Friday Headlines: Navigating NIL Edition

By John Morgan Francis@MonJorgan May 6, 2022, 8:00am EDT

Kentucky Sports Radio’s Jack Pilgrim published a piece late Thursday evening saying Kentucky expects the hammer to drop on schools using pay-for-play to recruit with NIL. Several programs, including teams in the Southeastern Conference, have used booster money for cash rewards to land recruits.

Pilgrim says “as other money-happy programs continue to spend, Kentucky basketball has taken a firm stance against pay-for-play while continuing to create lucrative NIL opportunities for its players the ‘right way.’”

“We’re not going to break the rules.” Those were the words of TJ Beisner — Kentucky’s Director of Player Development and NIL expert — that headlined Pilgrim’s piece.

Kentucky has prided themselves for recruiting and utilizing the benefit of Name, Image and Likeness in a legal way as well as having the best interest of their recruits in mind.

Beisner talked about instead of promising recruits playing time, shots or any NIL guarantees, Kentucky focuses on opportunities and what former players were able to accomplish at Kentucky.

“It’s about the opportunity and the support and the people who came before you, what they were able to do. That’s where we started with this last year, and that’s been something we’ve done for a while without financial compensation, just trying to build presence, build identity and build brands for players,” Beisner said.

Kentucky is once again ahead of the game and doing everything the right way, which is something other programs can’t honestly say at the moment.