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| Uncle Nate. Man in Charge. |
The Uncle Nate discussion was had on the Roundtable about a week ago. A college kid who has dropped out of school to be Johnny Football's personal assistant. Arranges for security guards, manages interview requests... really just to be a Turtle/E combo. Getting paid to hang out, answer a few phone calls? Sounds like a job I'd of gladly taken when I was 20.
ESPN's report yesterday states that it was Fitch (Uncle Nate to you and me) that halted the 'free' signings and said there was to be some compensation for all these autographs that were being shelled out.
That is - Uncle Nate saw more money than he was getting, and he got greedy.
So the $5k/month (guessing) wasn't good enough for Uncle Nate. Within the Manziel camp, I think that is what's going on currently. Mom and Pop Manziel want to get their hands on Nate to see what the hell is going on... and to get stories straight, should they need them.
And I think it's going to cost (kind of) Uncle Nate. Should things advance in this investigation, look for Nate to fall on the sword. He (or the Manziel parents) will say that Uncle Nate was arranging for payments without Johnny's knowledge, and the family is upset and concerned about how someone they had put so much faith in to help their son could do something like this. Crocodile tears... and SCENE.
You can book that.
Should this be the route taken, it could probably be argued that if it Uncle Nate was the one profiting from the autograph sessions - was he really doing anything wrong? He's just brokering a deal for an autograph broker. And what would the precedence be? Has there ever been another college football athlete with a full-time personal assistant? (At least a legitimate one?)
It has been said that the kid sitting next to Johnny Football can make money off him, just not Johnny.
But it's the silence (to this point) from everyone in the Manziel camp that leads me to believe that this one could be serious. In every other Johnny Football story this offseason - whether it be Johnny, his Twitter account, or his parents - someone has said something. These folks don't shy away from microphones.
Makes me think that they are getting their stories straight. (Which is smart, by the way.)
Last thing that lends credence to this situation - the reaction from Las Vegas. Team win totals for both Alabama and Texas A&M were removed from the betting boards, the spread had moved over three points, and some books had taken the game down all together.
When T-Town Menswear went down - it was an Internet sensation for about three weeks. But no games came off the boards. Like with just about anything, when you want a true indication of what is going on, talk to the people with no emotion in the game - just money.
Don't know how this is going to shake out, but it's enough to throw a scare into Vegas. And that should be enough to scare College Station.
Follow me on Twitter! @harry_long
