Part 2
By Colin Rajala
Trove: It makes sense to me to not have all of your eggs or focus in one basket and I hope that the university’s geographic location is as advantageous for NIL opportunities as you think it can be. Given the constraints of the school from a resource and size perspective, I know that thinking outside the box can be invaluable. Interestingly enough, I had discussed with friends previously how I thought Seton Hall could leverage its proximity to New York City and the metropolitan area and brand itself as the locale for metro hoops over the likes of St. John’s and Syracuse. When you think about that sort of branding, less U.S. companies are focused on tying themselves to a particular region, but I thought it could be valuable with foreign companies, particularly with the Chinese basketball and sneaker brands like Li-Ning and Anta. Sure they have signed players like Dwayne Wade, Klay Thompson and Kyrie Irving, to some success but what better way to stake themselves in the U.S. basketball market than taking a more grassroots approach and connecting with the school that is the closest to the basketball mecca that is New York City? It will be interesting to see how the corporation NIL opportunities unfold.
McBride: I agree with you, let’s figure out a way to get foreign money investing in Seton Hall. I have a dry erase board in my office that is jam packed with notes and ideas. I fill it almost complete up every day, take a photo on my phone, erase and then start all over again the next day. Foreign investment was written up there a couple of days ago and something we will certainly pursue with the right connections. It’s all possible and it can all be part of the grand plan.
Now it's just about getting organized internally then focusing my time and efforts on priorities as they arise. I think we’re in good shape and we’re getting close. It’s getting everyone to understand what we can do, and what are we prohibited from doing as well as getting the coaches aligned and the staff aligned, so everybody understands what their roles and responsibilities are. If there’s confusion internally then there’s going to be confusion externally, so my priority is addressing the house first.
Trove: I don’t have connections to those Chinese companies, but hopefully someone in the university community does. Now I am curious to hear what is the next priority for you beyond creating that internal alignment?
McBride: My next priority is going to be organizing Hall Hands on Deck and Hall Ball. How do I get those guys aligned and working together? I think I have a concept right now of what that could look like. I strongly believe that if an individual or a group of individuals stand up, raise their hand and say ‘I want to help’ or more importantly they start helping, then there is a place for them. It'll be very, very hard for me to ever say no to an individual or a group that has an NIL idea. I want to listen, and I want to understand and as long as everything checks all the boxes that need to be checked, I want them to have seat at the table and I want them to be part of this journey.
I’m figuring out how everyone plays in the same sand box together, and I think it is feasible. I’ll tell you, I'm not so sure consolidation into one entity is necessary. I know that is the current kind of wave with all these schools freaking out because they have multiple collectives. They're converging all of them into one, they're creating new entities or LLCs, but I’m not so sure that is something that we must do. Maybe it is exactly what we do ultimately, but that is what we'll arrive at after we finish this research period. I think that we can all live together, and we can all serve a purpose and we can all have a role to play that won’t be confusing to the fan base as long as its communicated properly.
Trove: I don’t think it should be too difficult to inform the fans and community about the two distinct entities and the different roles they play regarding the school’s NIL initiatives. I did want to circle back on something you mentioned previously about getting everyone on the same page internally. Many of these coaches signed up for these roles prior to the new landscape and I would have to think that it is not something they have thought seriously about before recently. How do you sort of educate them and orient them to help them navigate this new era of college athletics? I would imagine it’s not very easy teaching an old dog new tricks, so to speak.
McBride: That is an absolutely phenomenal question, that is the type of question that people should be asking right now. That aspect of things makes this job a ton of fun for me. My job is not to change the way an individual performs or works. I think my responsibility is to challenge individuals to look at things through a different lens. If they're looking at a problem and let’s say it’s an NIL topic, and they're looking at it from the same lens that they've looked at all athletic department challenges in the past, that individual or this process probably won't be successful. But if they can look through the same problem through a different lens, they're probably going to arrive at a solution that's beneficial for everyone. There's never my way or the highway type philosophy, that’s not going to work. Going scorched earth never works. It's always going to be a collaborative effort, bringing together individuals, departments, teams to come to the solution to get it all worked out in the end.
There have already been individuals that have stepped up and said, ‘I want to X, Y and Z, lets figure out how can we do that.’ That is fantastic and shows why Seton Hall is not behind.
The great thing about this school beyond that passionate fan base is the staff here. They are amazing. Everyone loves Seton Hall; everyone is enthusiastic about the university. We don't get into this job to ‘get rich’ you get into this job because something pulls you to it, and most of them truly are servant leaders. They come in every day with the sole purpose of serving our student-athletes and when you have a team of individuals that leave their egos at the door, it’s amazing what you can accomplish. Seton Hall fans and Seton Hall student-athletes should be very appreciative of the team that has been put together here because everyone's very positive and ready to step up and do what they can.
