2024-2025 NCAA Football Season Thread Football • Page 159

Like at that point you avoid Nico like the plague I feel. I really do not like this move from him

 

Tennessee is probably fine no matter what. Whatever team has been reaching out to him is probably fine no matter what. But if Nico is playing hardball I think he loses

 

yeah, he didn’t do enough last year to justify this. despite the playoff appearance, etc. the defense and Dylan Sampson got us there. but he’s also going to the nfl (on his timeline anyway) after this season. who is gonna offer him a one and done $4m contract? Ohio State? All the other rich usual suspects have their starter already.

 

TAMU maybe? Their starting options are kinda rough and they love spending money. I feel like that's a fringe competitive team that would benefit from a Nico in theory

 

I’ll root for anybody in orange and white on game day. And I think students should get their bag. But at some point you just have to side eye the adults in these kids’ lives giving them such bad advice. Make 2.5 million dollars, get Tennessee to another playoff, go to the NFL a local legend and get that payday surely is a more obvious career path and financially secure than all of this? Tennessee’s floor is probably 9-3 this year. Go flip one of those supposed losses and boom.

 

They were one of the 5-8 I had in mind who could afford him. I forget if Bama has a lights out starter yet. That would be… a choice. The last player that went Tennessee to Bama for a paycheck had the most hilarious reception home to Neyland (‘22).

 

Yeah Alabama was another thought. I also don't know who's gonna be starting for Oregon but I don't know their depth at all. Lots of the other competitive or semi-competitive high paying teams have a guy locked down that they're gonna rely on for sure over Nico

 

On the plus side, the backups must look pretty decent if he’s pushing for more money during spring practice. Or they look terrible and he knows, haha.

 

His brother just went to… Arkansas, I think? That would also be a choice considering they come here this year.

 

If Nico leaves Tennessee for Arkansas, Arkansas fans should sound all of the alarms IMO

 

I forgot they have Taylen Green again.

Our spring game is tomorrow. imagine that’ll clear things up

 

Update on all of this. Allegedly, looks like it was one of Nico’s family who started this whole thing. Guess someone called Dan Lanning at Oregon to see if they’d pay Nico more and Dan called Heupel because he thought it was slimy. Same family member also contacted Lincoln Reilly at USC, allegedly. Some of the justification was that Carson Beck got $4m from Miami, lol.

Goes back to what I was saying about kids getting bad advice from family earlier today.

 

Good on Lanning not being a slime ball and they gotta have more rules for this stuff.

 

Nico is done at Tennessee @Garrett

 

I’m proud of Tenn for saying nah, fuck this guy.

 

Yeah, glad they set a precedent for this stuff and put their foot down.

 

Fire Nico worked

 

Truly insane lose/lose for all involved

 

Hell yeah, Josh.

 

I can tell you Knoxville entirely went “okay, bye” and the University acknowledged that here. If the community had been in, he’d have gotten the bag.

There’s a SEC rule, I believe, he can’t go to an SEC school and play this year because it’s the Spring window… so I think we see him at USC. Saw a TikTok just now (how I found out lol) that FSU is probably on the table, too.

 

Idk, I think public sentiment should be way more in favor of Nico and away from UT than it currently is. I don’t think UT is specifically worse than any other institution nor do I particularly like the way Nico’s camp has handled this, but I can’t think of any other sport where a star player’s hold-in being met with getting immediately booted from the team would be met with something other than intense outrage at the team

 

In my lifetime, the sentiment of “if you don’t want to be here, then leave” has always been prevalent in Vols football culture. Peyton choosing to stay one more year probably laid that modern foundation. Lane Kiffin moving in the middle of the night. Jalen Hurd abruptly quitting in 2016. To’o To’o going directly to Alabama (the one unforgivable transfer for our fanbase; which is funny because Kamara did the opposite and is a legend now).

Knoxville is now a decent sized city, but it’s still very much a small town in mindset and culture.

 

He signed a contract that would pay him $8M. It’s already spring practice time. I just don’t like the arrogance, entitlement, and the me over team attitude of how this transpired. You have a contract that is more than fair. Deal with it. I think his family and inner circle gave him bad advice.

 

The way he/his people handled it was stupid for sure, but I’m pro-labor always. His Vols contract is amazing money but is not retirement money in a sport that destroys everyone that plays, so always go for as much as you can get, imo.

 

I love a good FAFO, and that’s exactly what happened here. Good riddance. Glad UT did the right thing here.