{"id":101046,"date":"2025-08-22T04:56:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-22T04:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/101046\/"},"modified":"2025-08-22T04:56:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-22T04:56:10","slug":"arkansas-sure-could-have-used-john-caliparis-proposal-vs-lane-kiffin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/101046\/","title":{"rendered":"Arkansas Sure Could Have Used John Calipari\u2019s Proposal vs Lane Kiffin"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"John<\/a>Photo Credit: Craven Whitlow \/ Mississippi Athletics<\/p>\n

College basketball has been a rich man\u2019s game for decades now, but the era of unfettered NIL money has taken that to the next level.<\/p>\n

Courtesy of the power of Tyson chicken nuggets, Arkansas basketball is fortunate enough to be part of the exclusive club of 8-10 programs with NIL budgets close to or exceeding $10 million for this upcoming season. According to 247Sports<\/a> in July, members of this \u201cgolden tier\u201d include blue bloods like Kentucky, Duke and North Carolina as well as cash-happy upstarts like Texas Tech and BYU.<\/p>\n

With the onset of revenue sharing this summer, schools are now allowed to directly distribute up to $20.5 million to players across all sports. Third-parties and NIL collectives can supplement those payments, but any package over $600 must serve a \u201cvalid business purpose\u201d<\/a> and pass through the clearinghouse run by the College Sports Commission.<\/p>\n

The Razorbacks used their expansive war chest to return the quartet of DJ Wagner, Karter Knox, Trevon Brazile and Billy Richmond III from last year\u2019s roster. Arkansas basketball coach John Calipari also added five-star freshmen Darius Acuff Jr. and Meleek Thomas into the fold alongside experienced transfer big men Nick Pringle and Malique Ewin.<\/p>\n

Earlier in the summer, Calipari advocated for some major reforms<\/a> to the transfer portal, most notably allowing players to transfer only once without penalty. After that, barring an exception like a coaching change, players would have to sit out a year.<\/p>\n

This week, the Head Hog took things a step further.<\/p>\n

John Calipari\u2019s Latest NIL Reform Idea<\/p>\n

As opposed to \u201ctraditional\u201d NIL deals, which usually entail doing promotions for businesses, collectives are third-party conglomerates which essentially provide pay-for-play packages for student-athletes. The House settlement nearly killed off these big-money organizations, but after a litany of legal challenges<\/a>, they seem to be here to stay \u2013 albeit within the guardrails of the CSC.<\/p>\n

Coach Cal wants further restrictions, specifically on the types of players who could receive funding from these collectives.<\/p>\n

He wants collectives to \u201conly be involved with retention of your players,\u201d Calipari said on the Nothing Personal podcast hosted by David Samson<\/a>, a former MLB front office executive. \u201cThey cannot be involved in recruiting freshmen, they can\u2019t be involved in recruiting transfers. They can\u2019t give those guys deals when they\u2019re coming in.\u201d<\/p>\n

New recruits and transfers would still get paid through revenue sharing and \u201creal\u201d NIL deals with businesses. The main goal of this measure would be to reduce the rampant tampering problem in college athletics. Texas Tech is in the golden tier for hoops bankrolling, but the Red Raiders have said the quiet part out loud on the football recruiting trail, as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to poach some guys,\u201d TTU general manager James Blanchard said<\/a> shortly after landing five-star offensive tackle Felix Ojo<\/a> and Arkansas legacy recruit Chase Campbell<\/a>. \u201cIf people are only paying them $100,000-$200,000, I\u2019m going to give him $300,000-$400,000 and go steal somebody.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Calipari\u2019s ideal world, TTU\u2019s loaded Matador Club collective would not be able to fund those poaching expeditions. The matador money could have been used for the reported $4 million deal<\/a> for star forward JT Toppin\u2019s return, but not for the football team\u2019s second-ranked<\/a> transfer portal class \u2013 or for softball pitcher Nijaree Canady, who was brought in from Stanford last year on a reported $1 million deal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

To be clear, Texas Tech is far from the only school being aggressive financially \u2013 if anything, you have to applaud their honesty. Don\u2019t hate the player\u2026<\/p>\n

The proposed system would essentially incentivize teams to focus on keeping their best talents, and give them a better ability to do so by having a dedicated fund for that purpose. In conjunction with Calipari\u2019s call for one-time transfers, these reforms would theoretically cut down on the massive flood of thousands of players into the portal each year.<\/p>\n

If schools want to go out and poach talent from other programs, go for it \u2013 but it will come out of their all-sport \u201csalary cap\u201d or \u201creal\u201d NIL deals rather than the comparatively shadowy collectives.<\/p>\n

Calipari is obviously focused on basketball in proposing these ideas, but their implementation would also have a major impact on the Arkansas football program.<\/p>\n

Coach Cal Throws Sam Pittman a Lob<\/p>\n

On paper, the move would be a massive boon for the Razorbacks. Given the Hogs\u2019 current financial struggles in the football department<\/a>, it may actually be a lifeline.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s no secret Arkansas football coach Sam Pittman has struggled to retain key players in recent seasons. Most notably this offseason, the trio of Jaylon Braxton, Luke Hasz and Patrick Kutas all transferred to Mississippi. Linebacker Chris \u201cPooh\u201d Paul Jr. did the same last year.<\/p>\n

These moves can\u2019t be labeled purely as tampering, as Lane Kiffin\u2019s program has seen much more success than Arkansas in recent years. It\u2019s understandable for these players to seek out a winning team after the Hogs won just 10 games across the last two seasons. But the timing and common destinations certainly raise some eyebrows.<\/p>\n

Calipari\u2019s change would give the Hogs a much higher chance to retain top talent on the gridiron and away from Kiffin. Given the difficulty of wresting blue-chip recruits from their home states, retention is likely the program\u2019s best route to building a winning roster. This year\u2019s squad, in particular, is headlined by former transfers in their second year with the program, namely Taylen Green, Fernando Carmona, Xavian Sorey Jr. and Larry Worth III. Unicorn fifth-year returnee Cam Ball also anchors the defensive line.<\/p>\n

Restricting collective money to retention could have increased the odds of players like Braxton or Kutas staying put.<\/p>\n

Calipari\u2019s reforms would add some sanity to the insane world of NIL, with the side effect of helping out the Hogs on both the hardwood and the gridiron.<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

\"YouTube<\/p>\n

\"YouTube<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo Credit: Craven Whitlow \/ Mississippi Athletics College basketball has been a rich man\u2019s game for decades now,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101047,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[402,1089,398,400,401,7939,7151,99,20471,1092],"class_list":["post-101046","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-basketball","tag-basketball","tag-john-calipari","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-basketball","tag-ncaabasketball","tag-revenue-sharing","tag-sam-pittman","tag-sports","tag-texas-tech","tag-transfer-portal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101046","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101046"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101046\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101046"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101046"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101046"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}