Would It Have Been Worth It For Texas A&M To Pay Johnny Manziel $3 Million For Two More Years? Without A Doubt

There is no denying that the Johnny Maziel era at Texas A&M will be talked about for generations to come, given the popularity of the former Aggies quarterback. One of true ‘NIL’ leaders before it was actually legal, stories of Manziel continue to be discussed, almost a decade later. 

The most polarizing figure in college football during his time in College Station, the Netflix documentary did a great job of highlighting some of the wilder things that occurred during his college days. But the conversation on how much money Manziel would've made in NIL has been a question that many have pondered since the start of this new era in college athletics. 

One of the most interesting aspects of his time at Texas A&M centered around money that he made off autograph deals that transpired in Miami, which led to him having to sit out just one half of football. The story is discussed in the documentary, but we did not hear much regarding the money that was made from ‘Bag Men’ during his time playing for the Aggies. 

That all changed on Wednesday, with Johnny Manziel sitting down with Shannon Sharpe on the ‘Club Shay Shay’ series on Youtube. 

Johnny Manziel Discusses Potential Deal To Return For 2014 At Texas A&M 

In his conversation with Sharpe, the former Heisman Trophy winner discussed a conversation that his father had with former coach Kevin Sumlin, which the pair discussed how much money it would take for ‘Johnny Football’ to return for the 2014 season. 

"I’m leaving to go to the draft. I’ll paint a picture for you," Johnny Manziel told Shannon. "It’s the spring of 2014, December 2013, right in there about December/January, I’m getting ready to make this decision on if I’m going to the NFL Draft or i'm  going to stay. And I found this out five years later from my dad.

"But my dad went and had a meeting with Kevin Sumlin. And pretty much went to him man to man and was like, ‘We’ll take $3 million and we’ll stay for the next two years.’ And my dad says this is as true today as he did when he told me. He (Sumlin) laughed. He did the same thing that he did when Killf Kingsbury asked to be the highest paid offensive coordinator the year before, and Kliff would've stayed with me and we would've ran it back and gone for another one. 

"But he comes to Sumlin, he asks him for X amount, Sumlin pfff," Johnny Manziel said. "He had this ego about him that what we built, ‘we,’ was all him. And then you start that next year. OK, I leave, decide to go to the NFL. This deal doesn’t work. Kevin Sumlin kind of blows us off, we can do this without you type of vibe."

Manziel would decide to enter the NFL Draft, where he was selected by the Cleveland Browns. But it was the attitude of Sumlin the following season that seemed to irk Manziel. 

"So the fall comes around, 2014, A&M football season. Kenny Hilll is named our starting quarterback. We win our first five games of the year, we’re 5-0, we’re Top-10 in the country. I ain’t getting no love in the program." 

But Shannon Sharpe was almost surprised to hear that Johnny Manziel's father was asking for money to return for another two seasons of college football, making it a point to say this was prior to NIL, pointing out this would've been a ‘backroom deal’. 

Johnny Manziel Discusses ‘Bag Men’ At Texas A&M, LSU And Alabama

The discussion of ‘bag men’ in college football is about as old as the stories from the legendary ‘Pony Express’ at SMU in the '80s. If you think your favorite program wasn't cheating in some type of way or paying players to attend school, i have some oceanfront property in Kentucky I'd like to sell you. 

What we are seeing in today's college football world is pretty much the same type of payments these athletes were receiving years ago, the only difference being that money transactions were held in hotel parking lots or bags being left on the backdoor of a house. It was as common back then as it is right now when it comes to NIL payments. 

So, now that we've gotten that out of the way, Johnny Manziel explained to Shannon Sharpe that there were ‘bag men’ at every school competing for titles, which should not trigger a shocked face while reading this. 

"It went on for 30, 40 years before," Manziel said. "It was the same way that was happening when you were getting recruited back in the day. 

Nate Fitch shares crazy Johnny Manziel/police interaction story. (Credit: Getty Images)

Sharpe made it a point to say that if Kevin Sumlin went to any booster in College Station, the deal would've been done in a second, which Manziel jokingly agreed with. 

"Just keep it in cash, throw it somewhere. We’ll get it later. We don’t need it right now," Manziel explained. "But for my security if something happens for two years down the road. And my dad did this without me knowing. And I ain’t mad at him about it for nothing. It’s the way the business worked back then. There was a bag man. There was a bag man at LSU. There was a bag man at Bama.  

"There was a bag man at every school around the country if you were competing for a national title. It is what it was, and it was always that way until we’re into the NIL portion of everything now, the way it should be."

None of these revelations should come as a surprise, but Kevin Sumlin would've most likely benefited from at least two more years with Johnny Manziel. The ‘Bag Men’ are still relevant in college football, but some of them are using the disguise of NIL.