Representative of The Grove Collective calls ESPN reporter's claim 'fake news'

In a recent interview with The Next Round, ESPN's Chris Low claimed that "the NIL collective at Auburn is ten times what it is at Ole Miss."

That statement could be interpreted as an an exaggeration, specifically one that Low was aware of when he said it. However, it received a lot of pushback on social media.

Now, a representative of Ole Miss' NIL collective has gone on record to deny Low's claims.

"I think it's fake news," Walker Jones of The Grove Collective said in an interview with SuperTalk Mississippi, a radio network that covers the entire state. "I think Chris Low is a great reporter. I've never spoken to Chris Low nor has anybody with The Grove Collective, so he has no idea how much money we've raised [...] I don't know where he would get knowing how big we are."

On top of questioning Low's statement on Ole Miss' NIL funds, Jones also is speculative about Low's knowledge about Auburn's NIL collective, On To Victory.

"I don't know if he truly knows how big Auburn's (collective) is," Jones continued. "Auburn is throwing around these huge numbers, and that's great, but how do we know what that number really is?"

According to reports, the Tigers have upwards of $13 million saved up in their collective.

"There's a lot of ways you can massage those numbers," Jones said. "There's a lot of smoke and mirrors where people can say 'those are dollars on hand,' or 'those are pledged,' or 'they're projections.' There's a lot of ways you can use fuzzy math. I can't control what Auburn does or anybody else, but I would tell you knowing where we are today I am really really comfortable with what we have on hand, what we have pledged, and what we're going to have everyday if this thing continues to scale up."

The Grove Collective has nine different monthly/annual tiers on their website to choose from (a one time donation can be given as well). The highest monthly payment tier is $1,250 dollars. At the time this article was written, just over 4,400 members were contributing to the collective.

"I don't know where Chris is getting his information [...] it may have been hearsay, which is fine," Jones said. "A lot of NIL stuff is. But I would question that comment because I don't think it is based in any sort of fact."

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