Mike Tannenbaum's The 33rd Team Moves Into NCAA, NIL Consulting

The 33rd Team founder Mike Tannenbaum recently talked about his company's future in NCAA consulting.

Ryan Reynolds | Apr 6, 2025

Sep 25, 2011; Oakland, CA, USA; New York Jets general manager Mike Tannenbaum during the game against the Oakland Raiders at O.co Coliseum. / Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

Building an NCAA football program is radically different today than it was just a few years ago. A big reason for that is the business element brought from Name, Image and Likeness (NIL).

Resource management is suddenly a massive part of building a successful college football program.

Given this still new landscape, it would be nice if NCAA programs could seek out guidance from a company with a wealth of experience in asset management directly related to building football organizations.

That's where Mike Tannenbaum's company, The 33rd Team, comes in for college football programs.

Tannenbaum is a former NFL executive and current ESPN analyst with nearly three-decades of NFL experience. He was part of the New York Jets front office from 1997 to 2012, eventually serving as the team's general manager and senior vice president of football operations from 2006-12.

One could easily argue the Jets' best roster and most successful team since their Super Bowl win in 1969 came during Tannenbaum's watch.

In 2015 the Miami Dolphins hired him as their executive vice president of football operations, a post he held until 2018.

Tannenbaum founded The 33rd Team in 2019, creating a football think tank filled with former players, coaches, executives and a variety of insiders.

Today, The 33rd Team produces content from NFL insider Ari Meirov and the St. Brown Podcast, featuring Detroit Lions wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown and his brother Equanimeous.

The 33rd Team also offers consulting services to NFL franchises and NCAA football programs.

This offseason the Jets hired The 33rd Team to support their search for a new head coach and general manager. New York interviewed 15 potential general managers and 16 head coaching candidates.

The organization ultimately hired Denver Broncos assistant general manager Darren Mougey to lead the front office. Former Jets cornerback and recent Lions defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn was brought in as the team's new head coach.

Tannenbaum's list of NFL connections is massive, ranging from the legendary Bill Parcells to current Washington Commanders head coach Dan Quinn. Tannenbaum also knows Glenn, as the two first crossed paths back in 1997 while they were both part of the Jets' organization.

The knowledge base and connections The 33rd Team has could bring value to any football organization, but their experience in contract negotiations and resource management could give college football programs a major edge over their competitors.

The 33rd Team's NCAA advisory services include helping universities navigate regulations, revenue sharing and NIL.

Tannenbaum recently spoke to NIL Daily on Si about the impact of NIL on NCAA football programs.

"The teams that will have sustained success will be the ones that have the marriage of great coaching, great development and great resource allocation," Tannenbaum said.

The 33rd Team is currently providing general consulting for the Washington Huskies football program, led by head coach Jedd Fisch. It's just the first of athletic departments that Tannebaum believes the firm can be an asset to in this new age of college athletics.

"In the past schools would make scholarship offers and now they are making decisions that are contextual decisions that are based on scarcity," he said. "So the more you pay one player the less you are going to have for another, and the last 30 years of my career, we always made those decisions that way. So one of the things we can bring to the table is the guidance and the experience of talking through strategic planning, allocation and understanding that every decision, the context is so critical because it may feel great for a second getting player X signed as a sought after recruit, but it could hurt in another way. I think having that experience, in a constrained system, is helpful."

Given that the 33rd Team is a "Think Tank," it brings a wide range of experience to a space that is starting to look more and more like pro football.

"At one point we had over 1,000 years of experience of former coaches and GMs that have been with us in some capacity," Tannenbaum said. "We have a deep roster. Our company is really based on the knowledge and the depth of football, using data, studying trends, doing meaningful research where we can bring value to schools and universities who are now making different types of decisions than they've had to make in the past."

As revenue sharing and NIL continue to change the landscape of college sports, The 33rd Team can provide NCAA football programs with objective insights backed by a wealth of experience.

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