Nijel Pack, now former Kansas State guard, has taken his talents to South Beach. Pack averaged 17.4 points per game and was a cornerstone on up and down K-State squads. He is now a Miami Hurricane, as an Elite 8 team this year nabs him. The main catalysts for this transfer? (Allegedly) NIL deals that enticed Pack and how Miami played in this past year's tournament. A case of a player choosing a school for... rather interesting reasons. Reasons that signify the culture change college sports is going through. The player-driven culture.
Players now more than ever are transferring, for good or for very self-absorbed, money driven reasons. Kansas State was on the upswing, an upswing he in part caused. Jerome Tang will excel there, he already has in recruiting. Why transfer to a program that, while may have been a fluke good team, was just that? A fluke team. Miami is losing multiple starters due to graduation and eligibility being maxed out. They were a 10 seed for a reason last year, inconsistency, and they caught fire during the tournament. It happens more than you think. Don't get me wrong, Jim Larrañaga is a great coach. Again though, I think the rebuild is much farther away with Miami than Kansas State, so why transfer? It presents a glaring flaw in my opinion, in a player driven culture and NIL driven transfer portal. One where players can break these commitments for selfish reasons based on NILs and market, rather than program prestige and potential. A reason many coaches are leaving, and why we're seeing a further commercialization of college sports. Money has always been the driving force in college sports, and now more than ever it controls what happens. The NIL giveth, and the NIL taketh away. Is "amateurism" dead yet, NCAA?
Burn Notice: 9/10, like Rome, the NCAA is burning. Nero, in this case, is the NIL.
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