It is November and it is time for another Aggie Town Hall. We're kindly joined by our AD, Ross Bjork, to answer your questions submitted by the 12th Man. As always, you can go to the official website of Texas A&M Athletics if you have a question for Ross.
Final home game coming up. Why does it fly by so fast?
I know. I mean, think about it. It feels like we were just here in August, getting ready for the season, kick off the season and talking about the opening game and opening weekend and how the schedule sets up and travel. And I mean, to say that we're 10 games into the season and you're approaching Thanksgiving and one home game left and another road game and talking about bowl scenarios and all those kind of things…it goes by way too fast. But that tells you that you are having fun, that it has been a great ride. I mean, things have different twists and turns throughout the year. We've certainly had that with our team this year. But you have a chance to finish strong and to say that, hey, you can win nine or 10 games this season…I think everyone would have signed up for that. And we know what the expectations are and it'll be fun to really celebrate our senior class and those guys that came back, had the extra year, have really laid the foundation for this program. I know a lot of Aggies will say thank you to those young men and their families.Â
This is a special group of young men and like I said, it lays the foundation. I mean, that's…look, we all want to win. We all want to win a championship immediately and those kind of things. But it takes a process. It takes young men believing in something bigger than maybe even what they signed up for. And then they lay those foundational elements because that sets the tone. Because the young guys look and say OK. When I'm in that position, I'm supposed to act that way. I'm supposed to perform at that level because that's what I saw when I was a freshman or when I was a sophomore. So it makes a huge difference having that type of leadership.
Are there any plans to improve the signage on the back of the Kyle Field video board? It would be great if there was a giant aTm or the Lone Star A&M logo that was lit up at night. We have done an awesome job with all the other lit-up logos around Kyle Field.
It's a great question. I wonder if he has a crane operating company, because in order to get up that high, you actually need a crane. So it's not just an easy solution. So yes, there are plans. It is one of those things that it really drives me crazy when I see that because it is so visible. I mean, when I pull out of my neighborhood, I can see it from my house. And I live about seven miles away. So it's very, very visible. It's a big attraction point, obviously, for the university, for our stadium. And so we're looking at what the options are for the back of the video board. The issues are, it has to be a breathable material because the scoreboard has to breathe. It can't be an enclosed apparatus. And so whatever is put on that side of the video board has to have a breathable type material, so you're limited by what you can put up. Right now, that's kind of, lack of a better term, a windscreen up there. Therefore, it collects and attracts dust. It's hard to clean because it is so high. Literally, you do have to get a crane. There's not just an apparatus where you can climb up on the stadium and kind of climb behind it and get some Windex out and a couple spray bottles, right? I mean, it is a complicated power-washing process. So we're looking at it. As we develop the whole south end of Kyle Field, as we look at indoor football and academic building, the Bright Complex, we're trying to figure out what kind of material? What's the right structure up there? It has to be breathable. Could you do something electronic? Could you do something that stays clean? So yes, it's something that we're reviewing. It may not happen quickly but over the next couple of years hopefully we can address that. But it is definitely on the list.
Now that NIL came into effect this season, businesses probably want to go after the household athletes in the big-name sports. One of the schools has seen a company sign all female student-athletes to an NIL deal with every female student-athlete earning up to $6,000. Can you see into the future NIL impacting Title IX?Â
Yeah, it's a fascinating question, honestly, because, he is on to something in terms of, one, the immediate. And then yeah, what does the future hold? Right now in our NIL agreements, we have around 85 to 90 athletes who have signed NIL agreements. Some have signed multiple agreements. And most of those are in football. And so the tricky part of this is, since the university cannot be involved…I cannot, my staff cannot, our staff…we cannot be involved in arranging NIL agreements. The market dictates it. The market dictates, do they want to go after a football athlete or a women's basketball athlete or a women's soccer player? The market dictates that. We cannot go to businesses and say, hey, we have this amazing women's basketball team. We want you to do an NIL. We can't do that. And so there is really no impact on Title IX, because Title IX is a federal law that says that you must provide the same amount of resources that we can control. So since the Texas law is written in such a way where we're not involved in arranging, securing, identifying NIL agreements for student-athletes, it doesn't impact Title IX. If we ever get into the situation where the athletic departments, the universities, can be involved in proactively pursuing NIL agreements, then I think you may have a Title IX balance where you've got to support your men just like you do your women and vice versa. So what we have to do from a Title IX perspective is to make sure that we're educating our female athletes just like we are the men student-athletes. That they have the same opportunities to build their brand through the media, through 12th Man Productions, through our…we have an unbelievable photography studio, a creative design department now that all of our teams are utilizing right now. So we have to make sure we're having those resources that are balanced and equal. But the market then dictates. The example he brought up, the $6,000 for every female student-athlete? I wish we could go out and secure those. We can't. The Texas law prohibits that. And so that's why we need a national standard. We need a federal approach to this, that everybody is on equal footing, if you will. And until that day comes, we just have to follow our state law and that's what we're doing. But it's a fascinating question. It's really, really smart for him to look at it that way. And we're going to make sure that we're always on the right side of the equation, whatever it is.Â
And it’s going to evolve.
NIL’s going to evolve. I saw something the other day. There's two different firms that are kind of the leaders in this space. The average agreement through a company called INFLCR, who we use, is about $1,300 per transaction. There's another company called Opendorse. The average is about $860 per transaction. I think people thought at the beginning we were going to see millions and millions of dollars pour in and the average deal could be $50,000 or $100,000. So I think we're seeing that, again, this is dictated on the market, and our athletes are taking advantage of it, which is great. But if we have 600 athletes and about 90 are utilizing it, there's 500 more that for whatever reason aren’t in an opportunity right now. So lots of evolvement that'll come to be around NIL.
Why are we still subject to national media pundits voicing their opinions on a weekly basis that LSU still has a chance to convince Coach Fisher to lead their football program?Â
Boy, where do we go? So I mean, I think in general, what can be done to stop the rumblings, if you will? And then sort of kind of what is a strategy, I think was part of the part of the other question.Â
One, the key is, I believe you have to go back to what we did in the summer. Back in August. We wanted to control the controllable back then, and we wanted to make sure that we locked Jimbo up. We knew that we would have six years left on his contract at the end of this season. And my point was if we locked him up for 10 years at the beginning, there's nothing that's changed, right? We've actually gotten better. We have more momentum. So why not take it back to a new 10-year period? And then the markets can always change the numbers, the salary, those kind of things. And so that's what we needed to do back then was control the controllable. So we did that back in August.Â
And then I think the same thing applies to what we're dealing with in this media cycle. Jimbo's controlling the controllable. He's addressed it twice. He's been very, very consistent about his messaging and his words. We continue to recruit at a really, really high level. And I loved his response yesterday. OK, why would I recruit like this to play against that particular talent? So to me, that was perfect. You can't respond to everything. You can't respond to every article that's out there. I mean, there was an article written today by a national writer talking about the coaching cycle and what's happening and gave no attention to what Jimbo said yesterday. It was like he didn't say anything, but was still LSU's top target. Until somebody else walks up to the podium, it's going to be that way.Â
And maybe that's the case. Maybe it's just going to be that way until somebody does walk up to that podium that's not Jimbo Fisher. And that's just the world we live in. But I know what we can do. We can be prepared. We can have Jimbo prepared. He was prepared on Monday. We knew this question was going to keep coming up. He was very direct. He controlled the message and he told the truth. That's the other thing about this. He's telling the truth. And that's what we have to go on. And so as far as different strategies and different tactics? I mean, I could sit here all day and we could blast on Twitter and we could do this. And every now and then I'll do something. I mean, I put something out there yesterday and I did respond to another national reporter and I just said, there's no semantics to this. This isn't about semantics. This is about here's the reality. And so I think we just have to stick to that. And the key is, let's finish strong. Let's win these last two games. Let's win the bowl game. Let's sign a top class. Let's continue to invest in our facilities that we're getting ready to do. And Jimbo and the program will speak for all of us as things continue to grow and build.
