Troy Aikman is a proud UCLA alum, but the legendary quarterback says his days of making name, image and likeness contributions to his alma mater are over.
Aikman discussed the NIL era during a wide-ranging interview with Richard Deitsch of The Athletic that was published on Tuesday. The three-time Super Bowl champion said college football has “become the Wild West” largely because of NIL. Like many others, Aikman would like to see athletes commit to a school for a certain amount of time if they receive money to go there.
Aikman also said he is “done with NIL” after he gave money to a player who went to UCLA for one year and then transferred.
“Where I’m at is I think there’s gotta be some leadership at the very top that kind of cleans all of this up. Starting with players that accept money, there’s gotta be some accountability and responsibility on their behalf to have to stick with a program,” Aikman said. “I gave money to a kid. I won’t mention who. I’ve done it one time at UCLA. Never met the young man. He was there a year, he left after the year. I wrote a sizable check, and he went to another school. I didn’t even get so much as a thank you note. It’s one of those deals to where I’m done with NIL. I mean, I wanna see UCLA be successful, but I’m done with it.”
The player probably viewed the situation differently from Aikman, but whatever happened was enough to make the Dallas Cowboys legend want nothing to do with NIL.
Aikman obviously is not the only one who feels that way. Arkansas head coach John Calipari has helped invent an insurance policy that protects entities that make NIL donations, but there are still plenty of issues that exist.
Aikman was a start quarterback at UCLA from 1986-1988. The Cowboys drafted him No. 1 overall in 1989.
