Brady Quinn Transcript
I spoke with Brady Quinn awhile ago to find out all the latest on his new FUND NIL foundation. Here is a transcript of our conversation. You can also find the audio up on our site as well. Here is the transcription from our conversation.
Are you (the Fund) focusing solely on current ND Student Athletes? They need to be enrolled in Notre Dame currently? There won’t be anything as far as recruits coming in? It will be people who are actually Notre Dame Student Athletes?
BQ: That’s correct. This is a fund for current student athletes at the University of Notre Dame, for really, for all sports. We’ve gotten started off with football players, initially, but this is going to expand through all sports. The biggest thing we want to highlight is the philanthropic endeavors of the athlete, and what they’re passionate about, and helping them build their brand, not only as an athlete but as a student at Notre Dame, but also about what they care about and how they’re trying to change the world.
All that stuff out there that you’ll see in regards to recruiting and NIL, that’s all inducement in my mind, and that’s all illegal. I don’t know how that’s going to be viewed, but at some point someone is going to step in and that stuff isn’t going to fly. That’s not what this is about. We want nothing to do with that. As I’ve said to other people, if I’ve learned anything about this process, it’s how to do it the right way, and make sure the student athletes, especially at Notre Dame, are doing something in this space, but along the lines that Notre Dame is built upon, and that’s God, Country and Notre Dame. It’s about thinking something bigger than yourself, and I think that’s what this highlights.
How do you plan to distribute the fund? I’d assume certain athletes with a higher recognition may get more? Or is it a situation where each person gets the same? Let’s just say the ND quarterback. A high profile position, do they get more than say the 3rd basemen on ND Baseball?
BQ: It’s equitable amongst men’s sports, women’s sports. It all comes down to the individual agreement that is agreed upon with the athlete, and obviously the charity that’s involved, too. I can’t give you specifics because this is an ever-changing landscape. Some of that stuff could change in the future in regards to what that looks like as we build and as we scale. If you’re the starting quarterback at Notre Dame, you’re not looking at a 501(c)(3) non-profit, which is what this is, to receive the bulk of your NIL funds. You’re looking at other players, like Kyle Hamilton for example, last year, who was receiving interest from a lot of other things. This is not built up to be something where if you are that position or that player, you’re making the bulk of whatever you’re making of NIL from this. This is not that.
If a person, say a normal alum, wants to donate to this fund, they have no way to know whether it’s going to go to a football player or?
BQ: Let me stop you because that’s not true. You can always endow funds. Just like any other 501(c)(3) non-profit. You can reach out to Megan Whitt, who is our CEO, and you can say “hey, I want these funds to go a certain sport or program. If they want it to go to a certain program or certain sport, they’re more than welcome to do so. If they want it to go to a certain athlete, we can try to work with that athlete to go make that happen. This is all new territory, so we try to be flexible. Not only to the best interest of the student athletes and the charities they’re involved with, but also the donors.
Have you set up any current situations with student athletes? Do you have anything running now?
BQ: Yeah, but we’re not going to get into any details. This is something where we don’t want to create issues within locker rooms like you’ve seen at Texas A&M or you’re seeing other places right now. When you see athletes out promoting different charities, there’s probably a strong likelihood that the FUND is involved in some way. Until we’re told otherwise. Until these student athletes and the sports teams want to make that more publicized, we’ll let them determine that. We don’t want to encroach on anyone’s privacy and how we’re handling all of this.
How much back and forth have you have with Notre Dame to make sure it’s done the correct way and everyone’s on the same page?
BQ: The first thing is, this is completely run and operated independently of Notre Dame because the Indiana state laws based on NIL deem that’s how this has to be, so they have no involvement in regards to how this fund operates, the direction of anything like that.
In talking with the University, there’s various people that we need to insure that the student athletes are in compliance and file the proper disclosures and so forth. There has to be a contact there to insure that any compensation that they’re receiving that’s part of their Name, Image, Likeness, in exchange for the services they’re providing for the charities has to be disclosed and filled out in the proper manner, so there is correspondence there, but we are completely independent from the University.
How do you decide who gets involved and for what?
BQ: We have a board of directors that then takes an application process for a student athlete and that board determines if that athlete is in good standing, not only with his team and the University, and is eligible. We want to make sure they’re in good academic standing with the University. Then they go through an interview process with our CEO, Megan Whitt of the foundation.
If you would like to donate to FUND, you can find out how to do as the link below.