LSU's Brian Kelly Comments on UNLV QB Matthew Sluka's Situation, New Age of NIL

Kelly believes unlicensed agents are a "red-flag" for young athletes, revenue sharing will become key soon.

Sep 14, 2024; Columbia, South Carolina, USA; LSU Tigers head coach Brian Kelly smiles after defeating the South Carolina Gamecocks at Williams-Brice Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Scott Kinser-Imagn Images / Scott Kinser-Imagn Images

Brian Kelly and the LSU football program have been at the forefront of the name, image and likeness movement over the last few years with the Tigers working with administration to raise the bar.

It's a tricky situation with a lack of structure, and on Wednesday morning, the college football landscape got a glimpse of that after UNLV quarterback Matthew Sluka elected to bypass the remainder of the 2024 season due to missed payments.

Sluka has decided to redshirt for the 2024 season after playing in only three games for the Rebels and will evaluate his options once entering the NCAA Transfer Portal.

He was reportedly promised $100,000 upon committing to the program as a transfer and received just a fraction of that.

Rob Sine, CEO of Blueprint Sports, which operates UNLV's collective, tells @YahooSports that the collective never agreed to a $100,000 deal with QB Matthew Sluka.

It made a payment of $3,000 to Sluka & were discussing a monthly payment of $3,000 before QB’s decision this week.

— Ross Dellenger (@RossDellenger) September 25, 2024

For Kelly and the LSU Tigers, they understand the lack of structure in place and the third-party entities in the way. There are no clearly defined contracts, which make it an even bigger mess.

“Well, you really don’t [have any protections]. The NIL, because it becomes a third-party piece, you lose control," Kelly said Wednesday morning on the SEC Teleconference. "That’s why the revenue-sharing piece is so important and getting that legislation passed now puts that back through the universities."

Kelly believes that revenue-sharing will be the key piece in all of this down the line. It projects to be roughly $22 million and could be in place as soon as the summer of 2025.

With a lack of structure in place, Kelly believes that revenue-sharing could be the "bread and butter" here.

"Now, those contracts can be written a lot differently (with revenue-sharing in place)," Kelly said. "When you’re dealing with a third party and collectives and NILs, the universities are at arm’s length. 

"It’s much more difficult to put into the kind of language necessary to see that maybe a quarterback doesn’t leave halfway through a season or a guy doesn’t opt-out for a particular bowl game. Revenue-sharing changes the dynamics. Now, I’m not saying it guarantees all those things go away. But, it does run that revenue through the universities and contractually now you’re at a better position to put forth the language necessary to see that maybe some of those things are more difficult."

Kelly also detailed the time and effort the LSU coaching staff takes with recruits during their visits to Baton Rouge. It's about discussing with the student-athletes how NIL works, how they can benefit from it and more.

"Unfortunately, those stories do exist and I think there’s a couple of things that when we have young men come to our campus, we do spend some time with them and the first thing is, you should never give up your name, your image and likeness, exclusively; you should hold on to that," Kelly said. "I think that’s the first thing. 

"I think the second thing is anytime we’re talking to the young men, we want to make sure that when we talk about agents that they’re certified. I know that’s difficult in most instances, but a certified agent versus somebody that does it as a part-time job, those should be red flags for families and they should be very, very cautious relative to signing anything if they are not a certified agent or they want your name, image and likeness. That, to me, are the kind of things that we try to educate when we have the young men on our campus." 

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