Welcome to Assembly required with Stacey Abrams from Cricket Media. I'm your host Stacey Abrams. The 2024 Olympic Games are now behind

us. A quadrennial reminder that the genetic lottery is real and some people can actually fly.

I had the incredible opportunity to attend part of

the Paris Olympics through a program with Nike. No, I did not see Snoop or Martha, but I did get a chance to watch Noah Liles lean in with his whole

chest. I got to cheer for US Beach Volleyball under the Eiffel Tower, and just to be clear, I'm 100% team Jordan deserves her medal.

She was extraordinary. I got to see her.

Watching the Olympics reminds me so much of how sports shapes how we see our world, how we see ourselves.

In this episode, we're going to dive into a topic that's been a game-changer

in the world of college sports and social media shorthand.

Name, Image, and Likeness, or NIL.

Some of you may be asking yourselves,

on a show about how we dissect public policy issues

and solve for change, why would collegiate athletics be a critical

issue? To paraphrase an oldie-but-goody, it's the economy, friends.

Kids head off to college to prepare to it's the economy, friends.

Kids head off to college to prepare to earn a living,

and for decades,

athletically gifted students

have been the source of lucrative earnings

for everyone but themselves.

To put this in context, collegiate athletics is a business.

By the way, that collectively generates $13 billion dollars in revenue every single year.

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