In a moment of turmoil in all grades of football, Don Yee has a plan for long-term stability.
One of the sport’s most influential agents, Tom Brady is one of his clients, Yee has partnered with former ESPN and NFL Network executive Jamie Hemann to expand HUB Football. The concept is simple, implementation can be very complex: it will provide opportunities for school players and loose street agents to be noticed in action through NFL teams.
HUB, in Southern California, will do so through test camps and games starting next June. Yee’s organization already organized two camps last fall, with just under 40% of participants signing professional contracts.
“We hope to improve the quality of products in professional football. That’s our goal, and we need to give players and their families a new tool they can use to organize their own career and trajectory,” says Yee. “They have been powerless for too long.
“There will be a lot of inventions in the football industry, and HUB is just one example.”
Professional footballers recognize the desire for more progression tools, and the coronavirus pandemic has exacerbated and will continue to exacerbate those desires. With the failure of the American Football Alliance and XFL, the disappearance of Arena Football and the CFL as an outlet for locating skill in the NFL, HUB can fill some of the gaps.
There may also be other gaps on the horizon. There probably won’t be much school football (if any) this season. Some schoolchildren refuse to play.
The gulf in the taste of college and professional games is growing. With little consistency in the control of school curricula and many divergent training approaches, it becomes more difficult to classify players as prospects. The professional days are so choreographed that they can simply take up a Broadway stage.
Evaluating loose street agents, an un contractless player anywhere, is a long, expensive and hasty process
“We already have commitments from various NFL groups to HUB, as customers, and we’re expecting a lot more,” Yee said without identifying franchises. “We are still in the process of determining whether we will restrict the product to various league groups.”
HUB plans include an invitation-only one-day educational camp with contactless football workouts designed for you. Between 20 and 25 players would attend the camp, with COVID-19 protocols implemented. The first camp is tentatively scheduled for September, subject to local fitness laws and regulations.
NFL groups can simply be a place to compare players with more intensity than is possible lately.
The games will be designed to complement the school’s source chain and will be tailored based on what SCOUTs and NFL staff executives are. There will be two games each and every June and Next July for any player who is about to be selected in 2022, and perhaps even for some who may not be eligible until the 2023 or 2024 drafts.
HUB will host those invitation games just like the Senior Bowl, with a week of NFL-style meetings, training and interviews, culminating in a game with rule adjustments like no blitz, man-to-man defense and others for the player. . Security.
Because those players will not be paid, they may maintain their eligibility for college. The concept is to provide deeper evidence of your skills.
Yee is also contemplating some other price for a player, suggesting that he might have played at the first or time of the year and may skip his junior season at that time, but play in HUB games while concentrating on the school players in the fall and preparing for the next NFL. Combination of exploration.
Maybe he played some other game; several closed NFL wings were basketball strikers, for example. Or he replaces a star player and rarely can show his talent in college.
Yee organized a game in December for players whose schools canceled or postponed their season. Only those with prospects would be invited.
According to him, HUB can offer other facets of development: promising aspiring coaches, lead coaches for game week; Minority and female staff can be placed in other positions to offload representatives in leadership roles.
“HUB aims to be the right one for NFL teams, elite players and their agents,” says Yee. “At the moment, there is no product like this on the market, which is unusual. This is the right time for innovation in professional football.”
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Ralph D. Russo, ap’s school football editor, contributed to the report.