Duke Launches Another NIL Approach

Well this is interesting: Duke Athletics, in an attempt to keep up in the age of NIL, has launched the Blue Devil Exchange. This is a marketplace for NIL opportunities. Essentially it’s a data base that has the student information so that businesses can message them and so forth.

It also has stuff on Duke’s end that helps to keep track and organize payments and tax information.

It’s pretty smart and, given Duke’s huge profile in basketball, will only help. Because, invariably, some kids - well, anyone, really - is going to pay attention to the higher offer. If we've learned nothing from Kentucky basketball, we’ve learned that.

Kidding!

Sort of, anyway. The late Bret Bearup told us how the system worked at UK when he was there and named names, too.

But we digress.

Duke is smart to do this. The ACC should be working on this front as well. The conference is behind the other major conferences in revenue and while NIL does not go to the schools, obviously, it is nonetheless something you’d want to be good at.

Why?

Because if you draw the best talent, it will absolutely help the ACC’s revenue.

Yes, it’s asymmetric, but it makes sense. Take this hypothetical: if Duke football could promise recruits $500,000 more than, say, Kentucky, recruiting will improve. And better talent means better results.