Sept. 11-17
We spent the week communicating with hundreds of test-takers, both the ones that passed and the ones that didn’t fare as well. We even solicited them for a brief survey, but more on that later. Here are a few observations about the new agent class.
They will not be as numerous as we expected: We reached out to hundreds of test-takers this week, and found out that only about 60 percent of those that used our test prep materials passed the exam. That’s down about 10-15 points from our normal rate, which probably indicates that numbers will be down across the board. The totals haven’t been released yet by the NFLPA, but we’re expecting a passage rate of around 35 percent, about 10 points off the usual rate. If true, and only about a third of the 454 test-takers actually passed, we’re expecting only about 150 new agents to be added to the rolls next month. As of today, there are 753 active contract advisors, so the number who’ll work with the ’22 draft class should come in a little under 900 agents, far short of the 1,000 we expected.
They took a harder test than normal: Many in the ’21 class registered more than a year ago, then had to sit through 2020 before finally taking the exam this summer. Despite studying for a year-and-a-half, we expect total passages to be down significantly. “That exam was hard as hell and they definitely mean for us to fail it,” texted one who passed, but who saw more than half of the prospective agents he studied with fail. We spoke to two established, long-time NFL agents who said they’d worry about failing the exam based on what they heard of it. “I’ve never failed anything in my life and . . . it doesn’t feel that great,” said one disappointed person who’ll try again next year. The NFLPA ramped up the intensity for the 2015 exam, dropping the passage rate from around 60-70 percent annually to below 50 percent. The union seems to have pumped up the jam once again this summer.
They are all in for the name, image and likeness (NIL) era: As we noted in this week’s blog, the new agent class is very aware of how NIL has changed things, and the excitement for it is unmistakable. In our survey, half of respondents said “it’s definitely going to be impactful in the area of football representation,” and 45.8 percent say they “see NIL as a real opportunity and a potential advantage.” The best news of all is that even those who didn’t pass can begin getting some of the harder lessons of recruiting and signing players out of the way this year.
For everyone who was part of the ’21 class, passed or not, we’re here. New agents will begin receiving the ITL Rising Contract Advisor Newsletter as soon as the new class is announced sometime next month. Once again, it will appear in in-boxes Monday through Friday for all members of the ’21 class for several weeks before we restrict it to members only. It will run all the way through the ’22 draft at no extra cost to ITL subscribers. For those who didn’t pass, we’ll have monthly Zoom sessions in which an active NFLPA-certified agent covers the toughest topics and dives deeply into each one, providing word problems similar to what was on the exam. We’re working out all the details. Stay tuned.
For both new agents and those who will try again next year, we’ll also introduce a three-session Zoom class on how to succeed in NIL. We’ll cover the new business top to bottom in three, one-hour sessions (well, one hour, at least). Again, we’re finalizing the details and we’ll have more information soon.
Bottom line, whatever the news you got this week, we’ve got your back, and we’re not going away. Got questions? Fire away. In the meantime, here’s a look at what else we saw, heard, read and said in the business of college and pro football this week.
Catching Up: Pat Mondock, 83, coached in high school and college, spending 10 years as head coach at Washington & Jefferson College in Pennsylvania, before signing on with BLESTO, then the Colts, Seahawks and Saints over a 22-year scouting career. We caught up with him this week.
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Where are you living and what are you doing now?: “I’m living in Pinehurst, N.C., and if you know anything about Pinehurst, it’s the golf capital of the eastern United States, and of course, I’m retired and haven’t done much other than living the good life. My wife, Kathy, and I play golf. I used to play a lot, but now I only play three or four times a week.”
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Do you miss the job? What do you miss most?: “You know, after I got out, I didn’t miss it a lot. I miss the game days, the scouting part and all that, that was really great, but it wears on you after a while and you get tired. Even when I was in scouting, people would ask me, ‘do you miss coaching,’ and I didn’t miss coaching so much except on game days. When I got done with it, I was pretty much done with it, but when I was done, I got interested in watching games, and it took me a long time to get away from evaluating players. I like to evaluate college games more than pros. I have had a great time the last couple days now that football is back. I do miss going to the draft and seeing the guys at the all-star games. I miss that kind of stuff.”
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Do you keep in touch with any of your former colleagues?: “I talk to Rick Thompson, who I worked with in New Orleans, quite often, and I talk to a friend of mine, (longtime former NFL scout and executive) Joe Bushofsky, who happens to live here in Pinehurst. I talk to him quite often, but other than that, I’m here in the hinterlands and nobody’s calling me to ask my advice. They’re not doing that kind of scouting anymore.”
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Do you go to any live games (HS/college/pro)?: ”Rarely. I go to a couple of high school games a year. They’ve got some pretty good teams around the area. I haven’t seen a live college game since I got out of it, but I do spend a lot of time in front of the TV on Saturdays. I think college football has really changed. I miss those 7-6 games every now and then, a good defensive game where the next play could be the one that breaks it, and I marvel at the ingenuity of the offenses, with the RPOs and throwing the ball. (When I coached), I wish I had been brave enough to throw the ball like they do nowadays.”
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Are there any players you love to watch and/or feel close to due to your work in the game?: “I’m a big (Tom) Brady fan, and a big (Bill) Belichick fan because I think they really had a great run there. I don’t know who was more important in that whole deal. But my favorite player of all was Peyton Manning. I thought he should have been a Heisman winner. One year, I got to (the University of Tennessee) late in the afternoon, so after practice, I went right in and watched tape, and I had to do the whole thing by myself. After about three hours, I was about ready to quit, and I hear this (film projector) running in another room, and a guy comes in to see what I’m doing, and there’s Manning. He sits down and talks to me and tells me everything they’re doing, and everything they were wanting to do, and from then on, I was a big fan.”
Review the latest from other former NFL scouts and executives by accessing our Catching Up archive here. Want to hear from a former scout, or know someone who may be interested in being interviewed? Let us know.
Get out the vote!: If you’re an active NFL scout, you just received (for the third time) an email with a link to vote on the BART List. It’s our tribute to former Rams scout Danton Barto, and it’s nothing more than a listing of all active NFC and AFC scouts who have been on a team on draft day, in a scouting role, five of the last six years. We’d appreciate it if you’d vote, only once, for the best 10 scouts in each conference. It’s kind of like filling out an MLB all-star team ballot. Please help us out. This is our first time trying this kind of balloting, and our goal is to recognize the best evaluators in the game. We hope you’ll help us. Thanks in advance.
Rep Rumblings: We had four reports this week. On Monday, we took a look at the progress of “grading” the NFLPA exams over the past seven years, and predicted that results would be out this week. It turned out that we were right, and on Tuesday, as we began gathering info from test-takers, we acknowledged the NFLPA’s speed, plus we looked at the search firm situation at USC and we tracked the latest in NIL signings. On Wednesday, we presented some of that info, plus we had more on the vacancies at USC and Connecticut. Finally, on Thursday, we touched on the progress of BART List voting, had more on the 2021 NFL agent class, and had NIL analysis (not everyone is getting lots of bang for their buck, especially when it comes to freshman signing flashy deals). You can get all our reports this week (and this year) here.
Next week: The NFL Agent Exam and the results are in; though we won’t learn the full list of people who passed the exam for about a month yet, most of the suspense is over. The NFL scout hiring cycle is over, too, and we’re still weeks away from a cascade of all-star invitations and the first signings of the ’22 draft cycle. That means it’s time to settle in and watch the games . . . for the most part. With two head coaching changes already on the FBS level, we’ll debut our ’22 College Coaching Changes Grid (here’s last year’s). We’ll continue to follow all the firings, search firm developments, AD decisions and more as the season progresses. Also, though the speed of NIL signings has slowed with the season under way, we’ll continue to follow all the social media posts, new partnerships and everything else related to name, image and likeness. Sometime this week, we’ll also announce our plan for Zoom sessions aimed at “coaching up” new agents on how to build a lengthy and lucrative NIL client list and a network of potential vendors. Speaking of Zoom sessions, we’ll also begin our monthly Zoom sessions for those who came up short on the exam this summer. We envision at least four sessions before the end of the year, and we’ll deal with the toughest topics on the exam. We are dedicated to making sure everyone who failed this year passes next summer, and we’ll start by soliciting topics to focus on. Bottom line, if you’re part of our network of exam prep clients, get ready for us to reach out to find out what you need. As for normal business, we are (still) hoping to get caught up on our Agent Changes, though we’ll definitely feature our Agents by Total Clients list next week. We’ll also definitely have our next five Profile Reports (Tulane, Tulsa, UCLA, Utah State and Utah – just 11 to go!); we’ll post in our weekly blog, Succeed in Football; and we’ll have several more of our Rep Rumblings reports. Football is under way and the excitement is building. Don’t get left behind! Join us.
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