On July 1, 2021, the NCAA determined that all athletes could benefit financially from their name, image and likeness. NIL, along with the NCAA relaxing its rules on student-athletes transferring from school to school, turned college athletics into what many observers have called the “wild, wild west.”
The rapid changes have been hard to follow and understand, but Department of Sport Management Professors Dave Meluni and Rick Burton are here to help with the new NIL Clubhouse Podcast. In their inaugural episode, Meluni and Burton examine today’s NIL landscape, discuss current legislation changing the business of intercollegiate athletics, and look ahead to what is on the horizon for the industry.
Listen to the NIL Clubhouse Podcast Episode 1 on Spotify.
Meluni, an associate teaching professor, has more than 20 years of experience in college athletics, first as a baseball player at Ithaca College and then by working in ticketing, marketing, sponsorship and digital roles at Ithaca, Cornell, Florida State and Syracuse. In fall 2021, less than two months after the NCAA’s NIL ruling, Meluni launched the first undergraduate NIL course in the country.
Burton, the David B. Falk Endowed Professor of Sport Management, teaches “Baseball in American Culture” in Syracuse’s Renee Crown Honors Program and has frequently served as a visiting professor at Kufstein Tirol University in Austria and the International Olympic Academy in Olympia, Greece. The author of “20 Secrets to Success for NCAA Student-Athletes” and several other books, Burton previously served as chief marketing officer for the U.S. Olympic Committee at the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics and as commissioner of Australia’s National Basketball League in Sydney, where he was responsible for every aspect of the NBL’s development and growth.