UCLA Guard Jaylen Clark Enters NIL, Cryptocurrency Landscape

The Bruins' bench player started his own cryptocurrency, $JROCK, with Rally on Thursday.

For the first time, a college athlete will have their own cryptocurrency.

UCLA men's basketball guard Jaylen Clark, in a partnership with cryptocurrency platform Rally, has started $JROCK. Clark announced the launch of his own personal coin on his YouTube channel Thursday morning.

Clark has been vlogging on his YouTube channel since before he even came to Westwood, and long before the NCAA opened the door to student-athletes profiting off their name, image and likeness rights on July 1. Now that he has an avenue to monetize his content and his fanbase, Clark has taken advantage.

According to Ben Bolch of the Los Angeles Times, people who purchase $JROCK – or Jay Coin – will earn exclusive merchandise and get a chance to star in one of his future YouTube videos. Bolch also reported that Clark will promote another exclusive giveaway on Instagram Live, rewarding the first 100 people to buy his new coin on Rally.

Clark has almost 23,000 YouTube subscribers and 59,000 Instagram followers.

“I love my fans and I’m looking forward to fostering a strong sense of community and providing exclusive access to what goes on behind the scenes in the life of a college basketball player," Clark told the LA Times. "Joining the creator economy opens up so many possibilities and allows me to bring my fans into the experience, which is something I’m very passionate about.”

Clark is represented by the newly-founded ACIB Management. One of Clark's agents, Ian Brown, said diving into the world of cryptocurrency was a way for Clark to gain a different kind of leverage in the new NIL landscape.

"We see crypto as an incredible vehicle for NIL because it really gives the power to the player in a way that other deals don't," Brown said to ESPN.

The platform Clark is working with, Rally, aims to provide content creators a platform to launch their own social tokens.

Rally vice president of partnerships Nick Millman told ESPN that the company's partnership with Clark could only be the beginning for cryptocurrency in college sports.

"The NCAA's policy change is allowing young, talented athletes to embrace the creator economy in ways which were previously not possible," Millman said in a statement provided to ESPN. "We are excited to have Jaylen at the forefront of this new economy and are looking forward to helping other athletes unlock new ways to share value with their fans."

$JROCK is currently selling at $0.640 per coin. It peaked at $0.858 per coin at 10 a.m. Thursday morning.

Clark played in 31 of UCLA's 32 games last year, averaging 2.5 points and 2.4 rebounds on 50% shooting from the field in 9.0 minutes of game action per night. In the Bruins' run to the 2021 Final Four, Clark put up similar scoring figures but stood out the most when he pulled down seven and nine rebounds in the Round of 32 and Sweet 16 despite standing at just 6-foot-5.

The Bruins open the 2021-2022 season as a consensus top-five team in the country, with Clark set to come off the bench.

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