- NIL Wire
- Posts
- 🏅 Interview with Mike Ross
🏅 Interview with Mike Ross
In partnership with
Hey there,
Today, we talked to Mike Ross, who heads the ConNEXTions Foundation, an NIL-related nonprofit. We’ll let him tell you more about it in a moment, but as for Mr. Ross himself, he is a businessman with a love for sports and a knack for helping young people. This interview covers a lot of ground — from the personal to the business side of NIL. Without further ado, let’s dive in.
If you want to learn more about ConNEXTions check out their website here.
— Cole, Justin and Collin
Interview with Mike Ross
In your own words, explain ConNEXTions to our readers.
ConNEXTions is a non-profit 501c3 that was formed to support male and female student-athletes with Division 1 athletic ability. All athletes joining the foundation receive free professional services, which levels the playing field and helps them advance to the next level. ConNEXTions guides every student/athlete towards college scholarships, pro contracts, and Olympic training.
What are CoNEXTions’ goals?
ConNEXTions’ goal is for EVERY student-athlete in our foundation to achieve a college degree and save enough money during college to purchase a home when graduating. If a professional career happens, that’s wonderful – icing on the cake, and ConNEXTions will help them select an agent. If a professional career does not happen, then we have doctors, lawyers, accountants, entrepreneurs, all with degrees ready to make an impact in their communities—and they saved enough money to purchase a home.
What’s the organization’s purpose?
Mentorship of student-athletes to provide a path to success in athletics, education, and finances. When a student-athlete has special abilities in their sport, ConNEXTions provides a clear path to success in terms of college education and financial literacy.
What services do you offer?
Services provided and paid for in full by ConNEXTions
Mental performance sessions.
Nutritionist counseling.
Power and speed training.
Weightlifting.
Specific sport skill sessions.
Rehabilitation.
Branding and marketing consultations.
Business consultation regarding potential engagements
Wealth management advice & account start up.
Contract advisory and editing.
College recruitment strategy and implementation
NIL endorsements
Social media optimization
Public Speaking
Entrepreneurship
Boost Marketing Performance with Anyword’s Performance Prediction
Tired of AI tools that don’t meet your marketing goals?
Meet Anyword – it knows your brand, your audience, and what content resonates.
Trusted by over 1 million marketers, Anyword connects your marketing channels to analyze past performance and scale high-performing, on-brand content using powerful analytics and insights.
Easily score new generated copy against old, identify top performers, and align your unique brand voice to any audience or channel.
You partner with some top student-athletes nationwide, both at the high school and college level. How has NIL impacted your service offerings?
It’s had a tremendous impact—ConNEXTions' business strategy is continually adjusting. Parents want to maximize their kid’s financial opportunities—and rightfully so.
What changes are you anticipating in the industry in the short term, and how will that affect how ConNEXTions operates?
ConNEXTions accepts things as they are now in high school and college athletics – collectives, NIL, and transfer portal. I must be on top of all the legalities, NCAA rules, and details to keep my student-athletes and families correctly informed. These are extremely exciting times for me as an entrepreneur, coach, GM and lover of sports —it plays right into my skill set.
There’s a lot of excitement around NIL right now, but also a lot of worry. What would you say are some of the policy’s pitfalls, and how are they affecting your student-athlete partners?
I would say most of the NIL world is generally positive but could use more transparency. However, I try to advise the athletes to be selective with endorsements to preserve their brand. Also, I want them to understand that money is not THE most important issue — education, saving money, and wealth management are ALWAYS the plan.
A considerable part of your mission is serving the athlete holistically. Are there pieces of the current high school and college sports landscape that make you worry that student-athletes are being commodified? Are you concerned about student-athletes being treated as commodities in the current landscape of high school and college sports?
These kids are being treated as commodities — this is reality. Now, my job is educating the athletes on how to build their brands, negotiate deals, and become entrepreneurs. To experience all this at such a young age is absolutely amazing and teaches life-long lessons!
What do you think college sports will be like five years from now? What will be similar? What will be different?
I feel the ultimate goal of the NCAA is much more transparency, which means college administratos and coaches will be able to communicate with each other over athletes recruiting and collective valuations. There will still be NIL deals & collectives, but more of a business model will be in place with more transparency.
What will be different… I feel colleges will be hiring NIL General Managers to control and educate this new world of college athletics. The GM will have two faculty members as assistants — One coach and one teacher. These two “assistants” will be the contact person for all student athletes to ask questions and communicate. More college Athletic Directors will be hired with degrees in law or business.