Penn State's James Franklin Calls NIL 'the Wild, Wild West'

Franklin and other coaches seek guardrails and guidance regarding NIL, particularly in recruiting.

Penn State's James Franklin has talked plenty with fellow coaches about how Name, Image and Likeness has changed recruiting. The consensus isn't positive.

Sure, most coaches support NIL itself as an opportunity for college athletes to profit off the games that profit off them. However, Franklin said that the lack of an NIL rulebook is hurting college football.

"I think there’s major concerns with what’s going on in college football right now," Franklin said Wednesday. "There’s just really no guardrails, not a whole lot of guidance, not a whole lot of governance. And it's concerning."

Franklin discussed NIL and Penn State on Signing Day while introducing the 22 players of his 2023 recruiting class who signed their Letters of Intent early. NIL might be preventing the class from being larger.

Penn State Athletic Director Patrick Kraft said recently that the program has lost potential recruits because of NIL offers elsewhere. He called that a space where Penn State won't participate.

"What you are hearing in the recruiting space is, and it happened with us just this week, people just won't come," Kraft said in mid-December. "They're throwing half a million dollars or $700,000 if you come to X school. We're not going to do that. That's just not how it works."

Franklin reiterated his support for NIL opportunities that give athletes the opportunity to earn money, represent a business or build their own. But he said NIL's impact on recruiting has produced some "crazy" conversations between players and coaches.

Without clear NIL guidelines from a collegiate governing body like the NCAA, Franklin said the scene has become "a little bit of the wild, wild west."

"Some of the conversations that are happening are crazy, and they've gotten down to the 11th hour of this," Franklin said. "It got as crazy as I've seen in my 26 years [of coaching and recruiting]. That's important. We're going to have to come up with a solution for college athletics as a whole and we're going to come up with a solution specifically for football."

Three NIL collectives are involved with Penn State athletics, including the football-only group Lions Legacy Club. Representatives of all three said their primary purpose is to support current athletes. None plans to get involved in recruiting.

"We’re not going out and promising crazy contracts or anything like that. We’re not having any conversations like that," said Chris Ganter, executive director of Lions Legacy Club. "It’s about building that foundation and taking care of the financial well-being and business mindset of these players who are here."

However, as Kraft noted, NIL collectives surrounding other programs are helping to build recruiting classes through deal-making. Kraft and Franklin said they want to create NIL opportunities for athletes through Penn State's large alumni network.

"I think this is what gives us an advantage," Kraft said. "We're Penn State. We're so big and powerful, and our alums are so engaged. It's harnessing that to help us in the recruiting front."

Franklin once again said that Penn State began its NIL program "way behind" other schools. Men's basketball coach Micah Shrewsberry told Nate Bauer of Blue-White Illustrated that his program ranks 13th or 14th in the Big Ten regarding NIL.

Franklin credited Kraft and Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi for understanding and addressing the issues. Penn State's NIL initiatives must continue growing, Franklin said.

"I think we've made up a lot of ground," Franklin said. "But we still have a lot of work to do if we say we want to approach NIL and everything else when it comes to competing at the highest level."

Kraft agreed, saying that he doesn't "lose as much sleep" over NIL as he did upon becoming athletic director in May. He added, though, that the athletic department is "just scratching the surface" of what NIL will become.

"I think you have to find a sustainable model," Kraft said. "What we have right now is not a sustainable model. ... There's a lot of misinformation on what people are being offered. And I think you're going to find as time goes on, 'Wait, they told me I was going to get X, and now I'm not.'

"So I think that's this new NIL world that we're living in. We're still trying to find our way through it."

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