What should/could NCAA do to regain control?

J

JRD90

Well-Known Member
I am in favor of NIL, if it's actually money for a kid to profit on his name, image, likeness. I also liked that a kid can transfer and not have to sit out if there's a coaching change, or feels like it is no longer a could fit. However, in both of these cases, what is actually happening was not the intended outcome. College football has become the NFL without a draft, without a salary cap, and unlimited free agency. Great for the players, bad for schools trying to keep a program sustainable.

Should transfer rules go back to having to sit out 1 year? This might limit the constant movement, and definitely limit the number of players who are on their 3rd or sometimes 4th team.

Should NIL signing bonuses be more transparent? These could be disclosed to the NCAA ( I hope players/parents realize this is taxable income and they don't have IRS problems down the road) and maybe a cap is installed? Or, and this may be too extreme, but once you agree to sign with a school and there is a NIL bonus involved, that becomes a contract to bind the player and school together for their 4 year career. So if you want the bonus, and the school gives the bonus, then both sides are committing to 4 years. This might keep the playing field a little more even for schools without deep pocket boosters.

Knowing the NCAA they won't do anything, but I think this current path is unsustainable. Plus for the large majority of even Power 5 signees, they will never make it to the NFL so getting a degree and setting yourself up for a 40 year working career should still be a main focus and pissing all of that away for some short term NIL money will not be in their best long term interests.
 
I think the NCAA should take another stab and pleading their class all the way up to the US Supreme Court (if they were to take on the case) to try to establish better guidelines for NIL, etc in terms of amatuer athletes.
 
JRD90 said:
I am in favor of NIL, if it's actually money for a kid to profit on his name, image, likeness. I also liked that a kid can transfer and not have to sit out if there's a coaching change, or feels like it is no longer a could fit. However, in both of these cases, what is actually happening was not the intended outcome. College football has become the NFL without a draft, without a salary cap, and unlimited free agency. Great for the players, bad for schools trying to keep a program sustainable.

Should transfer rules go back to having to sit out 1 year? This might limit the constant movement, and definitely limit the number of players who are on their 3rd or sometimes 4th team.

Should NIL signing bonuses be more transparent? These could be disclosed to the NCAA ( I hope players/parents realize this is taxable income and they don't have IRS problems down the road) and maybe a cap is installed? Or, and this may be too extreme, but once you agree to sign with a school and there is a NIL bonus involved, that becomes a contract to bind the player and school together for their 4 year career. So if you want the bonus, and the school gives the bonus, then both sides are committing to 4 years. This might keep the playing field a little more even for schools without deep pocket boosters.

Knowing the NCAA they won't do anything, but I think this current path is unsustainable. Plus for the large majority of even Power 5 signees, they will never make it to the NFL so getting a degree and setting yourself up for a 40 year working career should still be a main focus and pissing all of that away for some short term NIL money will not be in their best long term interests.
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The NCAA has said multiple times after the Supreme Court decision that it's washing its hands of NIL regulation. And to be honest, it's smart. If they tried to implement a transfer restriction they'd just get completely bombarded with thousands of lawsuits that they'd lose anyway.

An NIL cap wouldn't do anything...

1) It'd get sued into oblivion like above.

2) No one would abide by it and any money above the cap would just go back to being under the table.

3) Why would schools listen to the NCAA anyway? The NCAA is completely unnecessary for revenue generating sports. It's an antiquated, obsolete organization when it comes to football and basketball. Schools don't need it and there's nothing stopping them from flipping them the middle finger.

People keep erroneously going back to the NFL as an example of how salary caps would work. That's bunk. Total bunk.

The NFL is a single private league. To be a member of that league (a franchise team), you agree to be subject to salary restrictions. The NFL has implemented that restriction because as an entity it feels it levels the playing field and improves the fan experience. And many would argue that it works.

There is no single league in college sports. It doesn't work that way. First of all, the NCAA can declare any rules it wants...programs are under absolutely no obligation to abide by them. NCAA doesn't own the teams, the stadiums, or their resources. Even if programs did agree to salary limitations they'd get sued to hell like I mentioned.

Implement college salary caps on a conference-wide basis as a condition of membership? Good frickin luck. There are 5 major conferences. You think one of these conferences is going to be the first to dip their toes in those waters? No way. That leaves the other conferences with no salary caps with a huge advantage and you'd never get a single recruit to sign in a restricted conference.

Get all 5 conferences to agree to salary caps and transfer restrictions? Another huge nope. Again, there's too much advantage to being the "unrestricted" conference and you'd have nothing but a giant Mexican stand-off.

Turn to legislators to regulate this thing? Congress has already overwhelmingly shown that it is much more in favor of kids getting money instead of the shaft, and as long as kids are now getting paid, there is no way they're going to take on the giant task of deciding how to regulate it. The US government has a million bigger fish to fry and argue over ad nauseum before they're going to mess with this. Remember...the vast, overwhelming majority of people in this country don't give more than a passing glance at college sports. They simply don't care, and the people who matter are not in favor of restricting kid's income.

This genie is out of the bottle, folks. You either accept it and move on, or find a different pastime. And that includes me. College football and basketball of the last 50 years is dead. Done. Tits up. It's not going to change. Some of you may accept it and take up a new hobby. Some may continue to watch and just be pissed and rant till they die. The rest are going to be ok with it and still love the sport. But no matter what camp you fall in, this thing is 100% caused by the NCAA starting decades ago. Don't be mad at the recruits, don't be mad at coaches or collectives or boosters...be mad at Mark Emmert and all she shitbag poo stains who came before him.
 
HaydenHawk56 said:
I think the NCAA should take another stab and pleading their class all the way up to the US Supreme Court (if they were to take on the case) to try to establish better guidelines for NIL, etc in terms of amatuer athletes.
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1) Supreme Court won't take it on again. They already did and they aren't in the habit of wasting their time rearguing opinions a year or two after their previous one. Look how long it took for them to reexamine abortion and that was an actual topic that affects people and means something.

2) What's the basis? "The NFL has salary caps....DERP" The NFL is a private business that chose to do so because it thought it improved it's product. The NCAA doesn't own teams or facilities. And how can you argue that society is being harmed by not implementing salary caps or transfer restrictions? Because a bunch of middle age and elderly rich white guys want the old days back? LOL
 
Is it possible that the major CFB teams decide that things have gotten out of hand, and then they essentially create their own College Football League (single, private entity)? And then they institute regulations to take some power back from labor? And then labor organizes into a union that can collectively bargain for their rights?

I am not sure what an Alabama/Clemson/Georgia/Ohio State would lose vs. gain in that scenario? Would there be any advantage for them restricting the power of labor?
 
The NCAA "regaining" control??? That made me laugh. Seriously, the NCAA lost control way before this NIL thing kicked in, all they did was make paying players legal. Which is something that has been going on for quite a while now.

News flash, life isn't fair folks. I see no reason for the NCAA getting involved in this, they would look incredibly stupid if they did. These kids literally put their lives on the line playing a very physical demanding sport that can leave them scarred for life, let them get paid.
 
Fryowa said:
The NCAA has said multiple times after the Supreme Court decision that it's washing its hands of NIL regulation. And to be honest, it's smart. If they tried to implement a transfer restriction they'd just get completely bombarded with thousands of lawsuits that they'd lose anyway.

An NIL cap wouldn't do anything...

1) It'd get sued into oblivion like above.

2) No one would abide by it and any money above the cap would just go back to being under the table.

3) Why would schools listen to the NCAA anyway? The NCAA is completely unnecessary for revenue generating sports. It's an antiquated, obsolete organization when it comes to football and basketball. Schools don't need it and there's nothing stopping them from flipping them the middle finger.

People keep erroneously going back to the NFL as an example of how salary caps would work. That's bunk. Total bunk.

The NFL is a single private league. To be a member of that league (a franchise team), you agree to be subject to salary restrictions. The NFL has implemented that restriction because as an entity it feels it levels the playing field and improves the fan experience. And many would argue that it works.

There is no single league in college sports. It doesn't work that way. First of all, the NCAA can declare any rules it wants...programs are under absolutely no obligation to abide by them. NCAA doesn't own the teams, the stadiums, or their resources. Even if programs did agree to salary limitations they'd get sued to hell like I mentioned.

Implement college salary caps on a conference-wide basis as a condition of membership? Good frickin luck. There are 5 major conferences. You think one of these conferences is going to be the first to dip their toes in those waters? No way. That leaves the other conferences with no salary caps with a huge advantage and you'd never get a single recruit to sign in a restricted conference.

Get all 5 conferences to agree to salary caps and transfer restrictions? Another huge nope. Again, there's too much advantage to being the "unrestricted" conference and you'd have nothing but a giant Mexican stand-off.

Turn to legislators to regulate this thing? Congress has already overwhelmingly shown that it is much more in favor of kids getting money instead of the shaft, and as long as kids are now getting paid, there is no way they're going to take on the giant task of deciding how to regulate it. The US government has a million bigger fish to fry and argue over ad nauseum before they're going to mess with this. Remember...the vast, overwhelming majority of people in this country don't give more than a passing glance at college sports. They simply don't care, and the people who matter are not in favor of restricting kid's income.

This genie is out of the bottle, folks. You either accept it and move on, or find a different pastime. And that includes me. College football and basketball of the last 50 years is dead. Done. Tits up. It's not going to change. Some of you may accept it and take up a new hobby. Some may continue to watch and just be pissed and rant till they die. The rest are going to be ok with it and still love the sport. But no matter what camp you fall in, this thing is 100% caused by the NCAA starting decades ago. Don't be mad at the recruits, don't be mad at coaches or collectives or boosters...be mad at Mark Emmert and all she shitbag poo stains who came before him.
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Thank you for this. I've thought that there should be a cap just like the NFL, but I didn't think of it like this. The NCAA used to control everything in regards to college sports, but, as you said, not anymore. Not many people know that the national champion that will be crowned next month will still be, like it always has been, the mythical national champions with regards to the NCAA because it's not sanctioned by them. They just let CFA take over ~40 years ago and slowly build the system up with a goal of a single championship game which evolved into the playoff system and the NCAA sits back and collects the money.

I don't know nearly as much as you do, but I do know that there really isn't much of a governing body. It's like when a teacher is pretty chill every day until they're either in a bad mood or being evaluated and decide it's time to smack down on the rules and slap some wrists to show they're still in charge. My principal's gone today so... ;)
 
Fryowa said:
Why would schools listen to the NCAA anyway? Schools don't need it and there's nothing stopping them from flipping them the middle finger. First of all, the NCAA can declare any rules it wants...programs are under absolutely no obligation to abide by them. NCAA doesn't own the teams, the stadiums, or their resources.

To be a member of that league (a franchise team), you agree to be subject to salary restrictions. The NFL has implemented that restriction because as an entity it feels it levels the playing field and improves the fan experience. And many would argue that it works.
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So what I've quoted is this like private schools, public schools, and the ihsaa? ;)
 
CP87 said:
Is it possible that the major CFB teams decide that things have gotten out of hand, and then they essentially create their own College Football League (single, private entity)? And then they institute regulations to take some power back from labor? And then labor organizes into a union that can collectively bargain for their rights?

I am not sure what an Alabama/Clemson/Georgia/Ohio State would lose vs. gain in that scenario? Would there be any advantage for them restricting the power of labor?
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You'd have to get every single team in every conference on board with it and that'll never happen.

Let's say the 4 big schools you mentioned plus arbitrarily 6 other big schools decided to do what you're describing...limit NIL and operate in that space with a labor union.

What happens when Notre Dame and Florida and USC and Texas and Oklahoma and 100 other schools say, "Hey kids, we don't have all that restricted crap. Why not come play for us where we can pay you and your family what you're worth, without all the oppressive stuff from the other league, where they're trying to keep you down and keep you from earning the money you and your family are worth?"

How many recruits are going to play in the moral lighthouse league with restrictions? And what quality of football will they have?

Ain't gonna work.
 
Fryowa said:
You'd have to get every single team in every conference on board with it and that'll never happen.

Let's say the 4 big schools you mentioned plus arbitrarily 6 other big schools decided to do what you're describing...limit NIL and operate in that space with a labor union.

What happens when Notre Dame and Florida and USC and Texas and Oklahoma and 100 other schools say, "Hey kids, we don't have all that restricted crap. Why not come play for us where we can pay you and your family what you're worth, without all the oppressive stuff from the other league, where they're trying to keep you down and keep you from earning the money you and your family are worth?"

How many recruits are going to play in the moral lighthouse league with restrictions? And what quality of football will they have?

Ain't gonna work.
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But throughout the history of capital and labor, doesn't capital always gravitate towards monopoly and/or collusion? If there is already a precedent for this model within professional sports, why would this situation be fundamentally different? If a super-majority of the top-25 programs decided that this collusion was in their best interest, the stray holdout here and there would have to go along. What else are they going to do, start their own league without the top-25 teams? Good luck.

I am not asking these questions rhetorically, I have no idea the answers. This is an interesting experiment, to say the least.
 
ssckelley said:
The NCAA "regaining" control??? That made me laugh. Seriously, the NCAA lost control way before this NIL thing kicked in, all they did was make paying players legal. Which is something that has been going on for quite a while now.

News flash, life isn't fair folks. I see no reason for the NCAA getting involved in this, they would look incredibly stupid if they did. These kids literally put their lives on the line playing a very physical demanding sport that can leave them scarred for life, let them get paid.
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The NCAA should disband. Let the non-revenue sharing sports combine back up into something completely new that looks out for the best interest. Then let Football, basketball, and baseball schools in the south create their own superconferences.
 
IMO - in 10 years it will be SEC and B1G and they'll separate from the NCAA, have their own governing body and a commissioner of some sort. That will be the top end teams and schools. They will have all the money, all the TV contracts, the biggest NIL collectives. It will be the big leagues. Smaller schools will still be around and they will still play and we'll all watch but these 2 conferences will feed off them. Iowa is in a position of power that only about 25 to 30 schools will be in a decade or so. It's what still gives me a little hope of having a relevant program.
 
CP87 said:
But throughout the history of capital and labor, doesn't capital always gravitate towards monopoly and/or collusion? If there is already a precedent for this model within professional sports, why would this situation be fundamentally different? If a super-majority of the top-25 programs decided that this collusion was in their best interest, the stray holdout here and there would have to go along. What else are they going to do, start their own league without the top-25 teams? Good luck.

I am not asking these questions rhetorically, I have no idea the answers. This is an interesting experiment, to say the least.
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It is fundamentally different because the NFL is a group of 32 teams under one private bubble (the league itself). The NFL itself decided on a salary cap with it's member teams and they all agreed to it. There's no such entity with college sports (the NCAA is a paper tiger that's expressed zero interest in regulating NIL).

The NFL teams wouldn't exist without the NFL organization itself. They have to abide by the rules of the league because there'd be no pro football without it. College football teams don't have that authoritative figure.

If the top 25 teams in your example created an organization to regulate them and attempt to level the playing field, I disagree that the stray teams would have to go along. There is enough money outside those top 25 teams to entice the best players away to make money. You need to remember that with NIL being legal, the best players will chase the money no matter where it comes from. And because of that, schools have no incentive to organize under an umbrella league.

To put it another way, if the Seattle Seahawks decided to leave the NFL and go their own way they'd be dead. If say, Texas or USC or whoever decided they didn't want to live in the salary cap/restriction world, they don't have to and they'd actually be at a huge advantage not living in that world. In your example if the top 25 teams organized and put limitations in place, there would somewhat quickly be a "new" top 25 teams because they'd pay bigger money and get the recruits.

For example if Alabama limited pay to $100,000/year and restricted transferring within it's new conference, but Oregon came in and said we have no limits to pay or transferring, how long do you think Alabama would stay one of the top teams?
 
There's no going back from this. The NIL and the money are here to stay. I do think we'll see, at some point a "division II" again. And a thinning of the ranks of "division I". But how that exactly pans out and what it looks like, I haven't a clue.

I've been saying for nearly 25 years that football is going to look very different in 10 years. I might finally be right.

The precipitous decline in youth football and the ongoing decline in high school participation is the start. That decline isn't due to districts combining, I checked. If you walk through a middle school today, you're going to see more Bayern-Munich and "Messi" shirts than NFL gear. Even in many NFL towns. But soccer isn't the cause. It's the paradigm shift in parents. Parents understand the brain trauma. They may not understand that it's not "concussions", but they don't need to. There are way fewer "By-God-little-Johnny-you're-gonna-grow-up-and-play-football" families. And way more "I think I'm gonna encourage my athletic kid to get into soccer/cross country/basketball/hockey/lacrosse/swimming/or anything but football."

The first signs are schools like Grinnell cancelling the remainder of their football season like they did a few years ago. They were undersized and underskilled. There's just not enough good enough football players to go around and that shows up on the margins. There's high schools here that mothballed their football programs for several years. My kids attended one of the largest suburban high schools in the area and their varsity football team is no cut. They can still safely field teams, but there's never an overabundance of interest. Granted, they have zero history of any kind of success. There's another school here, Webster Groves (source of Adrian Clayborn, who's century+ long Thanksgiving tradition of playing Kirkwood (Tom Poholsky, William Inge)...which has been a cover story feature on Sports Illustrated is considering the future of football as they just can't produce enough players to compete.

I don't know what the collapse brings. Whether it will be a soft landing or a collapse. Let's not forget there's a huge bubble in post-secondary education to begin with, regardless of athletics. It's going to start hitting those smaller schools ("division 3") first. Schools that are probably already financially struggling and use athletics to boost their enrollment. Now, as they shut down football, those players will find homes at slightly larger schools like say UNI. And on up the chain.

In the short term, the NIL and portal helps because of the mobility to say a UNI...or even a Grinnell...that didn't exist before. But the longterm here, I don't see it being good. And while I've always leaned towards a soft landing, the money that's involved now? In the NFL? The value of the teams? The money for college TV contracts? NIL money? It's soooooo high. It's like an overvalued stock. What happens when it slips? I think there'll be panic and chaos. And I think that's way more likely now.

And before you tell me "football is too big to fail", let's talk about boxing. It was the absolute number one sport in the world for hundreds(?) of years?
 
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Fryowa said:
It is fundamentally different because the NFL is a group of 32 teams under one private bubble (the league itself). The NFL itself decided on a salary cap with it's member teams and they all agreed to it. There's no such entity with college sports (the NCAA is a paper tiger that's expressed zero interest in regulating NIL).

The NFL teams wouldn't exist without the NFL organization itself. They have to abide by the rules of the league because there'd be no pro football without it. College football teams don't have that authoritative figure.

If the top 25 teams in your example created an organization to regulate them and attempt to level the playing field, I disagree that the stray teams would have to go along. There is enough money outside those top 25 teams to entice the best players away to make money. You need to remember that with NIL being legal, the best players will chase the money no matter where it comes from. And because of that, schools have no incentive to organize under an umbrella league.

To put it another way, if the Seattle Seahawks decided to leave the NFL and go their own way they'd be dead. If say, Texas or USC or whoever decided they didn't want to live in the salary cap/restriction world, they don't have to and they'd actually be at a huge advantage not living in that world. In your example if the top 25 teams organized and put limitations in place, there would somewhat quickly be a "new" top 25 teams because they'd pay bigger money and get the recruits.

For example if Alabama limited pay to $100,000/year and restricted transferring within it's new conference, but Oregon came in and said we have no limits to pay or transferring, how long do you think Alabama would stay one of the top teams?
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I appreciate your thoughts on the matter, though not sure I agree. There are reasons to think you are right, and that college sports are fundamentally different:

It is akin to a religion, especially CFB in the south. People love the NFL, but not like Alabama fans love their Tide.

The salaries are currently being paid by boosters. I am skeptical of this as a sustainable model.

But I still find it hard to believe that the pro sports model used successfully in all other major US sport is not a possibility. If the top 25 teams decided they were going to form a PROFESSIONAL football league and pay their players a salary, there is not a viable opportunity for anyone to exist outside that league. If you weren't in that league, you would essentially be DII. How are you going to get your boosters to pony up to pay for that?

Ultimately, I know nothing about the ins and outs. But I have yet to be convinced that the way things are is the BEST way, or that it will be the way things are moving forward. I think the future will lie in something so completely different from what we think of as college sports that it isn't even within our realm of possibility yet.

(I made some edits for clarity after re-reading my post)
 
CP87 said:
The salaries are currently being paid by boosters. I am skeptical of this as a sustainable model.

But I still find it hard to believe that the pro sports model used successfully in all other major US sport is not a possibility. If the top 25 teams decided they were going to form a PROFESSIONAL football league and pay their players a salary, there is not a viable opportunity for anyone to exist outside that league. If you weren't in that league, you would essentially be DII. How are you going to get your boosters to pony up to pay for that?
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I think your skepticism is well founded. I know boosters have always been around and enjoy their perks. But I think there is much more of a transactional nature to the NIL money. Just a guess. If I've got soooo much money I'm giving a bunch of it to get my name on the program or in the scoreboard and get to have dinner a couple times with Kurt or Brain that's one thing. If I own a car dealership and have extra money, but not heaps of it and wanna make sure we get that QB from Michigan and I pour in $10k to help out and might get an afternoon with him signing pictures or something, maybe. But I'm gonna need to see an extra 10-20 cars moved that day.

And I wonder how much money shifts from general "booster" money to "NIL" money. And what that means for the rest of the athletic department budget. I'm under the assumption that when Big Bucks Booster throws a half million at the football team, that's a half million that the athletic department doesn't have to come up with out of their budget. Which means a half million can be spent on field hockey or baseball.

I do think we ultimately see a "division II" again. And a "division I". The "Premier College Football Division" or whatever you call it. I can't project what it looks like. Or what it means to the "division II" teams.

I believe that's an interim that will last for several years. But, will ultimately see more sea change.
 
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