I don’t know much about a man named Dan Lambert. Heck, hadn’t even heard of him until Wednesday morning.
But you know what? I like his style, I like it a whole lot.
I also wonder just how much a man like Lambert --- and more to the point his money --- is ever going to anything but widen the divide between the haves and have not programs in college football.
Let me explain …
Lambert is a savvy businessman and big, big, big time Miami Hurricanes football fan. He owns a chain of MMA gyms in South Florida where a slew of high-end fighters train and he’s done very well for himself.
Good on him.
He’s living the American Dream and raking in the dough. But he also wants to spread it around to some people.
That’s where his love of Miami football and the new Name, Image and Likeness stuff with college athletes intersects.
See, after talking to the compliance people at The U and also vetting everything through attorneys, Lambert has an offer on the table of $500 per month to each of the scholarship players on the Hurricanes’ squad if they advertise his gym on their personal social media pages. There are 90 players on scholarship. If all of them would take Lambert up on his offer, he’d be out $540,000 this year.
Man, I love America.
Secure that bag.
Get your worth.
If someone is willing to pay you for something, understand your value and cash in.
You can bet your rump if I were in such a position I’d simply be asking Lambert and his crew what I needed to do in terms of social media and then giving them instructions on where to send the check.
But it all brings us to the point of furthering the divide in college football.
Isn’t the playing field, which is already top-heavy and dominated by truly just a small percentage of teams that have a chance, perhaps going tilt even more?
I mean, in this case (and this is just one that is public) there is a South Florida businessman who has the funds, financial fortitude and drive to want to make the kids on the team he roots for get paid a decent sum. That leads to high school kids seeing that and, in turn, a very obvious recruiting tool.
That said, high-powered alums would be crazy not to do this at places like Alabama and Ohio State and at LSU and Clemson --- and all the select other places that have donors with the deepest of pockets and direct links to the players.
In reality, though, these teams are vying for the same title as the University of Cincinnati. And UTEP. And East Carolina, Temple, New Mexico State, Bowling Green, Troy, Arkansas State and places of the such.
Yes, Florida and Southern California fight for the same ultimate title as Middle Tennessee State and Rice do.
But there’s no way in the world the Name, Image and Likeness stuff will do anything but amplify and broaden such a gap and it is because of the deep pockets of people like Mr. Lambert at Miami. And people like him now know their money isn’t going to be hung up in some university bureaucracy, but it is going directly to those young men who put their bodies on the line on Saturdays.
I love America. I love this stuff --- people getting their worth and cashing in on what their true rate is.
What Lambert is doing is positively outstanding and I hope every single Hurricanes player grabs that $500 for those social media posts.
But the actuality is also (and it just is what it is) that such a structure and system will continue to push the low-level Division I football playing schools even further away from having any shot at all. They aren’t remotely in the same league.