A growing army of Barstool Athletes includes a handful of college golfers. But what does it all mean?

In college athletics, July 1 marked the start of something of a free-for-all. In a monumental shift for the NCAA, athletes can now begin to accept endorsements for the use of their name, image and likeness while still competing for their university.

So what now? Well, the landscape remains a little uncertain – and for golfers, at least, a little bit complicated. While the USGA opened a month-long feedback period in an effort to update their Rules of Amateur Status in February (in effect, the USGA is working to simplify its definition of amateurism), the new Rules were not scheduled to be adopted until Jan. 1, 2022.

In the meantime, Barstool Sports is doing what it does best: meeting the new NIL landscape with open arms. And college golf is very much included.

Two days after college athletes were cleared for these new endorsement opportunities, a fleet of college athletes had been picked up as “Barstool Athletes.” The Twitter handle Barstool Athletics (@stoolathletics) had garnered over 23,000 follows by July 3. There’s only a loose definition for what it all means.

A video of Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy also circulated on social media during which Portnoy gave a brief background of the concept. On July 1, Portnoy said, Adelaide Halverson, a volleyball player at Jacksonville State, DM’d Portnoy asking to be the first Barstool Athlete. The company agreed to send her Barstool merchandise, Portnoy said, and thus the Barstool Athlete program was born. The requests began pouring in after that.

“Listen, how do you become a Barstool Athlete?” Portnoy said in the video. “If you play Division I sports and you blink at me, we will sign you.”

Barstool has since set up an online application for interested athletes.

By July 3, Portnoy had sent an email message to those players accepted into the Barstool Athletics program. In the message, obtained by Golfweek, Portnoy noted that Barstool had received “literally 75,000 or so applications we are going through.” It had dedicated 15 people to the task.

Portnoy also assured athletes that Barstool was not asking for signed contracts or exclusivity, but there are few specifics beyond that. The object is to help athletes amplify their own brands.

Two of the first golfers announced as Barstool Athletes on July 1 were Oklahoma’s Logan McAllister and Auburn’s Mychael O’Berry. Mississippi State’s Ashley Gilliam, Alabama’s Canon Claycomb and incoming Christian Brothers freshman Jonathan Shuskey were later accepted into the program.

The early stages of Barstool Athletes feel a lot like the Let Them Play Classic, which came together quickly in May after the NCAA Women’s Regional in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, was controversially canceled because of heavy rains and subsequent course conditions. For Barstool, it was a successful first foray into college golf, and featured a field of 47 players.

So far Gilliam, a rising junior, is the only player from that field to become a Barstool Athlete. Gilliam set the Mississippi State scoring record (a 70.61 season average) as a freshman and played this year’s Augusta National Women’s Amateur.

Given what the LTP Classic grew into from such a seemingly spur-of-the-moment beginning, Gilliam has confidence that the Barstool Athlete program will be similarly successful.

“We really went into it with no expectation of it being how big it actually was and we were blown away with how amazing the tournament was,” she said. “You could walk up to that tournament and not know it was any different than any college tournament.”

Still, Gilliam acknowledges that she and fellow college golfers are treading lightly in the NIL landscape until hearing how the USGA will react.

According to Golf Channel reporting, the USGA is “assessing the interim policy” from the NCAA regarding the NIL concept and would provide an update by July 6.

“Honestly, we still don’t know stuff with the USGA so, obviously, all the golfers are being super careful,” she said. “We’re not signing anything, nothing like that because we obviously are waiting to see what the USGA says.

“It’s just kind of weird, the timing of everything because we’re not really sure about the USGA stuff.”

Despite the awkward timing, the fact that all the Barstool Athletes chatter unfolded on social media — Barstool’s playground — was right in Claycomb’s wheelhouse.

“I saw Portnoy tweeted out something with their first athlete and I knew after that tweet it was going to blow up,” he said. “So I followed it pretty closely over the next few hours. Then they posted a Google Doc, just kind of a sign-up sheet. I did that pretty early – I think it was two minutes after they posted it.”

He heard back 15 minutes later.

Athletes like Claycomb all across the college spectrum have scrambled to understand exactly what the new NCAA terms mean over the past week. Claycomb found it helpful that Alabama organized an informational Zoom meeting for its golf team last month to answer some questions.

Claycomb’s outgoing personality plays well on social media, and that will be an advantage in this new landscape.

“I think NIL is going to play really well into my hands just because I understand how all of it works from a social media standpoint,” he said. “It seems like for golfers, that’s going to be probably the most influential way we can do things.”

Barstool has also shown an interest in the diverse stories that athletes bring to the table. Shuskey, a 39-year-old staff sergeant in the U.S. Army set to retire later this summer and embark on a college-golf career, is a prime example. After sharing his background on Twitter on July 2, Shuskey became a Barstool Athlete. Even though that didn’t come with a lot of initial answers, Shuskey trusted Barstool’s reputation as being ahead of the curve on things like this.

“That’s the reason that I told him yes, and didn’t hesitate to tell him yes,” Shuskey said. “I know this is what they do and they’re really good at it.”

Portnoy recognized in his message to athletes that there would be strength in numbers. As for now, Barstool will continue to do what it does best: react quickly and figure out the details later.

As Portnoy said in his initial video, “We may become the most powerful agency in the world.”

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