It should come as no surprise that Bronny James and Shedeur Sanders are two of the highest-earning NIL athletes in the world — they have name recognition, media savvy and famous dads who have already proven sports superstardom runs in the family. Nico Iamaleava's rise to NIL millionaire was a far more hot-button issue — at least until this past weekend, that is.

Iamaleava, who famously signed an $8 million NIL deal in 2022 when he was recruited by the University of Tennessee to play quarterback for the Volunteers, may finally be starting to live up to the hype.

Iamaleava's NIL deal raised serious eyebrows — and potential NCAA violation concerns — when it was signed in 2022. The deal is with Spyre Sports, a collective that represents University of Tennessee athletes and is mostly comprised of the school's wealthy boosters.

It was considered one of the largest NIL deals signed by a non-professional athlete at the time, and was seen as a gateway deal for other egregious amateur contracts to come.

Sure enough, Bronny and Shedeur Sanders went on to sign lucrative deals themselves shortly thereafter, but the controversy continued to coalesce around Iamaleave for being the first to sign such a large contract.

Iamaleava became the poster boy for the new Name, Image and Likeness landscape, and not always in a positive light. Despite Iamaleava being one of the most coveted quarterbacks in the nation out of high school, and being ranked number two overall in the 2023 class, many critics saw the massive financial deal he signed — before ever stepping foot on the University of Tennessee football field — as proof that the NIL system was flawed and out of whack from the get-go.

But now, in Iamaleava's second season at the helm leading the Volunteers, he has a signature win under his belt to start to make the case that he's worth every penny of his deal.

This past weekend Iamaleava led 11th-ranked Tennessee over college football powerhouse 7th ranked Alabama, with a come-from-behind 24-17 win. Fans were swarming Iamaleava on the field after the game, chanting “Ni-co, Ni-co, Ni-co!”

Now the Vols are ranked 7th, with the Crimson Tide falling to 15th, and Iamaleava is a big part of the reason why.

He's already accomplished more than Bronny on the college basketball court, and has his team ranked higher than Shedeur Sanders' Colorado Buffaloes.

And he pretty much accomplished all that in one half of football. He started the game against Alabama looking very ill-at-ease in the pocket, and put no points on the board for Tennessee. But he turned things around in the second half, playing confidently and finding his receivers often enough to get his team their biggest win of the season.

So while Nico Iamaleava, Bronny James and Shedeur Sanders are out spending their NIL earnings this holiday shopping season, in a surprising and sudden reversal of fortunes Nico may be the one most able to brag about earning his keep in the always fast-changing NIL landscape.