Fundraising to meet payroll demands in NIL world is wearing Mark Stoops down

The college sports landscape was hit with a tidal wave when COVID-19, the transfer portal, and NIL all hit around the same time. That unintentionally created a pay-for-play model. A level ground has not been found but could come down the road.

But in the meantime, college football programs are in a fight for survival. Scholarship limits are now tied with meeting payroll. Kentucky head coach Mark Stoops is frustrated with what his job requires now.

In a one-on-one interview with the Cats Pause‘s Darrell Bird, Stoops shared what currently stresses him out about the job.

“I have 100 free agents every six months,” the Kentucky head coach told Bird. “You don’t think there’s pressure of raising money to keep them and to pay them what they deserve and to help them? And I’ve done this for two, three years completely alone. I get no help. None.”

“I feel very isolated, very alone. I’ll be honest, I don’t know how long I can take dealing with what I’ve dealt with. Myself, personally, I can only do so much. I’ve never felt this kind of stress and pressure.”

Every offseason, Kentucky must sign high school recruits. The program must also sign players out of the transfer portal. There is also a need to re-recruit their own roster. Star defensive tackle Deone Walker told On3‘s Andy Staples that he was being recruited by other schools when Mark Stoops was in discussions with Texas A&M on Thanksgiving weekend. There are likely many other situations just like. All of these things cost money. That money must come from donations.

“I can’t coach the way I want to coach because all I do is raise money or try to raise money,” Stoops said. “I have to go meet somebody for a drink or meet somebody for a meeting or dinner or do something to raise money three-fourths of my life. It’s just reality.”

“You go through all the frustration, and even panic. How do I raise the money? I feel very isolated on how to do it. But if I don’t raise it, it doesn’t get done.”

Former offensive coordinator Eddie Gran re-joined Kentucky’s staff in a support role in 2021 and is currently the special assistant to the head coach. The former assistant coach at Ole Miss, Tennessee, and Florida State now plays a massive role in Kentucky’s football fundraising but the Wildcats do not have the financial support that some of their other peers in the conference have.

“I don’t know what I would do without Eddie Gran,” Stoops confessed. “Eddie and I, at some point every day, we talk about how to raise money. How do we do it? How do we make payroll?”

“Other places are blessed with people that can raise it for them. We’re not there. So it just consumes me. I feel that pressure daily. If I don’t get it done, it doesn’t get done. Plain and simple.”

The 15 Club has been established as a Kentucky football only collective and plays a big role in creating a salary pool for the coaching staff to use when building a roster. But a heavy burden falls on Mark Stoops. The 12th-year head coach still loves coaching, but fundraising is taking up nearly all his time. Revenue-sharing is on the way, but NIL will still likely remain a factor in recruiting and serve as an extra benefit for prospects. The job has changed.

“Listen, I don’t need it to be, ‘Woe is me,’ or ‘We feel sorry for you,'” Stoops said. “But my job has changed with Name, Image & Likeness and the transfer portal. These issues, they consume me.”