This is the first installment of Football & Finances, a series from PAC Financial in Harrisburg and Tucker P. Nicholas, Private Wealth Advisor, on the money side of the athlete's journey. We are a football office at heart, but everything here applies to every sport: wrestling, basketball, soccer, volleyball, softball, track, all of it.
Quick answer: For many athletes, college NIL money may be the largest paycheck of their entire playing career. The average NFL career lasts about 3.3 years according to the NFL Players Association, and most football contracts are not fully guaranteed. Planning early, investing steadily, and building the right team around the athlete is the difference between a payday and a legacy.
The first real NIL check changes the temperature in a house. Pride, excitement, and then a quieter question that most families ask themselves and almost nobody asks out loud: what are we supposed to do with this? PAC Financial, a family-owned financial advisory firm in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, has been answering money questions across kitchen tables since 1972. Here is the honest version of the answer.
What is our firm's connection to football and sports?
Steve Marrazzo Sr., President of PAC Financial, bleeds football. Steve is a proud Bishop McDevitt football alumnus who shares his jersey number with LeSean "Shady" McCoy. An award-winning coach with the Holy Name Jets, he has watched his own players grow from youth football to NCAA competition. Sonya Essis, our operations manager, officiates football at the highest levels as an NFL and NCAA football referee, and this summer she wore the white hat at the Flag Football Championships in Indianapolis. Christian Marrazzo, licensed life and health insurance agent, and Tucker Nicholas, Private Wealth Advisor, grew up playing football, baseball, and other sports right here in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Multiple generations of financial and insurance professionals who can talk with you, your family, and the athletes we serve in a language that makes sense to you.
How long does a professional football career actually last?
About 3.3 years on average, according to the NFL Players Association. Running backs tend to see the shortest runs, often in the range of 2.5 to 3 years. And unlike baseball, where contracts are generally fully guaranteed, most NFL money is not. Outside of early draft picks, a football contract can end with an injury or a roster cut, and much of the number that made headlines never gets paid.
None of that is pessimism, and the athletes who thrive long-term are usually the ones whose families treated the math with respect early.
Why does NIL money deserve a plan on day one?
Because getting paid in college does not guarantee getting paid after it. For a large share of athletes, the NIL years may be the biggest earning window of their playing career. Here is the reframe we give families: plan as if college is the peak, and you lose nothing if the pros happen anyway. The pro who saved early is wealthier. The athlete who never turns pro has a foundation instead of a story about money that came and went.
The athlete also holds one advantage no veteran pro can buy back: time. A 19-year-old's dollar has four decades to compound. That advantage quietly expires a little every year it goes unused.
We also understand that each family's financial picture is different. For some families, this might be the first experience with a lump sum of money this size. For others, it may not. We are also realistic and understand that large sums of money can be sources of complications, distractions, and even envy. What we look to do is build the financial plan for the recipient and the household together. Without a plan, everything around the NIL funds is up for discussion at all times. With a good plan providing a clear set of guidelines, structure, and rules for this new source of wealth, everyone in the family benefits in the long run, especially the athlete.
What does a smart NIL game plan look like? Financial Planning for Pennsylvania NIL recipients
Simple beats clever, and the best NIL financial decision a Harrisburg area family can make is having the game plan. The families we see do well tend to run three buckets. A spending bucket the athlete actually controls, sized on purpose. A set-aside bucket, because NIL income is taxable and usually requires quarterly payments, which is a job for a qualified tax professional on the roster from the start. And a future bucket that gets funded first, automatically, before anyone feels the money. We also like to start the discussion of segmenting a portion of the NIL proceeds each year toward getting the young adult's Roth IRA fully funded every year of their adult life, where eligibility allows.
Hypothetical example, for illustration only: an athlete who sets aside $20,000 at age 19 and earns an assumed 7% average annual return, before fees, would have roughly $320,000 at age 60. That is not a projection of any actual investment. It is a picture of what time does for a teenager that it will not do for a 35-year-old.
Now picture this: a young, talented athlete who has worked their entire life toward playing professionally gets a scholarship to a top university and NIL money reaching six figures and beyond. They are 18 to 22 years old. Not only is there a risk of the money being spent in ways the athlete can never get back, but this young adult is now in a position where, whenever someone in their family or circle of friends needs financial help, the NIL recipient carries the burden of making constant decisions about how their own money gets spent. The reality is, when a young athlete receives that money, people are going to approach them for financial assistance, much like the stories you hear about lottery winners.
Having a structured financial plan from the start is the real difference maker. For an NIL athlete coming from a family that poured all its discretionary income into that child's athletic and educational growth, the athlete may feel responsible for taking care of the family with these funds. In a world where nothing is guaranteed, we like to advise from the base case that this could be the only lump sum that ever comes from the athlete's playing career.
Whether they go on to play professionally or not, that assumption protects the athlete and the family. With a defined financial plan, if an NIL recipient is leaned on for financial assistance, there can be clear guardrails around the money: defined yearly gift windows, and defined windows where gifting is on pause. Midseason, gifting is on pause. Deep-dive reviews happen in the dead center of the offseason. No distractions during the season is a core tenet of our NIL approach. And if you or your family ever need to tell someone no, you direct them to us. Let them aim the emotions and the blame at us. We will take it on the chin and protect you and your family. That is the hidden value in getting a team of financial professionals involved for Harrisburg-area families and athletes who find themselves part of the NIL boom happening around the country.
What can families learn from the athletes who benefitted from having a financial plan?
Look at the two names every Pennsylvania football family already knows. As widely reported, Saquon Barkley made a decision as an NFL rookie that shocked people: he saved essentially his entire rookie contract and lived on his endorsement income instead. Whatever happens on any given Sunday, that foundation is already built. Notice what the decision actually was. He treated his playing income as the thing to protect rather than the thing to spend, and he did it with a professional team around him, exactly the approach this article is describing, worn by a Penn State legend.
Kevin Durant went a step further and built a genuine business operation, Thirty Five Ventures, with a full-time business partner, investing in areas he took the time to understand. Some of those early positions have since become the stuff of viral headlines, like his stake in Hugging-Face, a company that was recently purchased by the world's biggest company as of this story's publish date, Nvidia. The lesson is not the headlines, because nobody can plan on a headline. The lesson is the structure: a real team, a real process, and patience measured in years, not seasons.
The cautionary list runs the other direction, and it is long enough that we do not need to name names. The athletes who lost everything almost never lost it in one bad day. They lost it to no plan, no guardrails, and nobody around them empowered to say no. The ones who got it right built systems. The horror stories winged it. That is the whole difference, and the system is just as available to a college athlete in Harrisburg as it is to an MVP.
Public figures mentioned are not clients of PAC Financial and have not endorsed the firm; details are drawn from public reporting. Past performance is not indicative of future results, and investments do not provide guaranteed returns. There is always a level of risk involved with investing.
Who belongs on an athlete's financial team?
A parent or guardian who slows every decision down. A qualified tax professional. An attorney when real contracts show up. And a financial advisor whose job is the part nobody else owns: turning income into a plan the athlete can live with at 40, helping divert outside financial distractions during the season, and helping build a financial future that does not depend on turning pro. The team does not need to be big. It needs to be loyal to the athlete rather than to the deal.
What other experience does our team have in these situations?
Tucker P. Nicholas, Private Wealth Advisor, understands from a different angle what it is like to be in the middle of contract negotiations, advocating for yourself, and looking at these situations with a nothing-guaranteed approach. Before his career as a financial professional, while studying at the University of Pittsburgh, his music went viral overnight. Within months, he went from nobody paying attention to fielding record deal offers from music industry institutions, Atlantic Records among them. They wined and dined him the same way college programs do with high school athletic prospects. He got the New York City office tour the way recruits get the campus visit and the good time on the scouting trip. Then he got to the fine print of those record label contracts. He watched friends and colleagues come into life-changing money in their early 20s, just like NIL deals, and saw the good, the bad, and the ugly that came from it.
The biggest regret he saw across the board was that the money was not handled as responsibly as it could have been. That none of it ever got invested. That they ended up in their late 20s with nothing new in front of them, wondering where all that money went and how they were going to pay rent, understanding they would have been in a better position if they had brought in a financial professional from the start, telling themselves that if they ever got one more shot at life-changing money, they would do it right the second time. You do not have to make those mistakes. You have the opportunity right now to have a well-formed financial plan from the beginning. It may not be as exciting as buying three new Lambos right after the signing bonus, and you may not have as many flashy things as your peers for the time being. But your future self will look back grateful that your past self had the foresight to make these decisions now, while the money is real and available.
Who should not hire a financial advisor for NIL money?
An athlete earning a few hundred dollars from local deals does not need to pay anyone for advice just yet, unless their broader financial picture warrants a conversation with a professional. A simple budget and a habit of setting a portion aside covers it, and we will tell you that for free. The conversation starts mattering when the numbers reach four and five figures, when a collective payment or a revenue-share check enters the picture, or when the athlete starts fielding pitches from people who found them fast.
The next step
If your family is holding NIL money and a plan does not exist yet, bring one number: the athlete's total NIL income so far this year, even a rough figure. That single number is enough for a first conversation about buckets, timing, and who else belongs on the team. Call PAC Financial at (717) 564-6400 or email tnicholas@osaicwealth.com. We serve athlete families across Harrisburg, Mechanicsburg, Carlisle, Hershey, Camp Hill, and all of Pennsylvania. We do not charge for our consultation meetings. We also offer financial planning services along with our investment advisory.
This information is for educational purposes only. Hypothetical examples are for illustration and are not projections of any actual investment. NIL rules continue to evolve; details are current as of September 2026. PAC Financial is a financial advisory firm serving Central Pennsylvania. Securities and advisory services offered through Osaic Wealth, Inc., member FINRA/SIPC.