Ducks Rising, the membership-based collective supporting University of Oregon athletes through name, image and likeness opportunities, is adding an advisory board of current and former players, player parents and business leaders and launching a baseball-focused operation to its infrastructure.
Former Ducks running back LaMichael James, current tight end Cam McCormick, James Johnson, the father of UO offensive lineman Jackson Powers-Johnson, and Chris Looney, an Oregon real estate developer and former president of the Oregon Club of Eugene-Springfield, will serve on the initial advisory board for Ducks Rising. Each will serve a three-year term, with McCormick serving a one-year term that began on Oct. 1, the collective announced Monday.
“Name, Image and Likeness continues to grow, and as it does, we are seeing athletes become empowered and proactive in developing their brand and marketing platforms,” Ducks Rising founder and CEO Andrew Parmentier said in a release. “The monthly membership drives the entire operation and while the large collectives with six-figure gifts are great, our model is to create a sustainable, transparent framework to support and provide opportunities for the players over the long term. The Advisory Board will allow us to continually stay on the forefront of the legislation, demand, growth initiatives and the content component of the site for our members.”
Ducks Rising, which offers monthly memberships from $20-250 as well as one-time payments for content from Oregon athletes, is partnering with former Oregon senior associate athletic director Joe Giansante to integrate a baseball-focused operation to its offerings. The baseball initiative will “deliver funds, education, tax services, associating membership, and an investment option” to athletes who participate in and create content for the collective, according to Ducks Rising.
“Andrew’s model is the collective of the future and that is what drew me to him and Duck’s Rising,” Giansante said in a statement. “I think we are all surprised at the incredible demand and amount of activity in NIL around the country — every recruitable and existing player has it top of mind — and it has just exploded. This model allows us to get very targeted in our membership by focusing first on former players of specific sports at the university like baseball, and work to get them involved in the success and empowerment of the players that follow directly in their footsteps.”