Nebraska paid Casey Thompson a rumored $250-300K to replace Martinez. Jeff Sims might have been paid more to replace Casey Thompson. Now Nebraska appears in the running to pay $1.0M+ to Kyle McCord to replace Sims/Haarberg/Purdy. Maybe one of these impulse buys will work for them. But resorting this often to the portal with big NIL dollars can have a downside, too.
McCord would be going from a team with a great offense with top talent everywhere (OL, receivers) to one with patchy talent. Would he perform as well ... would it be $1.0M+ well spent? Also, when you pay those kind of dollars, the starting spot is essentially guaranteed. Does this chase off Henrich Haarberg and Chubba Purdy, both of whom started several games at QB this past season? (Gophers' experience is instructive here). Who, then, are your back-ups? What if McCord gets injured, as Iowa's purchased QB, Cade McNamara, was this past season (and you don't have Iowa's Defense and STs, and soft schedule, to bail the team out)? I am actually fine if McCord (and WR Fleming) goes to Nebraska, and Nebraska spends a disproportionate amount of its NIL nut on two question marks, diminishing the NIL dollars available for Nebraska to hold its existing roster together.
One thing we have seen from PJ in Transfer recruiting: he is a value shopper (probably by necessity). We are no doubt paying reasonable/middling NIL dollars to a rising star at QB (Brosmer) with a one year commitment--ideally while Lindsay develops. For the third time in three years, Nebraska could be paying top-end NIL dollars for a portal QB, this one a slightly tarnished, falling star, perhaps to the detriment of its ability to attract young QB talent who see the obvious trend line. I'm OK with that.
attract young QB talent for the next couple of years. I'm OK with that.