The title of this story is not about the score of a soccer match, nor does it mean "naught" or "having no value or existence." Rather it refers to Name, Image, Likeness, the right of college athletes in the United States, especially in revenue-producing sports, to profit from use of their name, image, or likeness for commercial purpose.
The NIL policy first came into effect on July 1, 2021, and since then has become big business. While most athletes don't profit significantly from it big name athletes, or starters in football or basketball at big time schools, can rake in mega bucks. According to some accounts Caitlin Clark -- considered by many to be the best female college basketball player of her generation -- made more than three million dollars in NIL money her senior year in college, and Shedeur Sanders, a star college quarterback, made almost five million dollars in NIL money his senior year.
College athletes typically earn their NIL money with guarantees from booster clubs who have associations with businesses, or directly from corporations, by doing public appearances; print, social media, or television commercials; or by putting their name on sponsored products.
Since I was born late in 2002 I was 18 years old when NIL came into existence; while I was an athlete I never expected to profit from it, at least not to any significant degree; but as it says in Ecclesiastes, chapter 9, verse 11 "time and chance happen to all men."
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At 18 years old my only recollections of my early childhood years are confusing, troubling, and mysteriously painful. Maybe lots of 18-22 year olds don't have good recollections of when they were earlier than five years old, but in my case it wasn't just that I didn't have recollections; it was as if there was something there but some evil force was keeping me from remembering.
To say that my parents were not particularly warm and friendly people would be the understatement of the decade. They did nothing to help me when I asked about my early childhood -- in fact they downright discouraged inquires.
My father Norm Stevens is a stern man who is really smart and well off financially, and had been an athlete in his youth. He was supposedly the same age as my mother, Becky Stevens, who I was told had me when she was twenty one years old, but most people assumed -- from their appearance -- that she was much younger.
While my mother is not very intelligent -- she couldn't help me with my homework even when I was in fourth grade -- she really did have something going for her. According to my friends, and any male that I had talked to about her, she was the best looking woman ever. While my father isn't bad looking if he is an 8 on a ten point scale she is a solid 10. She has the face of Helen of Troy, a tall sleek athletic body (except for her prominent mammary glands), and lustrous brunette hair with natural (I presume) streaks of crimson.
Given that I am an only child and my parents could easily afford child care you would think that Becky would also work outside the home. She did not. Her life revolved around social activities, working out at the gym (six days a week, 90 minutes a day), playing tennis and golf, and doing some high profile, but not taxing, charity work.
Given their lack of warmth and empathy I guess it should have been no surprise to me when at age 11 my parents sent me off to a boarding school more than 300 miles away from the metropolitan area that my parents lived in. When I complained to my father in one of the few times that he wasn't completely stern with me he said "We're doing you a favor, Jubal Stevens, by sending you where you can become your own independent, self-sufficient, man. Plus you're too advanced for the area schools you've been going to -- your boarding school has much more challenging courses that will prepare you for college so that you can get into any university that you want to."
I didn't like it, but I had to admit that I was bored by my local school; it seemed that I had both my father's looks and intelligence, but I sure hoped that as an adult I wouldn't have his severe personality.
After a painful adjustment my first year at boarding school (all names are either omitted from this tale or falsified to protect the guilty) when I got into numerous fights with older boys, once it became known that I wasn't someone to fuck with I came to like boarding school more than living with my parents. It was challenging academically and I found that I had some natural athletic ability, and the personality and dedication to get the most out of my inherent talent. Also important to me were the empathy that the teachers and administrators exhibited.
There's no reason to belabor my early years except to say that by the time that I graduated High School, with more than 20 college credits already achieved, I was a decent baseball player and a good quarterback. In fact I was a good enough quarterback to receive Division I scholarship offers to several good academic universities, although no offers from perennial football powerhouses like the local state university (which I'll call "State U" for convenience) in the metropolitan area that my parents lived in.
While my parents only expressed lukewarm appreciation of my athletic success they were pleased -- mostly because it reflected favorably on them -- that I got an athletic scholarship to a top twenty academic university that also had a passable football program.
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As only the third string quarterback on my college football team I didn't have a high enough profile to get any NIL money, but I did make some money in college by creating and selling a business computer program. Also, I actually did take challenging courses and truly learned, something that not all of my teammates did. Then the "time and chance" that happens to all men occurred.
Our team was good enough to qualify for a bowl game, with six wins going into the last game of the season -- a rivalry game with the university we historically were the most competitive with. If we got a seventh win we would get into a much better bowl game, although that would be tough since our opponent was 9-2 while we were 6-5 with a comparable schedule.
The week of our rivalry game the second string quarterback was suspended from school for violations of the honor code; that meant that I was now the backup to our starter and I got more reps during practice than any week previously. Before the first quarter of our rivalry game was over, and we were trailing 14-3, our first string quarterback got injured. Fortunately for him it wasn't something that would be life altering but it would keep him out of that game and our bowl game.
As part of the "time and chance" that happen to all men during that game I was close to being in what athletes call "the zone" where their performance peaks. I played above my expected ability, the rest of the team rallied around me since I had as good a relationship with my teammates as anyone on the team had, and we ended up winning 24-21 when in the last minute our star running back took a swing pass from me, ran over two defenders, and dove into the end zone.
Something else happened during the game; it was the first game that my parents had attended during my college years, and they were seated in a prominent location. Anyone who has ever watched a college football game on television knows that the male producers and cameramen like to focus on pretty females when doing crowd or sideline shots. Since my mother is a fox, wore more revealing clothes than normal for mothers attending their sons' games (it was an indoor stadium so weather wasn't a factor), she was told by her friends that she was shown on TV at least a dozen times, usually after I made a good play (I was surprised that she would even know when I made a good play because she knew nothing about football -- although my father had played at a Division III school so she probably just followed his lead).
Apparently Becky's friends had called her during the game about her celebrity because I was told later that she became more demonstrative as the game went on, garnering her even more appearances, and after the game she gave me the most sincere and warm hug that I could ever remember receiving from her in my life, with a smile as wide as the Mississippi river on her face.
I should mention here as an aside that like life in general, fan appearances on TV during football games are not fair. If a star player's mother is homely and weighs 300 pounds she'll get on camera once -- maybe twice. If she's hotter than all of the cheerleaders -- like Becky is -- the camera will pan to her a dozen times, just like in our rivalry game.
Since I had played well (I wasn't actually in "the zone," although 80% there) in the rivalry game and would definitely be starting in the bowl game my parents suddenly became interested in football and made arrangements to get premier seats at my team's bowl game, which also was in a domed stadium, and gave me more positive feedback than I had ever received before in my life.
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I was at my athletic peak in the bowl game; I was in "the zone" and played way beyond my ability. Despite the fact that we played a school that was normally a football powerhouse -- although for them they had had a "bad season" by finishing "only" 9-3 -- and we were an eleven point underdog, we won by the same score as in our rivalry game -- 24-21 -- when I threw a touchdown pass to our tight end with eighteen seconds to go.
This time my mom had DVRed the game so that she could replay her appearances on TV -- fourteen times she told me a few days later after she had reviewed the DVRed version. She didn't leave much to chance by her outfit -- a much too tight and sleeveless version of my jersey that really highlighted her prominent mammaries, shorts, and her lustrous hair loose and hanging down to her shoulders and flipping every time that she cheered.
Becky was the most effervescent that I'd ever seen her after the game and on the field hugged me and kissed my cheeks more times than all of the rest of my life combined. Even my father was as close to cheerful as he was capable of being, with no trace of his typical severe personality.
My mother's bowl game appearance in the crowd -- and when she hugged me on the field afterward -- gave her significant social media attention, including -- apparently -- from other coaches and players.
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Once the entire football season was over and I was studying on a Thursday afternoon for an upcoming "Statistics 301" test my mother excitedly called me. "Jubal, you'll never believe it but Coach Williams called and wants you to transfer and has guaranteed NIL money for you."
His real name isn't Williams, but again I'm using aliases to protect the guilty; but he is the young (third youngest in all of Division I football in the country) head coach of the football powerhouse State U in my parents' metropolitan area. At first I was confused. "Why did he call you instead of me?" I asked, perplexed.
"He wants me to sell you on the idea. I know that the local university doesn't have the academic reputation of your present one, but it does have an excellent business graduate school and he assured me that you could take graduate business courses and get an MBA in the same amount of time that you could get a BS or BA degree at your present university," Becky enthusiastically replied.
