We have one of the best collectives, yes, but the money in baseball doesn't sniff Clemson, UNC, FSU, NCST, UVA, GT, or Louisville in our own conference. Bottom of the barrel. Wake does it without it.
We're far below anyone in the SEC aside from Missouri. I'd love to see that argued for us vs any team in that conference. I would have to do some digging but I lean closer to we may not have half of the payroll of the 2nd lowest program in the SEC in baseball.
Big 12 we are below Arizona, Arizona State, TCU, Oklahoma State, and Texas Tech. Probably on par with West Virginia but Sabins is lobbying for and earning a bigger budget and he will likely get it. Even Kansas agreed to pony up NIL along with the offer to extend their HC. Cincinnati just had a booster throw some big $ contribution to their collective earmarked for baseball on top of their newly revamped facilities. They had a massive party at a bar they reserved in Knoxville in that regional and collected/announced pledges close to $5M from that 1 event. They plan to climb up the Big12 ranks in baseball because they can't do it in other sports.
So ya.. on par with teams in the bottom of each of those conferences. Baseball NIL is miniscule and we could easily jump into the top 10 range with pennies on the dollar of the football deals. Its there and the hand of the collective is open, but "allegedly", JD doesn't want it to happen or doesn't want guys that are looking for that. I won't pretend to know exactly where the disconnect is because I don't.