#and signed thousands of autographs while being so sweet with this little angel and giving him such a wonderful experience | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

fieryrondo · 4 years

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my report on skate canada 2019 and how i fell in love with figure skating all over again (part 1)

It’s taken me about a month to sit down and write this. Not necessarily due to lack of time (though that is a factor) but because the experience was so much. Even now, with grainy photos and videos taken with a trembling hand as proof of my time there, Skate Canada feels like a bit of a fever dream. The best kind that leaves you breathless, heart-pounding and longing for more.

I’m not a stranger to traveling alone but this would be my first international venture for something solely recreational, something solely just for me. A purely selfish pleasure. The planning itself was a.process that evolved over the course of months. And to be honest, there were times when I thought this trip wouldn’t happen at all. My flight, booked months in advance, got moved up several hours earlier than expected, forcing me to decide between missing part of the gala or to stay an extra night. Personal problems drained my stamina, and several bouts of poor health stoked the fear that this day would never come. It only became real when I set off for Boston, carry-on, and swan plush in tow, for the first leg of my journey.

Kelowna, a charming lake-resort town in the middle of nowhere British Columbia. There are no direct flights from the East Coast there and I ended up having an overnight stopover in Toronto. From what I saw from the vantage point of the aircraft, Toronto was a beautiful city and reminded me a little of Los Angeles. However, I had little time to appreciate the city. I checked into a hotel to shower, warm up some leftovers, and resurrect my dying phone.

(above) My companions for the journey.

The swan was for Yuzuru, I know it is traditional to give him a Pooh bear but I picked the swan because it was the first program of his that I saw and to this day, it is still my favorite. It has a lot of meaning for me. The Sakura Pooh was my lucky charm, the Pooh ears a last-minute purchase.

Due to my schedule, I had to miss the first day, which itself was a bit of a risk. Isn’t it crazy? Traveling thousands of kilometers just to watch half a competition? I certainly thought so. Not to mention how Yuzuru performed during the short would have a direct impact on how he would approach the free skate. Skate Canada has never been his strongest competition. Even if he was the overwhelming favorite, like most fanyus, I’ve learned to take nothing for granted. When I heard that he skated well in the short, I breathed a little more easily before settling down to draft my letter.

“Perhaps it’s a bit forward of me, a complete stranger, to wish you this, but congratulations on your chest muscles” was the opening line of my letter, as suggested by my good friend Tanya over @turistinmyowncity. I was too embarrassed to actually take photographic evidence but rest assured I did include it. I like to think that it may have made Yuzuru smile. A gold foil origami crane was added for additional luck. Like many fans, I was keeping my fingers crossed for Yuzuru’s first Skate Canada title.

And then it was off to the airport again, this time for the second leg of the flight. Unlike the first flight, not so many passengers were flying to Kelowna and we all got to pick our own seats.

It did not occur to me that catching Yuzuru’s practice was even within the realm of possibility until I had realized that we had arrived in Kelowna 30 minutes earlier than scheduled. A fanyu i had been corresponding with had texted: “Yuzuru’s skating second to last in practice. If you hurry, you might make it.”

*insert dramatic cinematic action sequence where I race to the nearest cab driver, shakily request to be taken to Prospera Palace expediently without breaking any traffic safety laws and then quietly die to the barely heard strains of Origin while the main entrance security guard painstakingly searches my luggage.*

One of the most vivid memories I have of Skate Canada is dragging my ridiculously bulky carryon (gimpy wheel and all) up the flight of stairs in Section 114, trying to flatten myself and become one with the stairwell wall and not get in anyone’s way. A volunteer took pity on me and let me stand on the top of the steps for a closer look. The first thing I saw, of course, was Pooh-san, that bright splash of red and yellow works perfectly as a homing beacon.

I missed Origin but was able to catch the last few minutes of practice. As for first impressions go, I’m afraid I don’t have anything particularly new to offer. Yuzuru looks as exactly as he does in photos. Sharp, precise, graceful. And fast! He kept practicing what looked like his entrance into quad loop.

With men’s practice over, I met up with fellow fanyu VentusCantabile, an extremely sweet person with an excellent singing voice :). I dropped off my luggage at our Airbnb (conveniently located two blocks away) before rushing back over to the arena for the free dance. The venue itself is not that big so even in seats from the nosebleed section you can get a pretty good view. I was in section 112, the closest I could get to the judges' side view and also got a decent(ish) view of the kiss and cry.

I must confess that I don’t really follow ice dance and am unable to provide anything insightful. To me, everyone looked absolutely stunning. I cheered extra loud for Sara Hurtado/Kirill Khaliavin, the first Spanish ice dancers to win a Grand Prix medal. It’s no secret that I miss Javi terribly since his retirement so it was so nice to see Spanish figure skating continue to make strides. Sara’s story is also particularly inspiring. Like Javi, she has worked extremely hard to put Spanish figure skating on the map.

Other teams that impressed were: Gilles/Pourier, Hubbell/Donohue and Fear/Gibson. Fear/Gibson had an especially fun program and the Russian family next to me were so cute in that they were cheering for all of the European teams.

And then it was time for the ladies.

Media will talk about Trusova’s mindbogglingly difficult quads, Rika’s sublime triple axel, Medvedeva’s fight of a free, but the free skate of the night for me personally was Marin’s La La Land. So tenderly skated! Marin is so lovely and a true pleasure to watch live. To watch her bravely skate through (bandage and all) the best free she’s had in ages, how meaningful it must have been. And thus the first sea of Japanese flags washed through the stands.

Here is Evgenia! Her dress is actually extremely beautiful. A very charismatic skater, there were a lot of fans who had come from overseas to cheer for her.

Cute podium :)

Then a break for lunch. The funniest thing I found about being in Kelowna is how it is no exaggeration that figure skating fans just take over the town. The restaurant we went to was packed full of figure skating fans. Talking with fanyus was surprisingly easy. A bit awkward at first but it wasn’t long before we were easily chatting about scoring GOE guidelines and work and other fandom interests.

Then back to the rink for pairs. Given that there was a dearth of filled seats in the lower rows, I half-guiltily took the opportunity to sit a bit closer.

Watching pairs. Is. Terrifying. Lifts are hella more impressive. Twists are gravity defying. Throws are put your hands together and pray the guy does his part to help his partner land those jumps.

Vladimir Morozov lifting Evgenia Tarasova. I appreciated them a lot more live. Their elements are huge and so so clean.

Boikova/Kozlovskii are also now officially my favorite Russian pairs team. I had originally planned on filming their free since seeing quality pairs skating is such a rare opportunity in the US (cough, cough, please invest in pairs more, usfsa). I could not take my eyes off of them for one second. They were so confident and radiating electric charisma from start to finish. A young team with a very bright future!

Between the break, I also spotted Elladj Blade and Kevin Reynolds, the latter was kindly signing autographs. I was too shy to approach either of them but let me tell you Kevin is very sweet with little kids.

And then on to the men! The arena was starting to fill again so I ended up moving up a few rows. I was nervous (for a variety of reasons) but this was ultimately the event I came to see. Watching men is a bit like Russian roulette, you can either expect magnificence or implosion (or sometimes both). Not too many falls but pops are quite painful to see, especially when you know they are so costly. Still, there was a lot to like. Watching Matteo made my heart ache because his style reminds me so much of Javi’s (and doing a flamenco program does not make that association any easier). Roman is also really gorgeous to watch live, but he was so nervous during the free he was unable to show us what he’s really capable of.

At some point, you can sense the audience’s point of focus shift, probably during Camden’s skate (also really liked Camden!). I was sitting pretty close to the side of the skater’s entrance and noticed that all of the fans right by the stairwell had their phones/cameras out. Stairwell shooting is always a reliable indicator of Yuzuru’s arrival ^^

That roar of approval when Yuzuru takes off his jacket is something else. Origin 2.0 is a beautiful costume and way, way more sparkly in real life. Photos don’t quite do the sparkles justice.

Those six minutes of warm-up were honestly some of the most stressful I’ve experienced. Yuzuru kept drilling the quad loop, the jump that he had been having trouble with during practice. After he had gotten a beautiful one under his belt (good, please do that again in the free), he seemed to calm down.

I found it very difficult to concentrate on the other skaters in the second group. By then the stadium was packed and every seat was filled. I had doubts about whether or not I would even get the chance to throw my gift onto the ice because I was so high up and nowhere near the aisle. Worst case scenario, I would just keep my swan.

Keiji!!! He was so fun to watch here. I really love both of his programs this season and he was totally on from the very first jump! Not gonna lie, I saw my life flash before my eyes when he almost ran straight into the boards on his second sal, and then the dainty single toe on the end made me laugh. :)

So it never occurred to me, a formerly strictly broadcast viewer, the amount of time that skaters have right before they skate. There is SO much time. While they were doing the slow-mo replay and the judges were punching buttons, Yuzuru was already whizzing on the ice. He landed a very beautiful quad toe. Feather light. Airy. Calm and commanding, he looked good to go.

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At this point, I put down my phone. Although part of me cried at the thought of not having a personal recording of Yuzuru’s free, it felt important to focus entirely on him with my own two eyes.

There are no words that can quite describe what I felt when watching Origin. When I look back on this skate, I can only remember how hard I ground my teeth. How I could feel the opening drum beats like the beats of a human heart. How my knuckles whitened as they grasped the edge of my hard seat. Yuzuru went for the loop and spun out, clinging on to the ice by the edge of his blade. Not the prettiest landing but he made it.

The sal next, smooth as silk. Step sequence, violin choreo(!!), that scream for the prettiest triple lutz I’ve seen. Quad toe. How many quads left. My fingernails were digging into my plastic wrapped swan. THAT FUCKING QUAD TOE-EULER-TRIPLE FLIP. Ahhhhhhhh, roll of thunder, hear our cry.

The CLAPPING. 6000 voices in perfect synchrony. Every completed jumping pass felt like a victory charge. That bionic knee bend determination to eke out that double toe. All jumping passes cleared. At some point I must have started breathing again. A song in my heart, indiscriminate joy squeezing the heck out of my vocal cords. Lay down that ina bauer! A tiny slip on the hydroblade but he’s done it. He’s ground the silver curse to dust. When you’re screaming at the top of your lungs but you can’t hear a thing because everyone else around you is screaming louder than you. Final clapping sequence. Dramatique pose, punch the air. Sound your barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.

322.59!!! Feels. So. Damn. Right.

#yuzuru hanyu #skate canada 2019 #season: 2019 2020 #personal #my ears are still deafened from the screaming #part 2 will be gala!

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artificialqueens · 5 years

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Beyond My Wildest Dreams Ch 5/5 (Nina West/OC) - multifandomgeek

A/N: This is it, the final chapter. Thank you so much for everyone who left comments and indulged me on this little tribute to Nina. The project on this fic is inspired by the Project for Awesome, and in the back of my mind I hope Nina steals this idea some day and puts it to practice.

Thank you Writworm for betaing these last two chapters and thank you Meggie, pinkgrapefruit, and Dane for all the encouragement to finish this, I really needed it and couldn’t have done without it.

AO3

Nina’s house looked like the headquarters of a bank robber from an action movie. There were cables everywhere, her dinner table was currently supporting two big monitors connected to a laptop where there was a guy sitting down looking at so many things at once it was actually dizzying. On her couch, there were more people on laptops, and a few more desks were placed around temporarily.

The Big Project, now properly named Queens for Queers, had officially started 10 hours ago, though this set-up had been going on for a lot longer than that. There was a website up with all the information on the project. They had managed to partner up with some of the biggest LGBTQIA+ non-profit organization on the country plus a few international ones, and they were all listed with information on their work plus links to their own websites. Nina had done background checks on them personally, it was of the utmost importance that no corrupt or questionable organization was linked to this.

All the Drag Queens you could possibly know or follow on social media were talking about this, even if they weren’t participating directly on the project or didn’t help with the marketing campaign from the previous months. Queer celebrities and even a few mainstream ones were also helping spread the word spontaneously, making huge donations themselves. It was incredible.

When you visited the website, the first thing you saw was the donation button. Anyone could donate whatever amount they wanted, through any kind of card (debit, credit, international), and a couple of digital payments options also. That was a huge deal for international fans, Nina found, and had been a great idea not that hard to pull through. Under that, there was the ever-running number of dollars already raised, coupled with the name/alias of the last person who donated or purchased anything not anonymously.

Then, you would see the digital products. All the lives the queens were making were being recorded in HD and would be available for purchase. A few queens were also making special exclusive episodes of their podcasts for the project, some even making Q&As with only questions from buyers. There was Shangela’s podcast, Katya’s, Willam and Alaska’s, Bob and Monét’s, Dragcast, of course, and a few other popular Drag Race-centered pods. Trixie and Katya offered an exclusive episode of Unhhh with the same editors that would be called “This is totally a different show” for copyright reasons, which was really a money maker, Nina was considering upping the price of that one. Any of the digital products cost 15 dollars each, or you could have them all for $75. It was unlimited supply with a fixed cost and no shipping, really a nice, digital-era way of selling stuff. They would be delivered until pride and were being purchased in buckets by people all over the world, it was insane!

After that, you would see the merch. They had commissioned and in some cases had the works made for free from the best fan-artists known in the Drag Race fandom, and they were all printed on shirts, mugs, and posters ready to ship. All proceeds went to the project, but all credits were linked to the artists. Cheyne Gallard’s one was Nina’s personal favorite, and she was actually wearing it as she made sure if anybody needed anything while they worked.

Then, there were the lives’ tokens. The project would run for 24 hours, each hour had a live stream with a queen, some with two or three, like the Branjie one. Each queen was instructed to have a few things they could sell ready to be shown. Most of them had dug up some outfits they didn’t use anymore, some signed a few things. Katya promised to lick a few in her upcoming lives, and Nina had to tell her that no, she couldn’t fuck herself with anything and then sell it for charity, no matter how much more money it would make. Kevin made her sign a contract saying she wouldn’t, just in case.

Right now, Silky was live. She was driving around Los Angeles making every single person she knew sign the shirt she was wearing, which was obviously big enough to hold a lot of autographs, and Silky knew a lot of people. It was genius, people were already auctioning it on the website and the price was jaw-dropping. It was threatening to surpass Brooke’s red hoodie, which Vanjie convinced her to sell in their predictably most viewed live so far. Nina sat on her bed to watch it nervously, but her laptop got closed before she could really see anything.

“You need to calm down,” said Kevin, taking the device away from her and putting it on the nightstand with one hand while the other held a mug. “Finn is taking care of everything, we’re at a shouting distance, everything is going smoothly,” he said, climbing on the bed with her and sitting in front of her, handing her the mug. “I made you some nice, creamy cocoa,” he kissed her cheek, “so you can forget about numbers and internet connections for a second or you’ll have a migraine before this is even halfway done.”

“I love you so much,” said Nina, leaning to kiss Kevin on the lips after tasting the deliciously sweet cocoa. “Also, I noticed you locked the door?” she asked with a grin.

“I didn’t know if I would have to resort to extreme measures to make you relax, what can I say?” he said, smiling as he kissed her again. Nina put the mug away so she could kiss him deeply and pull him to lay down with her. She wouldn’t let it go too far (probably), but a little make-out session couldn’t hurt. She let out a low grunt as he licked into her mouth. Even after more than a year together, his soft touches mixed with passion still had her in awe.

“Oh my God, Nina!” came a shout, followed by a thug on the door, “bitch, is this locked?” Jamie’s voice could be heard as the doorknob rattled.

“Ugh,” grunted Kevin, falling on the bed on his back. Nina chuckled, giving him a short peck before getting up to open the door for her friend.

“What’s up, Jamie?” asked Nina.

“Remember when we said Ru must still be asleep?” said Jamie, barging into the bedroom and sitting on the edge of the bed with her laptop open. The project had started at midnight, and the lack of any manifestation from the biggest Queen of all had them jokingly saying she must still be asleep. Nina didn’t think much about it, really. Ru didn’t meddle with her children’s project, it was her MO. “She fucking woke up!”

Nina sat down and leaned into Jamie’s shoulder to look at her screen. Kevin did the same at her other side and both had their jaw dropped as soon as they spotted the number that indicated the amount of money they had already raised, right at the center of the Queens for Queers website.

“ONE MILLION DOLLARS?” Nina screamed. The last time she checked, they were at a very uplifting 400 thousand, still counting, and she was very happy with it. It was already more than she was hoping for, more than enough to account for the costs and then some, which was always the main goal.

“Mama Ru saw the thing and said, I’m gonna round it up for my girl Nina,” said Jamie laughing. She put her laptop on the bed and shook Nina a little, who was still frozen in her shocked expression. “She did it, Nina! For you!”

“One million fucking dollars,” she said again, looking at Jamie. “One million, Jamie!” she started laughing and hugged her.

“We’re not even halfway,” murmured Kevin from the other side, both hands on the side of his own face and looking like he was on the verge of crying. “Guys, that’s so much money,” he said, like he just realized it.

Jamie looked at him like she just now noticed he was there. “Oh, right, that’s why the door was locked! Sorry!” She said, suddenly picking her computer up. She hugged Nina one more time, they were both smiling as wide as they possibly could.

“One million,” said Nina again, giving little jumps of joy.

Jamie closed the door as she left, and Nina twisted the lock, promptly jumping at Kevin, tackling him to the bed and making him scream-laugh, startled. She kissed him all over his face, this wonderful man who she was so lucky to meet, so lucky to fall in love with, with whom she could share one of the biggest joys of her life right now. Who had made it happen, together with her.

“I love you so fucking much,” said Kevin, burying his face in Nina’s neck.

“One million dollars!” said Nina as if she was physically unable to say anything else. It didn’t matter, he knew. He laughed as she kissed him, kissing back just as fiercely.

The door was locked; they were going to celebrate.

#rpdr fanfiction #nina west #oc #fluff #beyond my wildest dreams #multifandomgeek #s11 #nina x oc #canon compliant

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your-dietician · 3 years

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A New Era Dawns In College Sports, As The NCAA Scrambles To Keep Up : NPR

New Post has been published on https://tattlepress.com/ncaa-football/a-new-era-dawns-in-college-sports-as-the-ncaa-scrambles-to-keep-up-npr/

A New Era Dawns In College Sports, As The NCAA Scrambles To Keep Up : NPR

The March Madness logo on the court during the Sweet Sixteen round of the 2021 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament in Indianapolis. Soon, some college athletes can get money when using their name, image or likeness.

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Justin Casterline/Getty Images

A new era in college sports begins this week.

Following Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear’s executive order allowing college athletes to be compensated for the use of their name, image and likeness — known by its abbreviation “NIL” — at least seven states will put into effect NIL laws, on Thursday. The laws allow athletes to make money for things like endorsement deals, signing autographs and social media content.

That’s been prohibited under NCAA rules, but now, the organization is in the process of reforming those rules. Especially after the recent Supreme Court decision weakened the NCAA’s long held, but increasingly outdated, notion of amateurism in college sports.

States take the lead

In 2019, California struck the first blow against the NCAA, in a very California way — a bill signing by Gov. Gavin Newsom on the set of Lebron James’ HBO show, The Shop.

The state’s Fair Pay to Play Act, the first NIL bill, reflected the growing discontent about the NCAA’s shaky ideal of amateurism, with so-called amateur athletes in the major sports generating vast revenues and not sharing in them.

For the NCAA, California signaled the start of a problem. A state-by-state patchwork of NIL laws would create recruiting advantages — athletes choosing schools in states allowing NIL payments — and thus create competitive imbalance.

Although critics say that imbalance has long existed in big time college sports.

But the NCAA failed to come up with a one-size-fits all plan. A vote set for January of this year was indefinitely delayed.

Now, the NCAA finally appears ready to act, but only after the states did.

“It’s the NCAA’s fault for not taking action,” said New Mexico State Sen. Mark Moores. The former college football player was the primary sponsor of his state’s NIL law, one of those going into effect Thursday, July 1.

“States are sovereign powers,” Moores said, “and when we see a situation that’s unfair and needs to be addressed, we’re going to use our ability to pass laws to address those issues.”

A payoff for hard work

With NIL, schools don’t pay athletes, third parties do. And New Mexico’s law is one of the least restrictive when it comes to compensation.

“The gold standard,” said longtime college athlete advocate Ramogi Huma.

Among other provisions, the statute lets athletes have their own shoe deals and allows third parties to pay for an athlete’s food, shelter and medical expenses.

New Mexico State sophomore basketball player Molly Kaiser says it’s amazing athletes will finally benefit from their name, and appropriate, she says, since they work hard to get their name out there.

“I’m honored to be a part of the start of that,” Kaiser said. “I think it’s going to be pretty cool, and now I can continue to make YouTube videos and actually profit off of it.”

18-year-old Kaiser says she was raised by a single mom and can envision sending NIL money back home.

“I think it’s all about trying to feed your family and making a way for them,” she said, “and not necessarily about us. At least for me.”

If University of Michigan basketball player Naz Hillmon decides to use the extra year of eligibility offered by the NCAA because of the pandemic, she’ll be able to take advantage of Michigan’s NIL law — it’s slated to go into effect in December of next year.

If she does, Hillmon has ideas.

Naz Hillmon #00 of the Michigan Wolverines is among the college athletes speaking out about new laws allowing them to cash in while playing in college.

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Naz Hillmon #00 of the Michigan Wolverines is among the college athletes speaking out about new laws allowing them to cash in while playing in college.

Elsa/Getty Images

“I would love to do some [basketball] camps,” she said, “whether they be in Ann Arbor or [her hometown] Cleveland. Just to be around in some way, give back to the community and kind of show my face and be appreciative of those who have helped me along the way.”

Hillmon also would like the chance to openly promote friends and family members.

“Some of them have businesses,” she said, “and [under current NCAA rules] I’m technically not allowed to promote them and say ‘go visit them.’ I have to word it in a certain way on my social media.”

In Los Angeles, USC quarterback Mo Hasan is hopeful. The lawmakers behind California’s Fair Pay to Play Act want to move up the law’s start date from 2023 to this September. Hasan, a podcast host, would still be in school and already he’s thinking in terms of NIL.

“I just got off the phone with a podcast network,” Hasan said last week. “They presented the opportunity to sign with them and partner with them in order to continue growing the podcast, and, generating revenue through advertisements.”

The money would “go to me,” he said, adding, “it would be historic because it’s never been done before on a student athlete level. So it’s really exciting to be on the frontier of this.”

Hasan confirms the NCAA’s fear that a patchwork of state NIL laws would affect recruiting.

“I think it’s a competitive advantage for sure,” he said. “If, you know, the state of Florida or the state of Texas (both have laws going into effect July 1) can offer these resources that the state of California can’t, that’s really hard to recruit against. You know, if I’m a top quarterback and I can make over one hundred thousand dollars at the University of Florida and I can’t make that at the University of Arizona, then that’s an easy decision in a lot of cases.”

Plenty of value in athletes

So what can athletes make in the NIL era?

A study in SSRN, the Social Science Research Network, on college athlete’s NIL value, found “the NCAA’S claimed position that student-athletes lack meaningful NIL value is false.”

Studying the potential for monetizing social media accounts, the easiest way to turn NIL rights into dollars, researchers estimated Trevor Lawrence’s Instagram account had a value of more than $330,000. Lawrence was the star quarterback at Clemson and top pick in this year’s NFL draft.

While football and men’s basketball players get much of the publicity in those two major revenue-generating sports, women are not left out of the equation. And in fact, potentially they could eclipse their male counterparts in NIL earnings.

Basing, again, on social media popularity, Axios noted that 8 of the top 10 most followed athletes in the Elite 8 rounds of this year’s men’s and women’s NCAA Division 1 basketball tournaments….were female players.

According to The Washington Post, other research found star athletes in women’s sports and Olympians now competing in college, could make up to half a million dollars a year in endorsements.

That’s big money of course. The majority of athletes, many in so-called non-revenue sports, doing camps and lessons, making occasional personal appearances, or working their social media, there’ll be more modest sums for sure.

You get what you put in

“The reality is, [making money off NIL opportunities] is just like anything else,” said Jim Cavale, CEO of the content-providing software platform INFLCR (pronounced “influencer”). “What you put in is what you get out. Any student-athlete who thinks this is just going be an automatic windfall of revenue, is insane.”

“You’re going to have to work at it. Some athletes will have to do less work than others, just like playing time. Some athletes are so gifted they can get on the field very easily and play and score and do well. Other athletes have to work a little harder. But everyone is going to have to put in some work.”

Cavale started his company in 2017, and is now using the last four years of connections and business to give INFLCR a leg up on the dozens of companies that’ve sprung up to take advantage of the NIL wave. Cavale says more than 100,000 athletes nationwide have the INFLCR app, which helps them manage their name, image and likeness opportunities.

Managing that business, doing the work to create their own brands, that’s a valuable lesson for any athlete, he says. From the star quarterback to the softball shortstop to the setter on the volleyball team.

“Even though they [may not make] a ton of money off NIL,” Cavale said, “it’s going to help them make the most of the network and surroundings they have while they’re playing. So they can start to make those connections and build the foundation for the rest of their lives. A lot of athletes, unfortunately, experience the side of the ball being deflated. The game’s over and nobody cares anymore. They don’t care they used to play. They don’t care you were this position on this team. You’re now an adult trying to make it in a very tough world. [So], get a head start.”

The NCAA plays catch up

The question remains, who will have the opportunities?

College athletes in at least seven states will as of July 1st. And it now appears all athletes will be included.

The NCAA’s quick game of catch up has the organization finally positioned to offer NIL rights nationwide.

Meetings last week led to the draft of an interim plan that, if approved, would take effect July 1.

Under the plan, athletes in the states with laws going into effect will follow those laws; in states without laws, schools can create their own NIL policies.

There still are prohibitions included in the NCAA’s plan, including NIL compensation can’t be tied to an athlete’s performance — not allowing, for instance, more NIL money for more points scored. The organization is trying to hold the line against pay for play, a bedrock of the amateurism model the NCAA has preached throughout its history.

But the model has been harder to defend as the money has boomed in big time college sports.

Indeed, last week the U.S. Supreme Court issued a stinging and unanimous ruling that the NCAA can’t limit athletes benefits that are linked to education. It was a narrow ruling but one that eviscerated the NCAA’s claim that it should be exempt from the nation’s antitrust laws because the athletes are amateurs.

The decision is expected to lead to future challenges to NCAA rules. Patrick Bradford, a veteran anti-trust lawyer based in New York City, was part of a group that filed an amicus brief supporting the athletes in the Supreme Court case. Particularly the African American athletes who comprise the majority of athletes in revenue-generating football and men’s basketball.

Bradford predicts the Supreme Court ruling has a lasting impact.

“I think it’s just a matter of time,” he said, “before the NCAA will have to divorce itself from regulating the economics of student athletes.”

For now, with its temporary NIL plan, the NCAA, which did not respond to a request for comment, is stepping back by allowing schools to create their own policies. But the association also says schools and athletes should adhere to the plan’s guidance “until such time that either federal legislation or NCAA rules are adopted.”

The NCAA Division 1 Board of Directors reportedly will meet Wednesday to make a final decision on the interim plan. If, as expected, the board approves it, the NIL policy would go into effect the next day.

Making the NCAA a partner, albeit belated, in a new era.

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