Clemson’s Athlete-Pay Plan Spotlights Jalen Hurts’ Agency Reps

A boutique South Carolina sports agency looks to be a big winner in Clemson athletics’ new fundraising plans in the wake of the NCAA‘s House settlement.

Clemson’s concept of a “front office,” announced Tuesday, will manage NIL contracts while also creating an in-house agency with Everett Sports Marketing (ESM) to help athletes navigate NIL offers and connect them with businesses.

ESM, based in Greensville, S.C., represents numerous NFL players, including Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts. ESM has also established itself in NIL, making deals for prep and college athletes such as Georgia QB Carson Beck, high school tennis phenom Anna Frey and college basketball players Haley and Hanna Cavinder.

ESM’s new role was part of a broader fundraising and marketing strategy outlined in a letter published for fans on Tuesday by Clemson athletic director Graham Neff. The AD revealed the university’s plans for the full approval of the House settlement, which would bring a new wave of athlete compensation to college sports starting next summer. The school plans to merge the 110 Society NIL collective with its longtime IPTAY (“I pay ten a year”) fundraising arm for Clemson athletics in an effort to bolster NIL funding for the school’s 600-plus athletes.

The school will expand scholarship offers and share the proposed $20.5 million House agreement maximum with athletes. Much of Clemson’s plan will depend on whether the House settlement gains final approval and withstands potential legal challenges.

ESM’s role with the school marks an expansion of the agency’s mission. “Our foundation is in NFL representation,” ESM co-founder Dan Everett said in a phone interview. “As NIL presented itself a number of years back, we kind of took the bull by the horns and thought, ‘Well, how else could we approach representation, not just as individuals, but as brands and universities and those with interest in sports?’”

In representing schools, Everett said, the agency goes from a convention-based model to retainer-based model, with the aim of sharing its expertise on procuring deals, managing logos and marks and talent representation. “The university has talent, it has property, it has live (events),” he said, “and being able to merge all those in a way to drive monetary value for the university itself is really at the forefront of how we’ve approached going to market with this new vertical business.”

Everett likens ESM’s approach with colleges to what McKinsey and Bain provide for their industry and governmental clients. The agency is launching with Clemson after a previous marketing venture with the University of South Carolina was deemed impermissible by the NCAA in late 2022. The subsidiary, Park Avenue, procured over 100 partnerships within three months, and switched to pull in outside funding after the NCAA ruling.

The new in-house agency will work in concert with Clemson Ventures, the entity created by the university that houses all revenue generation from its athletics. In the letter, Neff stated that “this partnership, along with the previously announced Clemson Ventures, will empower our student-athletes to maximize their NIL potential,” adding that the House settlement’s call for “legitimate ‘fair market value’ deals” makes the arrangement necessary.

The front office model of pro sports is being replicated across college sports, with some schools creating general manager positions and other jobs primarily focused on drawing revenue as opposed to administration or team support. Like some pro teams, Clemson has one ace up its sleeve that ESM intends to take full advantage when it comes to deals with interested NIL partners.

“What’s really unique for Clemson is, for the most part, they own their MMR (multimedia rights), which is extremely advantageous,” Everett said. “That kind of greases the wheels on deal procurement and execution, because you have the ability to support and represent the talent at a very high level, and you have the assets in house, and there’s no third party inside of that.”

Everett believes ESM, as a boutique agency, can build more intimate relationships with the clients, whether the individual athletes, brands or the schools it now represents. Its size means the agency can be more judicious about the kinds of schools it chooses to add to the portfolio.

“We’re looking for extremely large brands that have a lot of complexity to them, which also creates a lot of opportunity,” Everett said. “Some of the biggest brands in sports are in college football. And a lot of these brands that sometimes lay dormant for a few years, those are the ones that I think we have the most ability to pour some fire on, to bring some of that energy back into the marketplace with.”