The Million Dollar Man: Will NIL payout break Bryce Young?

Alabama quarterback Bryce Young being proclaimed as the new Million Dollar Man warrants a quote from the original. 

“You don’t tug on Superman’s cape, you don’t spit against the wind, and you don’t write checks that your body can’t cash!”

Insert a maniacal laugh from pro wrestling great Ted DiBiase.

We’ve officially reached uncharted territory with Young reportedly receiving “almost seven figures” in endorsement deals, per Alabama head coach Nick Saban. The name, image and likeness checks are being written. But will the 20-year-old sophomore, who has yet to even take a snap as a starter, be able to cash them with his play on the football field?

More importantly, will the early payout create a sense of overwhelming pressure that ultimately hurts his ability to perform?

Nebraska head coach Scott Frost believes so.

“I don’t know, if somebody gave me $750,000, I’d feel like I need to perform pretty well, particularly when you’re 19 years old,” Frost said at the Big Ten Media Day. “I think it’s great for student-athletes that they’re going to be able to capitalize on this. There’s going to be a million problems that come along with it that people aren’t expecting. Pressure to perform might be one of them.”

There will definitely be pressure for Young to perform this season, but it isn’t because of the massive endorsement deals he’s being offered right out of the gates. The pressure was always going to be there for the successor of Mac Jones and Alabama’s historically great 2020 offense. 

Young was clearly going to feel the weight of the world on his shoulders whether his bank account was in the red or soaring past seven figures. Such is the case when you play for a perennially contending school like Alabama. 

Such is the norm when Saban is your head coach. 

The expectations in the locker room are exactly the same as they were for Young before he started signing endorsement deals. If any coach is going to succeed at overseeing such a dramatic shift in college football, it will be Saban. 

Make no mistake, if Young stinks up the practice field, he’ll be the Million Dollar Man riding the bench. If anything, the large payout puts him at the mercy of talking heads in the media, fans and possibly even other players. You see it all of the time in professional sports. 

But then again, just being the quarterback for a football giant like Alabama is going to come with its outside vitriol regardless of the NIL deal. Countless fans and schools across the country have watched the Crimson Tide fe-fi-fo-fum their way through college football for years. There were always going to be the naysayers lying in wait to rub salt in the wounds if the experiment fails. 

Pressure is something Young will have to get used to regardless of the size of his wallet, especially if he’s saddling up behind center at Alabama. Jones and Tua Tagovailoa, Young’s predecessors, were both first-round NFL Draft picks. Even former Crimson Tide quarterback Jalen Hurts was taken in the second round. 

So there’s a certain level of intrigue to see if Young follows in those same footsteps. 

It’s the reason why the endorsement deals are piling up outside his door long before he even takes a snap—long before he proves he’s worthy of donning the superman cape.