Mississippi State hiring Maya Bulger for assistant AD job, NIL role

Mississippi State is looking to amp up its NIL efforts. Their latest personnel decision is another step forward in that mission.

According to Pete Thamel, Mississippi State is hiring Maya Bulger to be an Assistant Athletic Director at the school. In particular, her role will be focused on NIL Administration and Partnerships. The role itself has recently been created by the school.

Recently, Maya Bulger worked at Washington in a similar role. There, she was the Director of Football NIL for the Huskies. She was with Washington for 11 months. Prior to that, she worked at Illinois State. Again, that was a NIL-related role, with her title being the Director of Name, Image and Likeness & Community Engagement while there.

Before working at Illinois State, Bulger was an NIL Manager for Hawker Family Sports & Entertainment, a global sports agency.

The main NIL Collective for Mississippi State is The Bulldog Initiative. It was launched back in 2022 by Charlie Winfield, an attorney and a graduate of Mississippi State.

“Winfield founded The Bulldog Initiative with the goal of helping MSU athletes promote the university and the surrounding area through NIL opportunities,” is how the collective is described. “The Bulldog Initiative has the support of the MSU athletic department, including from [then] athletic director John Cohen.”

In 2023, Zac Selmon became the new Mississippi State athletic director. Still, The Bulldog Initiative still has the backing of the school

This move by Mississippi State to add Maya Bulger as an Assistant AD for NIL Administration and Partnerships comes shortly following concerns about the school’s NIL efforts and if they could end up falling behind their SEC rivals. During the 2023 football season, On3’s Pete Nakos wrote about the NIL efforts at Mississippi State and if it could impact their ability to hire a top head coach.

“A source familiar with the situation said the Bulldog Initiative collective has seen an influx of cash in the last six months bringing the budget up to the $5 million mark. That would bring the school closer to the middle of the pack in the SEC,” Nakos wrote.

What a school can offer from a name, image and likeness standpoint now matters when coaches are trying to evaluate a possible job. Specifically, what financial packages an institution’s NIL collective is able to offer and if it’s competitive with the rest of the market. NIL makes all the difference in recruiting, roster maintenance and the Transfer Portal.”

Clearly, building a strong NIL backbone is going to be important to running a program moving forward. Hiring Maya Bulger is a step forward in that effort by Mississippi State.