Short version: The money in your deal is meant for you. The reporting shows others who plan to be paid around your signature: helpers who take a cut, people who charge up front, a coach paid by his own player, and one scheme that ended in federal convictions.
Your name goes on the contract. The pay is supposed to go to you. But the reporting from the last few years shows a lot of people standing near the signature with a plan to be paid too.
Here is who they are, as the record names them, from the smallest ask to the one that went to a federal jury.
The helper who takes a cut
ESPN asked 1,000 college athletes about high school deals. 18 percent said someone had helped them with deals in high school. About two in three of those agreed to give that person a share.
The median share was about 20 percent. In ESPN's lead case, a Texas player committed to a school on about $36,000 a year. The man who had helped him then texted him asking for 25 percent.
That post has the full numbers, and what certified agents are allowed to take: What does a street agent take?
The fee up front
Some people want to be paid before there is any deal at all. ESPN reported people "charging parents an upfront fee." Others "negotiate a percentage of any NIL or college offers."
The Austin American-Statesman told it from a Texas kitchen table this month. A quarterback's mother said her phone started ringing in his sophomore year. The callers offered exposure and marketing help. They "just needed some money up front."
Another pitch she heard was a percentage instead: "We'll charge you 5%, help with recruiting, marketing and all these things."
The person who says they know the coach
ESPN described street agents as people who "say they have a connection to NIL collectives, recruiters or sponsors." What they sell is access, or the promise of it.
Tim Prukop, a co-founder of the sports marketing firm Eccker Sports Group, gave the Statesman an example of the pitch. Pay $10,000, and the seller will get you in front of a famous college head coach.
The Statesman also reported something longer. Some athletes sign agreements "in perpetuity," which means forever. They give the so-called agent a percentage of their earnings with no end date.
The coach who was also the agent
Sometimes the person in the middle is already in the building. In Palm Beach County, Florida, the school district's inspector general looked at a high school head football coach.
The investigation found he had worked as an unlicensed agent and had a client relationship with one of his own players. The player sent him $7,000 in bank transfers.
Asked about it by the principal, the coach said being an agent was "something I do outside of school." The Florida High School Athletic Association opened its own investigation, FootballScoop reported, citing the Palm Beach Post.
The signature is yours. In each case, someone else had already planned their cut.
The case that went to a federal jury
The biggest version of the paid middle was tried in New York in 2018. Three men were convicted of wire fraud, a crime of using calls, texts or wires in a scheme to cheat someone.
They were James Gatto, an Adidas marketing director; Merl Code, a former Adidas consultant; and Christian Dawkins, a former runner for an NBA agent. A runner finds young players and brings them to an agent.
Prosecutors said the men paid Adidas money to recruits' families so the players would sign with Adidas-sponsored schools. Once the players turned pro, prosecutors said, they were to sign with Adidas and with certain financial planners and agents.
One payment in the case was $100,000 to a recruit's father, to get his son to sign with Louisville in 2017. Other payments in the reporting were tied to Kansas and NC State.
The case treated the schools as the ones cheated. ABC11 reported the men "deceived universities into issuing scholarships under false pretenses."
A judge sentenced Gatto to nine months in prison and Code and Dawkins to six months each. In January 2021, a federal appeals court upheld the convictions.
What the contract shows, and what it doesn't
A written deal says who gets paid: the fee, the percentage, what it's a percentage of and for how long. A "marketing agreement" with someone in the middle is a contract too.
What the reporting shows is that much of this is never written into your deal at all. The up-front fee, the promised meeting, the cut asked for by text. Those happen around the contract.
Below the pros, the rules are thin. The NCAA told ESPN it has "limited ability to regulate agents." In Texas, the Statesman reported, an athlete under 17 can't sign an agreement with an agent at all.
What Leave does with this
Upload any agreement, including a marketing agreement, and Leave reads it back in plain words. Who gets paid, how much, what the percentage comes off and when it ends.
Leave takes 0 percent of anything you sign. If someone has told you they need to be paid before you can sign, the cases above are what the record shows. You decide what to sign.
Questions people ask
What is a runner?
A person who finds young players and brings them to an agent or a company. In the 2018 federal case, one of the three men convicted was a former runner for an NBA agent.
Can a high school coach also be a player's agent?
The rules depend on your state and your school. In Palm Beach County, Florida, a school district investigation found a head coach had worked as an unlicensed agent for his own player and taken $7,000 from him.
What happened to the men in the 2018 Adidas case?
A federal jury convicted all three of wire fraud and conspiracy in October 2018. A judge gave one nine months in prison and the other two six months each. An appeals court upheld the convictions in January 2021.
Be your own agent. Leave.