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Seven million dollars. For one player. At Mississippi State.
I get it’s Super Kamario, as Rick Neuheisel likes to call him. I also get that Miss. State was a true contender for the playoffs when he was healthy. I also get that the playoff is expanding, now likely providing access for a program like the one in Starkville.
What the rhymes with truck are we doing?
ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported that Kamario Taylor was finalizing a deal to return to Starkville in 2027. USA TODAY reported it’s worth at least $7 million. On3 put it at $7.5 million, according to the Clarion Ledger.
I watched Taylor this fall. I get it. Mississippi State started 4–0. He threw 17 touchdowns against four interceptions before his season was cut short. For a few weeks you could turn on a Mississippi State game and think, holy smokes, they might have the best player on the field against anybody. Then he hurt his foot against Missouri, tried to play through it and eventually needed season-ending surgery.
If I’m Jeff Lebby, I can see exactly how a healthy Kamario Taylor might save my ass. If I’m the guy Lebby calls to help pay for it, I have a few more questions.
Wasn’t there a damn cap?
The House settlement’s school revenue-sharing cap is $21.3 million across sports this academic year. It’s expected to rise to about $22.2 million for 2027–28. Seven million is nearly a third of that. We don’t know how much of Taylor’s deal will come from Mississippi State’s own revenue-sharing pool or how much might come from third-party NIL. But a deal for one quarterback is now being reported at roughly a third of what a school can share directly with athletes across its entire department. Sit with that for a second. ESPN’s reporting on the cap and the SEC proposal
And now the SEC is talking about a luxury tax on schools that go over the cap. What kind of tax bill are we drawing up in Starkville, my goodness? The proposal concerns a school’s total spending above the cap. I’d love to be in the room when somebody explains to a Mississippi State donor how much they need for the quarterback, how much they still need for the rest of the team and what happens if the school goes over.
Because who’s blocking for your $7 million quarterback? Who are you paying to go get the ball when he puts it up? And who takes the snaps if he gets hurt again? All of those guys have a market, too.
How many times can you make that call?
Look at Michigan. Bryce Underwood arrived as the No. 1 recruit in the country with a reported multimillion-dollar NIL deal. Tommy Carr started three straight games after Underwood was benched against Penn State, and Kyle Whittingham has since reopened the competition. Underwood may win the job back. If you were one of the people who wrote the big checks to get him to Ann Arbor, how eager would you be to write another one the next time somebody tells you they’ve found a sure thing? Reuters on Michigan’s quarterback competition
Michigan has Michigan money. Mississippi State has people who love Mississippi State, and I’d bet some of them had to reach awfully deep to keep Taylor. I understand why they’d do it. For once, the guy everybody else would love to buy is already in your building. You’ve seen what your team looks like with him. You know exactly how much it would hurt to watch him do it in somebody else’s uniform.
I hope Taylor gets every dollar he can. I hope he gets healthy and lights up the SEC. He’s got enough to do just getting back on the field. Lebby is the one betting that keeping him can change where this program is headed. He’s going to need wins, and if the wins don’t come, the hardest part might be getting the same people to pick up the phone next December.
That’s the part I keep coming back to. We’ve built a sport where a coach can ask people to put up millions for a quarterback rehabbing from surgery, then turn around and ask them to do it all again a year later. House settlement be damned. This is our new era, and it’s ridiculous as fuck.
—Chris
Catch up on Show Pony Live
Chris Vannini on the CFP rankings and the 24-team playoff — We talk about why November matters and what college football risks changing as the playoff grows.
Dusty Dvoracek on the Holy War, Tennessee–Texas A&M and playoff expansion — Dusty takes us inside BYU–Utah and makes the case for a bigger bracket.
Follow Show Pony Live on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to get new episodes in your feed.
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