Do n’t set the bar for transparency too high.
As college athletes and other users log on for the first day using “NIL Assist,” the governing body’s fresh unified database of college performer support knowledge, which was five years in the making, the NCAA hopes that is at least the contextual text they will pay attention to.
The system, built and administered by Teamworks, was unveiled officially Thursday, just as the NCAA’s latest, more liberal NIL laws took effect.
NIL Assist features three pillars—a information platform, a set of swimmer education tools and a register of professional service providers. The information platform, which is officially available, shows the consolidated regular and middle values of NIL deals disclosed by athletes to their schools. It is accessible by activity, conference, position and deal type—but is no detailed enough to identify certain athletes.

As fresh NIL statements are released, the dashboard’s information will be updated in real time. Part institutions are required to send their athletes ‘ information to the NCAA’s regional office twice a year. The company register, which will only be available to qualified athletes, allows them to suggestions and review Yelp-like ratings for agents, marketing consultants, brand-management companies and different third-party businesses that they engage with.
Representatives from the NCAA and Teamworks repeatedly stated in an interview with reporters last week that the platform’s quality and its data will continue to improve as time goes on. After being named the project’s third-party administrator in April, Teamworks had less than four months to build out its “web-based solution”, incorporating input from coaches, athletic administrators and members of the NCAA’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.
” It is going to at least be able to add some sunshine to this chaotic environment”, said Dave Schnase, the NCAA’s vice president of academic and membership affairs. It wo n’t address the issues with college athletics ‘ policies.
Teamworks vice president Kevin Barefoot, the company’s point man for the project, similarly sought to keep both hopes and anxieties in check upon NIL Assist’s debut.
” This is n’t an enforcement mechanism for eligibility”, Barefoot said. It does not address all problems, and it is not intended to establish what the fair market is. …It is a small and solid step forward”.
It is also a different step, with a different foot, than what was once envisioned—and, for that matter, what could come to be if certain provisions of the House v. NCAA settlement agreement receive court approval.
Former association president Mark Emmert and the Division I board of governors commissioned a working group to examine name, image, and likeness in those ilk-filled years of 2019 when the NCAA operated as if it still had control over the future of college athlete compensation.
The governing body submitted a bid for the following year among the group’s top recommendations for the NCAA to host a central repository of NIL information. The NCAA requested a platform that “identifies activities that may not align with the values of the NCAA, conferences or institutions” in its original request for proposal.

The NCAA released a new RFP for a third-party administrator in early 2024, which no longer made any mention of the platform having an enforcement function. The project was abandoned for at least for two years. Schnase also brought the message that NIL Assist is not intended to be an “eligibility trap” during last week’s press conference.
College sports leaders had previously indicated an interest in the platform’s administrator if they had no financial ties to college sports.
Former NCAA official Oliver Luck and media executive Bill Squadron, both of whom are now assistant professors at Elon University, co-founded the nonprofit NIL Education and Information Center, which they marketed as a transparent clearinghouse for the registry without having any apparent commercial repercussions.
Big East commissioner Val Ackerman, who co-chaired the NIL working group, told Sportico in May 2021 that the platform “must be seen as distinct and apart from anyone who’s looking to make money in this space.”
That same month, one of the RFP bidders, INFLCR, announced in a press release that it was withdrawing its bid, thus “avoiding the ethical pitfalls that would present themselves”. INFLCR was later acquired by Teamworks.
When asked about conflict-of-interest concerns of now having Teamworks run the platform, Schnase acknowledged that” we talked about the independence of the third-party administrator, and that got pretty far down the path”.
However, he suggested that high-minded notions ultimately gave way to practical concerns.
” We needed to have something that was the best product—the best tech product, the best customer service skills and the best prices—and we found that Teamworks hit those three things”, Schnase said. ” I think it is important to recognize the independent nature of this, that was the original intent, but]in the end ] it was really about making sure we had the best product for student-athletes”.
Other than that their relationship was for a number of years, both the NCAA and Teamworks kept their financial details to themselves.
Teamworks will not profit from the trove of back-end athlete NIL data that it currently has access to, despite the restrictions of NIL Assist.
Barefoot spoke with Sportico this week about how Teamworks, INFLCR’s now-parent company, and INFLCR’s bid for the project differed three years later in a phone interview.
In large part, INFLCR recused itself because many ( competitors ) who were interested in winning the award were motivated to generate transactional income from athlete deals, according to Barefoot. ” We may be the only NIL tech company that does n’t charge transactional fees for NIL transactions,” says one analyst. For any transaction that flows through its marketplace, INFLCR takes zero transaction fees”.
Barefoot added that the recent RFP was different, and emphasized different needs, than the one put out in 2019, and therefore opened the door for a company like Teamworks, which boasts partnerships with over 230 college athletic departments. Learfield, Opendorse, and Student Athlete NIL ( SANIL ) were among the other businesses competing for the position.
The NCAA and the plaintiffs ‘ attorneys proposed a “robust and effective enforcement and oversight program” to vigorate NIL deals for illegal inducements in the House long-form settlement agreement, which was made public last week. A tech platform like NIL Assist would appear to be using this program.
Nevertheless, according to Barefoot,” there has been nearly zero discussion about enforcement” from the start of the project through now.
” All of our energy and discussion has been around something that provides transparency”, he said. That is a completely transparent response, the author states.