Ready for endorsement deals in high school sports? Southlake QB shows we’d better be

Quinn Ewers would surely love to go down in history as a great Ohio State quarterback and perhaps even an NFL legend.

But the Carroll High School Dragons football star, who recently announced that he would forego his senior season to enroll early in college, may become known instead for helping open the door to endorsement deals for high school athletes.

Ewers is considered the top football recruit in the U.S. Under new rules allowing college athletes to accept payment for endorsements and other activity — known as name/image/likeness rights, or NIL — he’ll draw lucrative contracts while at one of the country’s top college football programs.

State of Texas rules bar him from doing so as Carroll’s quarterback. Graduating early and heading north could mean hundreds of thousands of dollars or more; he’s already signed his first deal, with a Dallas-based beverage company.

College sports has shifted dramatically on the issue of payments for athletes, particularly since the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in June that the NCAA can’t bar them from making money, as it has for so long. Several states were already moving to give athletes the right to profit off their names and likenesses through endorsement deals, sponsored social media activity, signing autographs and the like.

Ewers’ move shows that policymakers, schools and parents need to carefully think through the trickle-down effect on high school sports. Should athletes at that level be able to cash in, too? How do we ensure minors’ rights are upheld and they get the best deals they can? Protecting youths who aren’t business-savvy should be a top priority.

At first glance, many will recoil. It’s just unseemly to imagine high school kids getting a check from the local car dealer in return for appearing in an ad. But in places like Southlake or Aledo or Katy, there’s no use pretending high school sports aren’t already big business.

It’s too early to say if courts might rule that high school athletes have similar rights to their college counterparts, but the issue will come to a head, said Sarah Brown, a clinical assistant professor of applied physiology in sports management at Southern Methodist University.

“The difference at the high school level is age,” she said, suggesting that some schools “may dip a toe in [and say] here are some programs they can be endorsed by.”

Brown, who’s also a lawyer, follows the issue closely as a researcher — and as a resident of Southlake. She pointed to a de facto experiment happening in the states. California was the first to give high school athletes the right to profit, stemming from its experience with children working in the film industry. (Kids can’t use their schools’ uniforms or logos in their endorsements.)

Texas is one of just three states to bar payments in state law, but the associations governing high school sports in most states prohibit payment to athletes.

Changing that could unleash a host of unintended consequences. Coaches fear that because a few elite players would be the ones getting paid, team cohesion would suffer. That would diminish one of the most valuable parts of athletics, learning to work well with others.

Deals would likely tip heavily toward boys in football, basketball and baseball, creating equity concerns for girls and individuals in less popular sports.

Then, there are business concerns that most of us can’t even imagine. Brown noted that in elite programs, biometric data is collected to gauge performance, and athletic apparel companies who sign athletes take extensive data to improve and hawk their products. Young people raised in the social media age rarely think of privacy concerns, so who will look out for them in signing contracts?

“If we’re worried about the vulnerability of college athletes, how do you protect those even younger?” Brown said. “We have to make sure they’re not taken advantage of.”

A more immediate concern will be the extent to which colleges will use NIL enticements in recruiting. They’re not supposed to be involved in deals, but the allure of large programs that can help students brand themselves could become a factor, Brown said.

If more elite athletes follow Ewers and leave top high school programs early to take advantage of college earning opportunities, pressure will mount to find a way to keep them around.

Before Texas is forced down that path, lawmakers and educators should carefully consider the consequences and be ready to do what’s right for young people, first.

This story was originally published August 10, 2021 at 1:06 PM.