💰 How Caleb Williams Just Saved $1.2M

It’s exceedingly hilarious to me how far ahead of every other sports league the NFL truly is.

I mean, MLB’s Spring Training just started and the NHL and NBA are both in the middle of their seasons and the only stories I’m seeing on my timeline are about college football players deciding whether or not they want to run a 40-yard dash in Indianapolis.

Oh, and storage units, but more on that later…

🗞 The Big Story: Dana White’s Next Billion-Dollar Bet

📉 Biggest Loser: Storage Wars - NFL Edition

🏆 Winner’s Circle: How Caleb Williams Saved $1.2M

🗞 The Big Story

Dana White has already pulled off one of the best deals in sports history, and he might have just done it again.

A Brief History of the UFC: In 2001 Dana White and a pair of brothers named Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta bought the Ultimate Fighting Championship for just $2 million.

At the time, the sport was perceived to be an overly violent spectacle with zero mainstream appeal.

That was until Dana and his team leaned into popular youth culture and viral marketing to make the company worth billions, eventually selling the UFC in 2016 for $4 billion.

And now, Dana and the Fertitta brothers are looking to do it again with another controversial sports property.

The Birth of Power Slap: Dana was introduced to the sport through videos he saw from Eastern European countries like Poland and Russia where slap fighting has its roots.

He immediately became hooked, and in 2022 he started Power Slap from scratch.

Huge Valuations: Dana has publicly stated that Power Slap is already profitable, earning a valuation of $450 million in its first nine months.

And he believes that it won’t be long until the business is valued at over $1 billion.

But how is this possible?

I mean, the sport is only sanctioned in two states, Nevada and California, and there have been only five live events to date.

Not to mention the health risks that many doctors, public officials, and even fighters have pointed out.

Ticket Prices: Power Slap benefits from cross-promotion with the UFC and Dana White’s own brand, which has driven up ticket prices to an upsetting level for many MMA fans.

Silver Tier Tickets ($495):

• Seating in rows 4-7

• All-Inclusive Pre-Show Hospitality

• Post-Even Stage Photo Opp with Power Slap Belt

• Power Slap Souvenir

Gold Tier Tickets ($695):

• Seating in rows 2-3

• All-Inclusive Pre-Show Hospitality

• Post-Even Stage Photo Opp with Power Slap Belt

• Premium Gift Signed by Dana White

Platinum Tier Tickets ($3,000):

• Seating in the front row

• Meet & Greet with Charles Barkley

• All-Inclusive Pre-Show Hospitality

• Post-Even Stage Photo Opp with Power Slap Belt

• Premium Gift Signed by Dana White

Social Metrics: The demand for this spectacle has also carried over to social media, with highlights being viewed hundreds of millions of times and featuring prominent celebrities.

@fullviolence

Travis linked up with Dana at Power Slap 😭 (via @FightMafia) #danawhite #travisscott

Distribution Woes: Power Slap doesn’t have the same level of distribution as the UFC (especially after getting dropped by TBS at the end of its first year).

This has left it to stream its events on the right-wing platform, Rumble, where it gets anywhere from 85,000 to 195,000 peak, live concurrent viewers.

Next Up? Still, Dana White claims that Power Slap was the “story of the year,” even claiming that it has the potential to be bigger than UFC one day.

I guess only time will tell.

📉 Biggest Loser

This might be the craziest football story of the year so far…

Remember Storage Wars? Last week, a TikToker named Vincent Broadway went viral for paying $1,880 for an abandoned storage unit filled with thousands of dollars worth of player-exclusive college football gear.

The storage unit drew a lot of attention at auction for the large safe inside but Vincent ended up bidding on it because of the Michigan Jordan cleat he saw in the back.

And when he was finally able to access the whole unit, he couldn’t believe what he had stumbled upon… and what it was all worth.

The Haul: In a three-part series on his page, Vincent reveals dozens of boxes of unworn sneakers and cleats from a former Michigan football player, with some pairs like these Michigan Jordan 1 Lows going for thousands of dollars.

There were also:

• Boxes of legos

• Unopened video games

• A Louis Vuitton toiletry bag

There was even a notebook from team meetings with weightlifting info, although many people on Twitter incorrectly identified it as a playbook.

One Man’s Trash: The safe that initially drew everyone’s attention ended up being empty but the total value of the entire unit is estimated to be well over $20,000.

And even though Vincent tried to hide the identity of the player, he did mention that they were a 2023 first-round draft pick.

And given the fact that this person clearly played at Michigan, Cowboys’s rookie defensive tackle Mazi Smith is the only person to whom this stuff could belong.

And for whatever reason, he didn’t make a payment on this unit.

So now he has to watch some random guy sell all of his old stuff online and make thousands of dollars…

That’s gotta hurt.

🏆 Winner’s Circle

Caleb Williams just saved himself $1.2M but this decision could end up costing him millions more.

Why Get an Agent? 98.9% of NFL players employ agents and nearly every athlete entering this year’s draft will have one too.

The relationship between an agent and a college prospect is actually pretty simple:

An agency lends a player upwards of $70,000 for training and living costs, and in return, the agent gets a 1-3% cut of the athlete’s rookie deal.

And for most players, this ends up being a pretty good trade-off since they’ll be making millions of dollars once they get drafted.

Players also get the benefit of having someone in their corner who knows what the draft process is like and an agent can even use their relationships to help a player get drafted higher.

Flying Solo: But what happens when a player decides to enter the draft without an agent?

Well, we saw that happen with Lamar Jackson (who still represents himself).

Many industry experts say that the reason he fell to number 32 is because he didn’t have someone in his corner to advocate on his behalf.

But still, this is the same strategy Caleb Williams is using since when the NFL released its list of players eligible for this year’s draft, Caleb’s name appeared without any representation.

But I think this is actually a genius move by Caleb.

More Money, Fewer Problems: For starters, he was already making millions of dollars through NIL while still in school, so he doesn’t need an agent to loan him a couple thousand dollars for training and living expenses.

And besides that, he’s all but guaranteed to be the No. 1 overall pick, and the way NFL rookie contracts work, there’s no real negotiating he’ll have to do.

All first-round draft picks basically have their contracts preset.

2024 NFL Round 1 Salaries (Estimated by Spotrac):

So by entering the draft without an agent, he avoids having to pay anyone 3% of that deal, which comes out to a savings of more than $1,000,000.

But what about when his rookie deal expires?

Well, then I’d expect he’ll sign an agent to help him negotiate his next contract but until then he gets to kick back and keep all the money he makes in the draft.

Pretty genius if you ask me.

⏱ In Other News

• Why does every NFL stadium look like this?

• The most expensive women’s basketball game ever.

• “I don’t got a motherfucking boss,” me either, Pat.

🎁 Share the Bottom of the Ninth

When you refer new readers to the Bottom of the Ninth, you win exclusive prizes.

➡️ Here is your unique link to share: https://bottom-of-the-ninth.beehiiv.com/subscribe?ref=PLACEHOLDER

You’re currently at 0. That’s only 1 away from receiving a Bottom of the Ninth Sticker!

*Please do not use fake email addresses — they will not qualify as referrals. Thank you!

👋 Happy Friday, we’re still hiring over here at Uncle Charlie Corp but I realized we might have made it too hard to apply…

So to fix that, we tossed our job on a website called TeamWork. It’s my first time using it, but it’s pretty slick!

It’s a website made specifically for jobs in sports. The link for our position is here but feel free to poke around.

Maybe you’ll find something you like!