Charles Hicks, a Stanford junior who last November won the NCAA cross-country title in a close race against Northern Arizona’s Nico Young, has signed a name-image-likeness (NIL) deal with Nike, the company that also sponsors Stanford’s sports teams.
Ray Flynn and Matthew Sonnenfeldt, agents with Flynn Sports Management, negotiated the deal for Hicks.
Hicks, 21, announced the news with a video to his YouTube channel, which has about 33,000 subscribers. His video giving a tour of the Stanford dining hall has been seen 53,000 times.
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“The NIL space is so new and unexplored that it’s pretty difficult to pin down concrete reasons for why things happen, though I’d imagine winning nationals didn’t hurt my résumé,” Hicks wrote to Runner’s World in an email sent via Flynn Sports.
“After November, the team at Flynn Sports got cleared by Stanford and the state of California to act as my NIL agency. Since then, working with them has helped things materialize a lot quicker than they had in the past and has been incredibly exciting.”
The terms of the deal were not disclosed. As per NIL rules, the contract can’t be based on Hicks’s athletic performance. He won’t earn a bonus, for instance, if he wins another NCAA title on the track.
Hicks, who is majoring in cognitive science, according to his Stanford bio, will be paid to promote Nike products through social media posts and appearances.
“While I’m not able to delve too deeply into specifics, there [are] social, digital, and in-person engagement obligations in the contract,” Hicks wrote. “Everyone involved has been incredibly [accommodating] of my needs as a student athlete throughout the process, which alleviated any potential concerns about scheduling conflicts.”
One agent, who works on many NIL deals but does not represent Hicks, estimated to Runner’s World that Hicks’s deal could be worth between $50,000 and $150,000 per year.
Hicks has two more years of cross-country eligibility and one more year of eligibility for indoor and outdoor track. He wrote in his email that this deal doesn’t necessarily change the calculus for when he might turn pro.
“At the end of the day, my decision will always be dictated by the goals of the program, my personal goals as an athlete, and the incredible group of guys I get to live and train with out here,” he wrote. “That’s a decision I'll have to make when the time is right.”
The deal will end—as all NIL deals do—when Hicks goes pro. At that point, he’s free to sign with a different agency and a different shoe company—although Flynn and Nike have a head start on the relationship.
Flynn Sports earlier negotiated a deal for Katelyn Tuohy of North Carolina State University, with Adidas, which sponsors NC State’s athletic department. Tuohy has won two NCAA titles, one in cross country and the other in the outdoor 5,000 meters.
Other college runners with notable NIL deals include Emily Cole of Duke, Talitha Diggs of Florida, and Matthew Boling of the University of Georgia.
Flynn told Runner’s World that NIL deals are a positive development on all sides, helping to keep top runners in college.
“If you are a university head coach, and your athlete becomes a champion as a freshman, there’s always that risk that an athlete could turn pro at any time,” he said. “NIL is a bridge to keep athletes in the NCAA system and less in a hurry to become professional. Many universities recognize the advantages for their athletes and actually support the NIL options for them, knowing that the better ones will keep [athletes] around longer.”
Sarah Lorge Butler is a writer and editor living in Eugene, Oregon, and her stories about the sport, its trends, and fascinating individuals have appeared in Runner’s World since 2005. She is the author of two popular fitness books, Run Your Butt Off! and Walk Your Butt Off!
