These are people who otherwise didn’t have access to this sort of expensive sponsorship or ambassadorship. It can be, for them, a totally new revenue line in certain instances and even if it’s not about revenues, It gives them the ability to express themselves and dress themselves in a way that is fun for them but also appeals to their audiences so it only allows the relationship between their own audiences and themselves their own personal brands to be stronger, to be more cohesive.”
Formalwear partnerships are not exactly designed to ensure, for example, that all PSG fans walk into Dior stores and that Inter supporters start purchasing clothes from Canali as frequently as they do the team’s new kits. These deals can play a sizable role in putting together the unique puzzle that is brand-building, an increasingly important marketing exercise no matter the industry.
Fashion as part of a broader experience
The newness of the crossover between luxury apparel companies and sports is not one-sided. In an era of unmatched global connection, history-laden sports teams have felt a need to refresh their brands to appeal to the widest audience they have ever had access to. PSG have used that opportunity to focus heavily on fashion, which is how Allegre and his team interpreted the brief from president Nasser al-Khelaifi upon Qatar Sports Investments’ takeover of the club in 2011
“Our president shared a clear vision: To make Paris Saint-Germain a global brand both on and off the pitch, and for me, the objective was to be both a successful football club and a cultural brand in its own right,” Allegre said. “This ambition quickly took shape with unique collaborations that had never been done before by a football club, a showcase in the iconic Paris shop Colette, and our first appearance at Paris Fashion Week, in collaboration with Koche and Bape. Then, seven years ago, our collaboration with Jordan Brand.”
PSG’s collaboration with Jordan, the brand named after basketball great Michael Jordan and owned by Nike, is the club’s most notable expansion into the fashion industry and perhaps the most natural marriage between sportswear and style that currently exists. Jordan has designed kits that the players have actually worn in competition, as well as several athleisure collections with the club. Jordan Brand and PSG are now synonymous with each other in a way that earns the club style points, finding a genuinely authentic meeting point for two industries that have sometimes seemed like polar opposites.
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“Fashion and sport are about the same things: Identity, emotion and movement. When they come together in an authentic way, it creates powerful things, stories that touch people,” Allegre said. “All our lifestyle initiatives in the broadest sense are a way of bringing people into our world, even if they’re not football fans at first. Sometimes it’s a jersey seen in a concept store or worn by one of our players on Dota [the video game] that gets the ball rolling. We also know how to use our power to put the spotlight on designers, stylists and creative collectives — whether in Paris, Tokyo or Los Angeles — who have the same values as us.”
PSG’s presence in the fashion industry is not just limited to their work with Jordan, though. Dior is their formalwear partner this season in a deal that really leans into Paris’ reputation as a fashion capital. It offers a different type of visibility for PSG in an industry that they have already staked their claim in.
“Paris Saint-Germain is the sporting soul of Paris. Together, we embody a certain idea of modern refinement,” Allegre said. “For the 2024-25 season, Dior has once again designed exclusive outfits for the players and staff. But it’s not just a suit: it’s a posture, a way of representing the club at all key moments — whether at the entrance to the stadium or on the red carpet. The high standards of fit and detail echo what we strive for on the pitch: precision and excellence. It’s lifestyle in its own right.”
The innovative strategy can go a long way for a club like PSG, who do not benefit from the splashy domestic broadcast deals some of their counterparts around Europe count as part of their earnings. No club will turn down an additional revenue stream, though, and the increasing commonality of formalwear in sports marks an impressive collaboration between two industries that once had very little in common. It helps that partnerships like PSG’s with Dior and Inter’s with Canali have an authentic hook — the luxury brands hail from the same cities as the clubs they partner with, adding to the unspoken experience of a match, whether you are in attendance or not.
In short, it is a new spin on things for a new audience in a new age.
“The new generations who have taken us away from simply product consumption to a brand and experience consumption first,” Serdari said. “Many more people are willing to have a pleasant afternoon or evening watching a sport that they like and they like it because it’s part of this experiential lifestyle. Within that experiential lifestyle, they’re also more prone to be educated about new products that come from specific brands … Millennials started it all but now Gen Z is very much about the experience rather than the product.”
Kirby Smart’s first college coaching stop was at tiny Valdosta State back in 2000. The team’s strength and conditioning coach was Michael Doscher, who was asked two decades later what Smart was like then, which may have foretold what he would become. Doscher thought for a couple beats, then answered.
“He was humble,” Doscher said.
Valdosta State was a budding cradle of future big-time head coaches — Hal Mumme, Mike Leach, Dana Holgorsen, Will Muschamp — and they all had some “it factor” about them. And for the 22-year-old Smart, fresh off an All-SEC playing career, it was the way he carried himself.
“Kirby was a little more personable about it, more friendly and had that way about him,” Doscher said.
Maybe it’s hard to consider the current Smart — the 10th-year Georgia coach who rants and rails on the sideline, who has six national title rings as a head coach and defensive coordinator — as humble. Yet, it’s also a bit of the secret sauce.
It was for Nick Saban, the man who hired Smart away from Valdosta State and into his vortex, and is now off the stage — essentially replaced by Smart as the accepted best coach in the sport. And while they’re not the same person or coach, the reason they got to the top and stayed there may be the same: The flexibility to adjust when the world around them changes.
Saban, the defensive mastermind and offensive traditionalist, adjusted late in his career to the up-tempo, passing revolution. Smart made the same adjustment, but also to changes in the sport: unlimited transferring, paying players, the flattening of the talent pool such that the Georgias and Alabamas can’t hoard talent like the old days.
Eleven months ago, Smart’s program seemed to be falling back to the pack. The Dawgs were soundly beaten by Notre Dame in the quarterfinals of the College Football Playoff, ending a season that had an SEC championship, but also three losses and more close calls. When it ended, Smart declined to make any changes to his coaching staff, to the concern of many in Georgia’s fan base.
And a month into this season, Georgia suffered its first home loss in six years and needed the help of a missed field goal to win at Tennessee. The Dawgs didn’t look like a great team anymore.
Now here they are: SEC champions again. Playing their best ball going into the Playoff, one of three betting co-favorites to win the national title. The Playoff could always re-ignite questions. However, right now, entering Thursday’s Sugar Bowl tilt against Ole Miss, Georgia as an elite program seems inevitable, for a simple reason: The head coach knows what he’s doing.
Staff management
Some saw it as stubbornness. Smart saw it as stability.
Georgia was coming off a rough offensive season in 2024, especially in blocking. Quarterback Carson Beck regressed, receivers dropped passes and there was almost no running game. That was despite three offensive linemen being good enough to be drafted in the first three rounds of the NFL Draft.
And yet Smart opted to bring back offensive line coach Stacy Searals and offensive coordinator Mike Bobo, who was Smart’s college teammate and close friend. To the critics, Smart was allowing personal relationships to cloud his professional thinking. To Smart, he was counting on two veteran coaches with longer track records.
“We’ve built our program around retention,” Smart said in the spring. “I think we’ve got the most stable, not only staff, but stable organization in all of college football. I think that’s what we’ve hung our hat on, is we have stability. We have retention. We have a great foundation. We’re built to last.”
And built, it turns out, to validate Smart’s gamble.
Gunner Stockton and the Georgia offense have soared this season, validating Kirby Smart’s bet on continuity. (Kevin C. Cox / Getty Images)
Georgia’s offense may be the reason it made the Playoff, winning early-season shootouts against Tennessee (44-41) and Ole Miss (43-35). New quarterback Gunner Stockton ended up seventh in the Heisman Trophy voting. The running game was a strength. Bobo was named a finalist for the Broyles Award, which goes to the nation’s top assistant.
The defense was realistically the bigger worry until late in the season, when the old Georgia defense showed up again, smothering Texas, Georgia Tech and Alabama.
Still, it goes further than that: Georgia’s special teams have always been an underrated strength, and Smart has put Kirk Benedict in charge of that for several years.
And off the field, the longtime guiding force remains Scott Sinclair, who has been the strength and conditioning coordinator throughout Smart’s tenure. The two are wrapping up their 10th season together.
“This league will chew you up and spit you out,” Smart said, mentioning how other teams have player and coaching turnover, while his program is among the best at retention. “I take a lot of pride in that, and I think that’s one of our weapons.”
Smart in charge (still, with help)
Georgia’s talent advantage isn’t what it was in the pre-2021 days, when unlimited transferring and NIL arrived. The Bulldogs no longer can stow blue-chip recruits on their bench for a few years, then unleash them as starters. It has been a hit to the team’s depth, and occasionally left weak spots on the field.
The program, nonetheless, has also managed it well enough that it still has plenty of talent. Georgia signed 21 of its 24 starters in the SEC championship in one of its past four recruiting classes, all of which ranked in the top three nationally.
And when the program badly needed a difference-making receiver, it got him via the transfer portal. USC’s Zachariah Branch has become such a focal point of the offense that with 73 catches, he’s four away from setting Georgia’s single-season record.
In an age when many programs are hiring a general manager, Georgia already has one: Smart. He has always been the de facto GM, the one in charge of roster procurement. There isn’t a person in charge of it who reports to Smart. There is a football chief of staff — Mark Robinson — and director of player personnel — Will Myers. Still, as the portal and NIL became prominent, Georgia didn’t have to expand its personnel staff. It was already pretty robust.
“We’ve got a lot of people in charge of roster management, including myself, including our football office staff (who) are involved,” Smart said. “Our operations slash player development, player personnel staff, everybody gets involved in that.”
This was what Saban did: He revolutionized college football coaching at Alabama in the late 2000s by hiring analysts, which critics pilloried as staff-bloating, but it was Saban who wanted extra eyes on his team and extra hands in recruiting. Saban was not arrogant enough to think he could do everything.
That’s the formula for Smart in this era: Lots of eyes, ears and mouths involved, then he makes the final call.
“It’s a team effort,” Smart said. “We reorganize and restructure some things in terms of what falls under whose duty and whose aspects. But at the end of the day, I’m not ready to run off and go hire somebody that’s just going to make all the decisions for what goes on the football field. I think I’ve got to stay involved in that heavily. We’ve got the capacity and the quality of people in the areas that I think we need.”
Georgia’s 117 wins since Kirby Smart took over in 2016 are second-most in the country behind only Alabama’s 121. (Todd Kirkland / Getty Images)
Internal culture in the age of NIL and the portal
Georgia has dealt with too many bad headlines over the last few years, with a couple dozen players arrested since the January 2023 car crash that killed a player and staff member. However, Georgia people — administrators, staffers, players — put those issues in a separate category from what they see as a strong internal culture. There is a dichotomy: Players getting in legal trouble is something Smart has had to handle, adjusting his level and manner of punishment. Yet, when it comes to team-building and chemistry in the age of NIL and the portal, not much has changed.
“NIL hasn’t impacted what we’ve been doing,” said Drew Brannon, a sports psychologist who has worked with Georgia since 2018, especially starting with the 2021 national championship season. “The things we’ve built in terms of program DNA have certainly had a positive impact given the ramifications of NIL, but we haven’t done things differently due to NIL, portal, etc.”
Georgia has been practicing skull sessions — when players in small or large groups discuss personal issues or desires — since 2021. Smart has also given Brannon the floor to introduce motivational exercises, such as before the second national championship, using the Netflix and Blockbuster story.
There have been some challenges, especially last year, when players said the connection among teammates, especially on offense, wasn’t as strong. Still, there was also optimism from existing players about the returning 2025 core.
“I’ve got a lot of faith in them,” linebacker Smael Mondon said last February. “They’ve got a good leadership class, and I feel really good about it.”
That’s been borne out. The quarterback change also helped. Beck was quieter and on his own, while Stockton’s personality and playing style endeared him to teammates. Teams often feed off the personality of their quarterbacks. This year’s team pulled off comeback wins over Tennessee, Auburn, Ole Miss and Florida — and it did that last year too. This time, though, it improved as the season continued and looks much better heading into the CFP.
“We do our best to enhance our efforts each year with tweaks, but the fundamentals don’t change, and I think that has a lot to do with why our players and staff don’t flinch when they encounter challenging situations,” Brannon said. “Coach Smart does an incredible job of modeling this from the top, which is what you see in the highest-performing organizations in the world.”
The USA TODAY Sports Men’s Basketball Coaches Poll Top 25 has been refreshed following the eighth week of the season. It was a bit of a light week due to Christmas, but some showdowns still took place amid the holiday celebrations, resulting in some movement throughout the Top 25.
With conference play picking up this coming weekend, we’re getting into the nitty-gritty of the season, where the rankings will fluctuate week-in and week-out. While this past week was packed with tune-up games and not a ton of riveting action, that won’t be the case from now until April.
Regardless, the Coaches Poll Top 25 is certain to see plenty of movement. For now, here’s how things stack up after Week 8. This week’s updated rankings are below.
Michigan enjoyed a full week off and enters the week undefeated at 11–0. The Wolverines return to action with home games against McNeese State on Monday and USC on Friday.
Senior forward Yaxel Lendeborg has been the engine, stuffing the stat sheet with 15.6 points, 7.1 rebounds, and 3.8 assists per game. Michigan will look to stay perfect as conference play looms.
Arizona rolled past Bethune 107–71 last Monday to improve to 12–0 on the season. The Wildcats host South Dakota State before traveling to Utah for a road test on Saturday.
Freshman guard Brayden Burries has emerged as a steady scorer, averaging 14.0 points per game. Arizona’s depth and tempo continue to overwhelm opponents early in the season.
Iowa State remained perfect at 12–0 after an off week. The Cyclones host Houston Christian on Monday and West Virginia on Friday.
Junior forward Milan Momcilovic leads the team at 18.3 points per game. Iowa State’s balance continues to separate it from most of the field.
UConn had the week off and remains one of the nation’s most complete teams at 12–1. The Huskies head to Xavier on Wednesday before hosting Marquette on Sunday.
Junior guard Solo Ball leads the backcourt with 15.4 points per game. This week offers a strong measuring stick against Big East competition.
Purdue stayed idle last week but remains firmly entrenched near the top of the Coaches Poll with an 11–1 record. The Boilermakers face a tricky week with a home matchup against Kent State on Monday before heading to Wisconsin on Saturday.
Senior forward Trey Kaufman-Renn continues to anchor the frontcourt, averaging a double-double at 13.9 points and 10.0 rebounds per game. Purdue’s ability to maintain consistency through a two-game week will be closely watched.
Duke remained idle last week and sits at 11–1 entering a two-game stretch. The Blue Devils host Georgia Tech on Wednesday before traveling to Florida State on Saturday.
Freshman phenom Cameron Boozer has been dominant, averaging 23.2 points and 10.0 rebounds per game. Duke will be tested defensively as ACC play intensifies.
Gonzaga extended its winning streak with a victory over Pepperdine on Sunday and sits at 13–1. The Bulldogs play three times this week, traveling to San Diego before hosting Seattle U and LMU.
Junior forward Braden Huff leads the way with 19.1 points per game. Gonzaga’s depth will be tested during the busy stretch.
Houston enters the week at 11–1 after a quiet stretch. The Cougars host Middle Tennessee State on Monday before heading to Cincinnati on Saturday.
Senior guard Emanuel Sharp continues to pace the offense with 17.9 points per game. Houston’s defensive pressure remains its calling card heading into conference play.
Michigan State enjoyed a week off and sits at 11–1 on the season. The Spartans host Cornell on Monday before traveling to Nebraska on Friday.
Senior forward Jaxon Kohler has been a force inside, averaging 13.9 points and 10.3 rebounds. Michigan State will look to sharpen its execution away from home.
BYU cruised past Eastern Washington 109–81 last Monday to improve to 12–1. The Cougars face a lone test this week with a road trip to Kansas State on Saturday.
Freshman star AJ Dybantsa has lived up to the hype, averaging 23.1 points per game. BYU’s offense remains one of the most explosive in the country.
11. Vanderbilt
12. North Carolina
13-T. Nebraska
13-T. Louisville (+1)
15. Alabama
16. Texas Tech
17. Kansas
18. Arkansas
19. Illinois
20. Tennessee
21. Virginia
22. Florida
23. Iowa
24. Georgia
25. St. John’s
Dropped Out: No. 25 USC
Others Receiving Votes: Kentucky 35; USC 25; Utah State 14; Auburn 7; Saint Louis 6; Clemson 6; Seton Hall 5; Oklahoma State 5; Yale 4; UCLA 4; Saint Mary’s 4; LSU 3; California 2; Villanova 1; Miami (OH) 1; Indiana 1
When Bobby Petrino returned to Arkansas after the 2023 season, his first task was finding a new quarterback.
In this era of college football, that also meant funding a new quarterback. For that, the former head coach leaned on his old friend Frank Fletcher.
The Little Rock-based businessman stepped up and footed a large chunk of the bill for Taylen Green, the talented signal caller Petrino identified to run his offense for the Razorbacks.
It hasn’t only been a transactional relationship, though. Over the last two years, Fletcher has been mindful of Green’s life after sports. Rather than simply handing the star quarterback a boatload of cash, he offered something few college athletes receive: personal relationship and mentorship.
“I had a wonderful two years with Taylen Green,” Fletcher said during Monday’s edition of Morning Mayhem on 103.7 The Buzz. “I was lucky that I happened to back a player that was that nice a kid and [had] great parents. I’ve learned a lot from him. I’m teaching him everything I know, and he wants to learn.”
Fletcher helped Green navigate the financial market by giving the QB1 homework, making him chart a series of stocks over a few months – something that could prove even more important after his subpar finish to the 2025 season likely impacted his pro prospects.
But it wasn’t just financial exercises. Fletcher turned the lessons into on-the-job training – especially when it comes to creative thinking.
After dealing with complicated, 15-page NIL contracts from the university, Fletcher found a way to work around the red tape.
“We had a one-page deal that Taylen’s dad looked at, that we paid him quarterly,” Fletcher said. “He was a direct employee of Fletcher Auto Group, and he advertised for our Honda store in Northwest Arkansas.”
Such arrangements, which align with the original spirit of NIL, allowed boosters to effectively pay student-athletes whatever they deemed the market value of the service provided. That changed with the House settlement that went into effect this summer.
Among other things, it introduced a centralized clearinghouse through which all NIL deals over $600 must be approved. Now, Fletcher can no longer bypass the red tape and unilaterally make deals with players like Green. His contract with the quarterback would still be subject to the “fair market value” requirement, hence why the original agreement ended in April.
The settlement also ushered in a new era of rev-share payrolls alongside NIL agreements that was supposed to cap football roster spending and effectively level the playing field. Boosters of many Power Four programs, however, have found loopholes of their own.
Creative maneuvering remains alive and well.
Peeling Back the Curtain
During his now infamous appearance at the Little Rock Touchdown Club in September, Arkansas athletics director Hunter Yurachek referenced a shady “third lane” in which other schools are operating.
He was confident in how the UA has adapted to the two primary “lanes” — revenue sharing and “legitimate” NIL deals — on the financial front, but the eighth-year AD has long been a vocal opponent of pay-for-play deals that were supposed to be eliminated when the House settlement went into effect over the summer.
Of course, that hasn’t happened.
Despite the revenue sharing “cap” being set at $20.5 million, which is distributed amongst all sports on campus, there have been numerous reports this offseason of new coaches being promised roster “salaries” well over that number — even before factoring out the portion going to men’s and women’s basketball, baseball and other sports.
According to The Advocate, Lane Kiffin will get $25-30 million to build his roster at LSU. After flirting with Arkansas, Alex Golesh will instead have close to $30 million to spend on players at Auburn, according to 247Sports’ Auburn Undercover.
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The above-the-cap difference comes from third-party NIL deals, which must be submitted to NIL Go and approved by the clearinghouse to keep everyone in the good graces of the College Sports Commission.
While people like Frank Fletcher used to do it simply for convenience, schools have been forced to get creative when finding workarounds to navigate Yurachek’s so-called “third lane” — which The Athletic’s Stewart Mandel and Ralph Russo pulled the curtain back on over the weekend.
Their reporting found that some have simply not reported deals, especially since the Power Four schools have yet to agree on enforcement rules, but there are also some seemingly above-board ways to fudge the cap with the help of collectives.
One such way, according to The Athletic, is by paying agents separately. In this scenario, a $100,000 deal negotiated by an agent taking a 10% cut would come out to $90,000 from the school to the player, which counts against the rev-share cap, and $10,000 from the collective to the agent, which doesn’t and also isn’t subject to the clearinghouse.
When collective employees are worried about a large deal being approved by the CSC, they have reportedly been known to verbally agree to a certain amount, only to split it up into smaller deals submitted throughout the year that ultimately equal the agreed upon total.
The Athletic also reported that at least one school’s collective is believed to have paid the entire incoming freshman class to avoid having to count it against the rev-share limit.
It’s worth noting that the UA doesn’t have an active NIL collective at the moment, as it cut ties with the Blueprint Sports-run Arkansas Edge in October. Sources have indicated to Best of Arkansas Sports that the UA has something else in the works, but no such announcements have been made.
Still, like Fletcher and its fellow SEC programs, Arkansas has room to be creative. Yurachek must be willing to navigate that “third lane” or risk the Razorbacks being left in the dust.
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Frank Fletcher talks about his NIL agreement with Taylen Green beginning at the 2:16:55 mark below:
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More coverage of Arkansas football from BoAS…
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College football free agency does not officially kick off until the transfer portal opens on Jan. 2, but planning for the eventful two-week period is well underway. Players are announcing their intentions as coaching staffs prepare a plan of attack. It’s a busy time for every college football program, but the intensity is amplified even more for first-year head coaches, like Kentucky’s Will Stein.
With every coaching change, there is significant roster turnover. You can expect some schools to change more than half of their roster as a coach tells the old players to kick rocks as he brings in new ones from the transfer portal.
Lane Kiffin was called the “Portal King” during his time at Ole Miss. The man has frequent flyer miles in college football free agency. One of his first hires in Baton Rouge was Eric Wolford. The former Kentucky assistant coach did not fix the Wildcats’ high school recruiting woes on the offensive line, but his intense style actually might help Kentucky this offseason.
You have to be a certain type of person to play for Eric Wolford. Not every LSU offensive lineman is gonna sign up for that. Kentucky needs offensive linemen. You know who is well acquainted with those LSU players who need a new home? Joe Sloan.
Kentucky needs five new starters on the offensive line. There are a few reserves from last year’s squad that may be ready to emerge as starters, but the Cats need players in the trenches. Plenty of Joe Sloan’s former LSU players will be available in free agency.
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LSU Offensive Linemen hitting the Transfer Portal
OT Carius Curne — A top 15 overall talent in the 2025 recruiting class who was evaluated as a guard, the Arkansas native started five games as a true freshman, splitting time at both left and right tackle. He showed plenty of potential and will be a hot commodity in the transfer portal. He has three years of eligibility remaining.
OT Tyree Adams — Adams earned a starting role at left tackle ahead of the 2025 season before an injury forced him to undergo season-ending surgery in November. The New Orleans native has two years of eligibility remaining.
IOL Coen Echols — Started the last eight games at left guard and played the third-most snaps on the offense. The former Texas A&M commit will be a true junior with two years of eligibility remaining.
C DJ Chester — LSU’s starting center in 2024 led the team in snaps, but was replaced by a Virginia Tech transfer this fall. He enters the transfer portal with two years of eligibility remaining.
OT Ory Williams — The redshirt freshman earned two starts at left tackle at the end of the season. He appeared in four games total and logged 150 snaps.
The LSU offensive line was far from a juggernaut for Sloan last fall. PFF gave the Tigers the worst run-blocking grade in the SEC after finishing at the bottom of the league in rushing yards per game (104). Even though the unit had plenty of imperfections, there are still players with plenty of upside and SEC experience who could find a second wind by following their old offensive coordinator to Kentucky via the transfer portal.
Texas Tech will begin its first full day in South Florida on Tuesday with a morning practice followed by College Football Playoff quarterfinal media day at Hard Rock Stadium, site of Thursday’s game against Oregon.
No. 4 Texas Tech (12-1, 8-1 Big 12) meets No. 5 Oregon (12-1, 8-1 Big Ten) at noon ET on New Year’s Day. ESPN will televise the game, with Joe Tessitore and Jesse Palmer in the booth and Stormy Buonantony and Katie George on the sidelines.
This will be the first time the programs have met in the Capital One Orange Bowl and the fourth meeting overall dating to 1991. It is also the first College Football Playoff quarterfinal in Orange Bowl history.
– TECH –
This isn’t isolated to mid-tier teams like Iowa State. Even former powerhouses are reeling from portal raids. USC, under Lincoln Riley, hemorrhaged 15 players after a disappointing 2025 season, including backups and starters seeking better NIL opportunities elsewhere. The Trojans’ losses exacerbate roster instability in a program once synonymous with West Coast dominance. Similarly, Florida State shed 25 athletes, UNC lost 15, and over 10 programs nationwide saw 20 or more departures, highlighting how NIL bidding wars amplify turnover at underperforming or underfunded schools. These exits often follow coaching changes or subpar seasons, with athletes prioritizing financial incentives over rebuilding efforts.
The fallout extends beyond regular-season rosters, contributing to a palpable lack of interest in the multitude of bowl games not tied to the College Football Playoff (CFP). With the transfer portal overlapping bowl season and NIL deals luring players away, non-playoff bowls have become exhibitions of depleted teams, rife with opt-outs and makeshift lineups. Players, now professionalized through NIL earnings, increasingly skip these games to avoid injury risks ahead of the NFL draft or to chase better opportunities via the portal, rendering many matchups unwatchable and irrelevant. This year alone, several 5-7 teams declined bowl invitations outright, including Iowa State and Notre Dame that also had a 10-2 winning record in 2025, signaling diminished prestige, while opt-outs have turned storied bowls into shadow versions of themselves. Viewership for non-playoff bowls remains robust in aggregate—Disney’s 33 such games averaged 2.7 million viewers last season, up from prior years—but fan sentiment and expert analysis point to growing apathy, with complaints that NIL and the portal have “demolished bowl season” by eroding competitive integrity. As one observer noted, these games hold “no interest” for teams anymore, fueling calls for reforms like paying players to participate or shifting the portal window post-bowls.
As the 2025 calendar winds down, the NCAA’s revamped transfer portal is poised to swing open on January 2, 2026, ushering in a condensed 15-day frenzy that closes on January 16, 2026, for most football programs. This single-window structure, a shift from previous dual periods to curb ongoing tampering and streamline chaos, includes extensions: Players from teams in the College Football Playoff national championship (set for January 19, 2026) get an extra five days from January 20-24, while coaching changes trigger separate 15-day windows starting five days after a new hire. Amid NIL’s financial allure, this upcoming portal period could accelerate roster volatility, with programs like Iowa State still reeling from pre-window announcements and others bracing for bidding wars.
Yet, in Texas—the epicenter of NIL spending—some programs thrive amid the chaos, leveraging deep-pocketed boosters to build fortresses against portal losses. The University of Texas (UT) boasts the nation’s top football NIL budget at $35-40 million for 2025, enabling net gains like edge rusher Colin Simmons from LSU and wideout Isaiah Bond from Alabama while minimizing outflows. Texas A&M follows closely with $51.4 million in total NIL revenue (football-dominant), adding 12 transfers like quarterback Marcel Reed despite some exits tied to NIL dissatisfaction. Texas Tech, spending nearly $30 million, turned the portal into a weapon with 15 additions, including quarterback Brendan Sorsby on a rumored $4 million deal, fueling a playoff push. SMU, raising $65 million for all sports via its Mustang Club, focused on retention bonuses to limit departures to just five, adding talents like edge Braden Carter and earning ACC buzz.
Contrast this with in-state rivals Baylor, TCU, and the University of Houston, where modest NIL resources expose vulnerabilities. Baylor ramped up to $15 million in NIL spending, adding 24 transfers to flip its roster, but still suffered heavy losses post-2025, prompting coach Dave Aranda to fight for key retentions like four critical players amid portal risks. TCU, also allocating around $15 million to football under Big 12 revenue sharing, balanced gains (e.g., experienced quarterbacks) with lumps from departures, reflecting the portal’s double-edged sword in a new era of $20.5 million caps. Houston, with unspecified but lower NIL figures, bolstered its roster with 15 transfers and 30 overall additions, yet faces ongoing portal needs after a 4-8 season, lacking the financial firepower to consistently outbid elites.
This Texas divide underscores NIL’s inequality: Wealthy programs like UT and A&M buy stability and stars, while others like Baylor and TCU scramble to plug holes, often becoming feeder systems. As the transfer portal window in 2026 looms, college football’s soul hangs in the balance and talk of reform is already in the air.
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