Syracuse, N.Y. — The NCAA is promising to crack down on schools whose boosters are trying to lure high school athletes with big-money payments.
The new tough talk could have implications for Syracuse University and Adam Weitsman, the booster who has gone public with his hope to spend $1 million or more to help draw top national recruits to the Orange men’s basketball team.
The NCAA has said in the last month that it wants to limit what it sees as the abuse of its rules governing so-called “name, image and likeness” payments. Wealthy boosters of college sports programs across the country are paying recruits and transfers to enroll in those schools — all by calling it NIL.
The NCAA does not allow boosters to be involved in recruiting. Under NCAA rules, boosters cannot provide recruits benefits that aren’t available to traditional students.
Despite a court ruling less than two years ago that paved the way for athletes to start making money through NIL opportunities, the NCAA says its existing rules still apply in recruiting, and it wants to start enforcing them again.
Syracuse seems to have noticed. The school’s athletic department changed its NIL policy Wednesday, a sign that it is taking the NCAA threat seriously.
The NCAA’s crackdown could invite more scrutiny of Weitsman, Syracuse’s most visible athletics booster. He has flown in a recruit on a private jet and is publicly courting Syracuse basketball recruits with, what he says, are six- and seven-figure offers.
Syracuse athletic director John Wildhack didn’t answer directly this week when asked twice if he was confident that no violations had occurred at Syracuse. But he said Syracuse has done its best to follow the rules during a chaotic period and that the policy change was a meaningful sign of that effort.
Weitsman says he’s following all the rules. He hired a nationally known lawyer who does substantial NIL work. He says that will ensure he’s not putting the school in danger of NCAA violations.
Weitsman said he is not involved with recruiting because he does not talk about recruiting. He said he is not paying athletes to play for Syracuse because he is paying them to do charity work with him in Central New York and they could pick any school in the area.
Many experts in NIL, law and compliance told Syracuse.com those justifications sound shaky, and that these workarounds have become more risky as the NCAA promises to use “common sense” to keep boosters out of recruiting and enforce long-standing rules.
“(Syracuse) is like the perfect scenario (the NCAA) is describing,” said Mit Winter, a former college basketball player and a lawyer with Kennyhertz Perry law firm in Kansas. “To (the NCAA) and to any reasonable person, it appears the rules are being violated.”
Syracuse.com interviewed 12 experts who work in NIL, law or compliance for this story. Ten believed Weitsman’s actions might be enough to trigger an inquiry from the NCAA under its new focus. They wondered whether Weitsman’s reasoning would hold up under close scrutiny.
But none could be certain that Syracuse would face punishment either. So far, no schools have been punished for this kind of recruiting. Some lawyers familiar with the subject question whether the NCAA has the stomach for the potential legal battle that could follow any attempt at punishment.
Two of the experts said they believed Weitsman was technically abiding by NCAA rules.
“Do you think if I was doing something wrong I’d be posting it on social media?” said Weitsman, who has 19.3 million Instagram followers. “There’s no backroom, secret deals with me. I’m doing everything in the open.”
The NCAA’s new stance — and the inability of lawyers to agree on the rules — highlight the confusion and uncertainty running through college sports.
Boosters are chasing any loophole. Schools are trying to thread a needle, avoiding violations without falling behind the competition. The NCAA has provided minimal guidance.
“It’s a complex time,” Wildhack said. “The ground rules are relatively broad. When the ground rules are broad they are subject to interpretation by different experts. … There is so much gray. There is 98 percent gray. We’re trying to navigate that.”
Despite the confusion — and 18 months in which no public punishment has been dished out by the NCAA amid some blatant breaking of NIL rules — the organization is sounding the alarm that penalties are coming.
In comments made at the NCAA convention last month and reported by Collegiate Sports Connect, Jon Duncan, the NCAA’s head of enforcement, said the organization has a number of investigations into schools in progress. He said it is hiring more investigators to chase down NIL violations.
Most notably he stressed the importance of a rule change approved last October — that went into effect Jan. 1 — which allows the NCAA’s enforcement arm to take circumstantial evidence into account when charging schools with violations.
The NCAA can use things like media reports and other credible public accusations to make charges. If a school is charged, it will be assumed guilty and have to prove its innocence. The process would invite the NCAA to start asking uncomfortable questions.
Duncan said the rule eliminates the NCAA’s need to have a smoking gun — such as an outright confession or a text message proving a violation. The previous standard, he said, hindered efforts to punish violations that were reported in the media and many felt were glaring.
“The (new rules) allow us to take a common-sense view of a fact pattern and circumstantial evidence and take it to the school and say, ‘The burden is on you, institution, the burden is on you, Coach, to show it’s not (a violation),’ " Duncan told Collegiate Sports Connect.
The majority of experts interviewed for this story said an NCAA crackdown could be an issue for Weitsman — and others across the country who might be taking a similarly aggressive approach in recruiting — where explanations often require a suspension of common sense.
Weitsman says his efforts to bring elite players to Upstate New York include making NIL offers to high school recruits worth six or seven figures. He recently flew Top 100 recruit Elijah Moore into Syracuse with two famous rappers for a game on a private jet, just days before he announced his commitment to SU. Weitsman said he offered Moore a multi-year NIL deal worth six figures, with incentives that could increase it to seven.
Moore’s flight, he said, was part of a separate NIL agreement, one that high school athletes in New York are permitted to accept. That, Weitsman said, kept it from being an impermissible benefit under NCAA rules.
He hopes his efforts help Syracuse. But none of it, he claims, is an effort to recruit Moore or others specifically to Syracuse.
The NCAA declined to say whether it shared those interpretations, directing questions to the school.
All of the experts that Syracuse.com spoke with acknowledged they don’t have access to all the information about Weitsman’s efforts, making it difficult to offer an opinion. Most said they couldn’t speak directly about Weitsman but discussed rules and interpretations.
Two of the experts praised his lawyer, Darren Heitner, for having expertise in the field. They all said that having a lawyer was a good sign.
Still, their opinions on whether Weitsman is breaking NCAA rules ranged from “not technically” to “hard to say he’s not.”
Most agreed he is taking a risk and bringing Syracuse, a school that has been found guilty of violations twice over the past four decades, with him.
“What scares me is it’s very clear he is actually dealing with high school recruits,” said Peter Schoenthal, the CEO of Athliance, a company devoted to working in NIL and compliance. “I know he’s saying the right things — we’re not talking about basketball, we’re talking about mentorship.
“But at the end of the day, you are sitting courtside with a kid who ended up committing. You are going to do NIL deals with him. You are a booster and being a booster isn’t a God-given right. It’s a choice. That’s where I see potential issues down the road.”
Many boosters have jumped into what they call NIL, taking advantage of unsettled guidance. Many have interpreted the rules in ways that suit them.
Others are betting that even if the NCAA does decide to punish them, the lack of clarity about the rules and the number of others behaving similarly will result in a slap on the wrist.
“What I see is there are a number of promoters and agents and attorneys and marketing professionals who are making it up as they go along,” said Eric Brown, a labor employment lawyer in Connecticut for two decades who entered the NIL space to help his nephew, a football player at Notre Dame.
“They are taking the stance that I’ll ask for forgiveness, rather than ask for permission. People who are doing wrong may not have clarity they are doing something wrong.
“I sort of believe athletic departments are happy to let this guy, or others like him, go out on the limb for them. The athletic department benefits by getting the athletes and they keep themselves at arm’s length.”
An NCAA committee document shared last weekend by Winter provided more evidence that the organization wants to keep boosters out of recruiting.
The document noted that when the NCAA is pursuing NIL rules violations, it should seek out familiar issues involving boosters. It listed actions that Weitsman acknowledges he has taken, such as contacting a prospect about NIL before they have signed with a college.
An NCAA discussion document provides some insight into the type of behavior the organization wants to stop.
When asked whether it considers those to be current rules, the NCAA told Syracuse.com the document was a discussion document and not a formal set of rules.
Still, it seems to provide a window into the type of recruiting behavior the NCAA wants to eliminate.
Syracuse responded to the NCAA’s tough talk this week by tweaking its NIL policy, prohibiting deals that require athletes to live within a certain proximity to the university.
Weitsman said previously that his deals require athletes to live and do work in Central New York or the Southern Tier.
After this article was published, Weitsman said his deals do not have residency requirements and that any future deals will say athletes can live wherever they would like.
Multiple experts said a residency requirement is a clear indication that a deal isn’t actually NIL but the type of abuse the NCAA is looking to stop.
David McGriff, a sports and entertainment lawyer in California, said a residency clause is a popular ploy used by boosters and collectives across the country. He said it’s often a telltale sign that NIL is being used improperly.
“People keep coming up with what they think are clever end-arounds on inducement or recruiting,” McGriff said. “It’s not very clever. It’s obviously not tricking anyone.”
The Athletic reported that a $13.85 million proposed deal between a top quarterback recruit and boosters from the University of Florida included a requirement that he live in Gainesville, Florida.
“We carefully studied what the NCAA published 10 days ago and where we are with things our boosters are trying to do,” Wildhack said. “So we modified our policy. For a student to have to live in a certain area, certain state, certain area code, we’re not going to accept NIL deals with that type of language. To me, this is a clear example where we, on our own, are going to amend our policy.”
While Weitsman has become the face of the school’s NIL efforts, Wildhack did not mention him by name during a 20-minute interview this week.
Syracuse also has multiple collectives operating on its behalf. They have not disclosed the level of detail in their offers that Weitsman has and have focused their public efforts on current athletes.
The majority of the experts who spoke to Syracuse.com said they encourage boosters to avoid getting involved in recruiting, where the NCAA seems most eager to flex its muscle.
Weitsman has jumped head-first into the arena.
He said he believes financial support for Syracuse athletes from other boosters lagged behind other elite programs. He said supporting Central New York athletes with money is critical if SU is going to continue to compete at a championship level in revenue sports.
Syracuse basketball coach Jim Boeheim intimated the same last weekend when he accused Miami, Pittsburgh and Wake Forest of “buying players.” He later walked back the accusations against Pittsburgh and Wake Forest.
Miami, meanwhile, has been led by John Ruiz, one of the few boosters more public about their efforts than Weitsman. Ruiz’s efforts have reportedly drawn attention from the NCAA. It’s unclear what the result will be.
Experts warned that SU could find itself on a similar path.
Unlike others across the country, Weitsman said, he is working transparently. He said he is careful to follow the advice of his lawyer because of that scrutiny. He said the NCAA has not contacted him about his efforts. He said if he’s told his interpretations are wrong he will stop.
He has described his efforts as good for athletes, charities and Central New York.
But by showcasing his pursuit of high school prospects from courtside seats, Weitsman has delivered a clear message to both elite recruits and NCAA enforcement.
He is willing to do big — and risky — business.
“You fly a recruit in for a game, he commits three days later and you’re going to sign an NIL deal with him,” said Ryan Whelpley, a corporate attorney in Massachusetts and a contributor to Conduct Detrimental, a blog and podcast focused on sports law.
“It’s hard to imagine that’s not at least circumstantial evidence.”
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