{"id":255724,"date":"2026-04-18T13:12:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-18T13:12:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/255724\/"},"modified":"2026-04-18T13:12:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T13:12:15","slug":"texas-coach-steve-sarkisian-reveals-how-lamborghini-partnership-began","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/255724\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas coach Steve Sarkisian reveals how Lamborghini partnership began"},"content":{"rendered":"

Texas football makes headlines every year for its parade of Lamborghinis<\/a> during the prime official visit weekend for top recruits.<\/p>\n

The sheer flashiness of the expensive cars as a tool to entice high school football recruits while on a college campus is still polarizing to fans getting used to an era where college athletes can profit off of their Name, Image and Likeness.<\/p>\n

But University of Texas football head coach Steve\u00a0Sarkisian revealed in a Friday interview with\u00a0Marshawn Lynch and Mike Robinson on Da Get Got Podcast that the partnership wasn’t coordinated by the University, as many believe.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sarkisian starts the conversation by distinguishing the two types of NIL that existed in 2021. There was “pay for play” NIL, where university donors formed collectives that could pay players in exchange for public appearances and community service. The other way, however, was “true NIL,” where the player had a brand and could sign endorsement deals independently with companies. Bijan Robinson<\/a>‘s deal with\u00a0Lamborghini was the latter, and it happened by chance.<\/p>\n

“He met the Lamborghini people from Austin at a car race in town and Bijan was being Bijan…He might be the nicest human being on the planet,” Sarkisian said on the podcast. “He was playing with their kids and next thing you know: they worked a deal.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the partnership didn’t end there. Since then, the car dealer has partnered with former players Jordan Whittington, Jake Majors, Jaylan Ford, Michael Taaffe and Isaiah Bond. In 2025, CJ Baxter<\/a> and Connor Robertson received summer internships through the partnership.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sarkisian brought up the\u00a0Lamborghini partnership as part of a broader conversation about Texas’ urban campus. That carries a recruiting advantage, because the city offers opportunities after football.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The criticism of exorbitant NIL deals <\/a>has often been regarding what providing big-time money to college kids does to them and how a fleeting paycheck might get used up if not translated into long-term well-being. Sarkisian’s recruiting pitch seems to work to help players see the world beyond.<\/p>\n

To Sarkisian, these independent, “true NIL” partnerships also allow players to network for careers they might pursue after college.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I got guys doing internships with Tesla or now Google or Apple or oil and gas,” Sarkisian said. “This money is short-term, but I’m trying to help our players see long-term, right? Because they aren’t all going to play as long as you two (Marshawn Lynch and Mike Robinson) did in the league…the reality of it is, even if they make it, they’re going to be gone within three years. Then what are they going to do? Making these connections with the people here is huge.”\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Texas football makes headlines every year for its parade of Lamborghinis during the prime official visit weekend for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":255725,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[16469,1704,85744,27,29,28],"class_list":{"0":"post-255724","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas","8":"tag-chronsports","9":"tag-chronstaff","10":"tag-chrontexas","11":"tag-texas","12":"tag-texas-headlines","13":"tag-texas-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255724"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255724\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}