Do we owe Worthy, Ford and Cunningham any old NIL money?

Armando Bacot is in the news a lot lately, and in the off-season so little of it is for playing basketball.

The Tar Heels’ rising senior center-forward decided to stay in school and get his degree, and he also beat the mock draft boards, where he was not listed as a first- or second-round pick.

If undrafted, he would have had to make an NBA team as a free agent, just as his frontcourt mate Brady Manek will try to do with the Charlotte Hornets. And while he will get his degree, Bacot is also getting paid handsomely from Name-Image-Likeness deals, estimated at $500,000.

Armando is not making seven-figure bucks like transfers and some high-profile freshmen who are getting paid by so-called “collectives” from such schools as Miami and Texas. So far, AB’s biggest deal is for “5 figures” from Jimmy’s Seafood in his native state of Virginia.

While it is at the other end of the scale, the Mondo Burger at Town Hall Grill and Town Hall Burger and Beer in Chatham County and Durham is getting a lot of attention at those local eateries. But it is not the first time a Carolina basketball player has had a burger or sandwich named after him. When a group of us opened Four Corners on Franklin Street back in 1979, there was no NIL but lots of rumors about who had a piece of the place. Dean Smith was a partner (no, but he did like the corned beef), Phil Ford wasn’t paid for his giant photo holding up 4 fingers?

Nor did Billy Cunningham get royalties from the Kangaroo Kid – “really jumps with hot mustard.” The two most popular items on the menu were the “Worthy Burger,” and the “Fabulous Phil” roast beef sammy. Jordan’s “Tongue That Wagged” didn’t last long because the meat cost so much.

Other ideas we toyed with were the biggest sandwich, a triple stacker named for muscular Larry Miller. The most expensive was the gourmet special called the “Rich” Kupchak, a 1976 first-round draft pick. Desserts were Sweet D’s for Walter Davis.

That was 40 years ago, long before NIL came on the scene. We might have given the players a Worthy Burger or two, but they never made any money off them.

We pretty much didn’t either with a place that was far more fun than profitable in those good old days.

 

Featured image via Hugh Morton

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