AIR made history earlier this week.
The first active high school football NIL deal to ever be done.
Maybe you saw an article covering it.
AIR has now signed several athletes to big-time contracts and hundreds to smaller ambassador programs.
While this is their first high school deal, it won’t be their last.
I get questions from business executives, agents, athletes and parents all the time about what we look for when signing an NIL deal.
I’m going to cover specifically what we looked for in this HS deal, but for a full overview I would recommend reading this as well:
We’ve Signed 350 Athletes to NIL Deal Here’s Exactly What We Look For
What AIR For in This HS NIL Deal
The team at AIR wanted to dip in to the high school space for an NIL deal.
Given the fact their app only offers football (at the moment) really slimmed down the selection process from the start.
Add in the fact that high school NIL deals are only permitted in a few states, further simplified the search.
AIR decided to look in New Jersey and California.
They preferred a player that met these categories:
- class of 2023
- several college offers
- solid social media following across all major platforms
- upside potential
Something else they examined was how easy would it be to work with the athlete, their family, and agent.
AIR actually ruled one prospect out because they heard his father was notoriously difficult to deal with.
Major lesson to be learned for all the parents, as NIL continues to move downstream in to high school.
It took their team roughly an hour to decide on Jaden Rashada, talk with his agent, negotiate a deal, and send over the contract.
Boom history made – Jaden Rashada NIL Deal = complete.
So What’s The Deal Look Like?
Jaden and his family were super easy to work with which made this whole process much smoother and less stressful.
His agent, Ethan Weinstein, is awesome as well.
For disclosure purposes, and respect of the family, I won’t publicly release the full contract but here are some key points behind the deal:
Jaden:
- 3 month contract w/ possibility of renewal
- Four-figure deal paid up front
- National articles through our PR team
AIR:
- 2 social media posts a month
- link in bio
- posts offers and commitment on The AIR App
It’s a very reasonable and productive deal for both sides.
Most negotiation books will tell you there’s no such thing as a win-win, but then I don’t know what you would call this.
Main Takeaways of Jaden Rashada NIL Deal
High school NIL deals are becoming very real.
Jaden Rashada was the:
- 5th HS athlete to sign a NIL deal
- 2nd HS athlete in California (behind Mikey Williams)
- 1st Active HS football player
It’s a shame that only a few states currently allow high school players to profit off of their name, image, and likeness. I expect more states to allow them in 2022.
Being reasonable and easy to work with will take you far – this applies to brands, athletes, parents, agents, etc.
A kid missed out on a nice payday and being the first ever HS football player to sign a NIL deal because of his dad. Don’t be that parent.
It’s awesome to be at the forefront of this exciting new industry where I get to help educate others on NIL and also sign athletes to deals.
