Johnny Manziel specializes in making headlines for his various off-field activities, but one guy who has gone pretty unheralded in the Manziel circus is Nate Fitch — otherwise known as "Uncle Nate." Fitch has been around for pretty much all of Johnny Football’s antics, and multiple sources have told ESPN that he’s the one who set up the autograph sessions that allegedly resulted in Manziel’s payday.
So what does Fitch do exactly? ESPN’s Wright Thompson recently shed some light on Uncle Nate’s role in Manziel’s camp:
He's a college dropout, in the entrepreneurial sense of the word, more dreamer than slacker. He's Manziel's assistant, media coordinator, business manager, and designated driver. He goes by Uncle Nate, which is a nickname Manziel says Fitch gave himself. Fitch, 20, allegedly works for free, betting on the come, looking into the future when Manziel is an NFL star. He wears a gold rope bracelet, acting like an agent on a television show, talking with confidence about tit-for-tat horse-trading and his deep knowledge of the NCAA rulebook. If you wanted to get Johnny Football, at least before Sunday, Fitch could do in two days what Texas A&M couldn't do in two months. As publicists go, he handled himself like a pro.
Right now, Uncle Nate is making the NCAA look like fools. They have yet to find proof that Manziel profited off his signatures, and with all the autograph brokers staying silent, they don’t seem to be getting very close. So while investigators scramble to find any evidence, Uncle Nate will be sitting back and enjoying the Manziel life. Uncle Nate: 1, NCAA: 0.
