Yea Alabama partners with Athlete's Thread to release officially licensed basketball jerseys

Yea Alabama has released a string of merchandise since its early February launch.

The official NIL entity of Crimson Tide athletes dropped T-shirts celebrating the SEC regular season and conference title in men’s basketball. Hats donning the collectives logo have also been released.

Now it has released its first take on officially licensed jerseys. Through a partnership with Athlete’s Thread, all 17 Alabama men’s basketball players have their officially licensed jerseys on sale. Athletes will receive a portion of each sale.

Fans have to choice between crimson or white; uniforms are unisex and on sale for $99.99.

Before the name, image and likeness era, athletes were not able to receive any profits from their jersey sales. Now in the last 20 months, that has completely changed. Fans are able to also purchase merchandise that has their favorite player’s name on it, too. Fanatics launched its NIL jersey program storefront back in September.

The Brandr Group has also worked with schools to release replica football uniforms, with a share of profits going to athletes. It is also a win for the school, with jerseys featuring the institutions’ marks which only strengthens brand awareness.

Collectives have continued to release athlete-centric merchandise as a way to generate income but also awareness.

The Crimson Tide punched their ticket to the Sweet 16 on Saturday night with a commanding 73-51 win over No. 8 seed Maryland. All-American freshman Brandon Miller finished with 19 points after going scoreless in the first-round game due to a groin injury.

Alabama is set to play No. 5 seed San Diego State in Louisville on Friday.

Yea Alabama continues to ramp up activity

The collective has released a number of initiatives since its February launch, showing off its ability to turn moments into NIL opportunities.

Less than 10 days after Yea Alabama’s launch, an Auburn fan’s sign stated in all caps, “WHERE LEGENDS ARE PAID.” The “A” in paid was written in the script Alabama logo. College GameDay picked it up, eventually taking off on social media.

By the end of the night, after Alabama’s 77-69 win over Auburn, the collective had launched a tee with the saying. The quick-witted marketing ploys have not stopped there. A shirt celebrating the Tide’s SEC regular season title was release shortly after the clinching game.

Yea Alabama has also released licensed basketball trading cards with ONIT Marketing.

Obviously, football will eventually become one of the main focuses. The Tide held a meet-and-greet with four highly-touted freshmen and fans at The Authentic shop at Bryan-Denny Stadium. Yea Alabama heavily promoted the event.

The organization has received backing and praise from Nick Saban and Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne. It has also preferred to call itself an entity over collective because of the connotation of the word.

“I think the primary reason was just because some of the negative connotation … with ‘collective’ being a potential four-letter word,” Yea Alabama’s executive director Jay McPhillips previously told On3’s Andy Wittry. “In fact, I believe athletic director Greg Byrne used that same analogy during an interview when speaking about NIL at some point in the past.

“There’s certain connotation that comes with the word ‘collective,’ and while we have operations that seem very similar to other collectives and how they operate, because of ours being multifaceted – it’s not just a collective of funds. It is a much more diverse, full entity that helps our student-athletes in multiple capacities.”