Here we go: BIG players want a piece of TV pie

[IBleedMaroonDawg]

As I have posted before The major colleges need to offer a professional sports curriculum. Every other person goes to college to prepare them for their future of choice, Do the same for these people. You can have true academic courses for those that choose to go to the new curriculum. Have classes on law for contracts, finance, communications, business, psychology, Kineseology, etc. along with expansion on the physical requirements necessary to succeed in your chosen sport. Those that want to study for other futures are welcome to do so.

Smartest post in this thread.

One point getting lost in this thread is the fact that if TV money is added to the NIL the blue blood programs and conferences will get an even larger advantage.

What is going to happen to FCS football? Does this make North Dakota and James Madison the last version of amateur football?

 

[PooPopsBaldHead]

I don't blame anyone for being a capitalist, ever. Get paid whatever you can, whenever you can. Would be hypocritical for me to have any other take since it's what I do. But the players are making the wrong argument.

They should be arguing to eliminate Title IX. Football and basketball players could be fairly compensated and everyone, including us fans would be hunky dory if all of our donations and spending went to the respective sports we spend money on. Instead we fund hundreds of scholarships, facilities, and coaches in sports where attendance and interest are virtually non existent. The football and basketball players should be arguing "quit spending the profits we generate on other sports."

So for the last 50 years, we have been paying players... Not just football and basketball, but also track, tennis, soccer, etc players. Their sports are the vampires taking money that could easily be dispersed to the more popular sports' players. It's not cool for the players to make that argument though, but I personally would rather see my money go to the sports I choose to support and it's players instead of funding **** I have no interest in. My favorite thing about NIL is my money is going to the 1 sport I decide, not spread across 20.

So let's rephrase the question a bit. Would you rather have the monies you spend go directly to the programs and participants you choose to support and reward those who most contribute to your enjoyment based on ability and performance? Or would you rather spend/donate the same amount of money to be dispersed to every student athlete on campus (except for 17ing baseball of course) evenly through scholarships, travel costs, coaching salaries, etc?

We currently have a system where all revenues are shared equally amongst the community regardless of the value created by each contributor.... German guy wrote about that system I think. The players are advocating for their share of the pie based on market value if the markets were indeed free. Scottish guy wrote a famous book about that kind of system.

In a way this is almost an Adam Smith vs Karl Marx argument the players are trying to make, but they're not making it... They're just coming across as greedy to a lot of folks.

 

[Smoked Toag]

It's not college baseball or hockey players driving the request for more money either. It's not entirely coincidental that college baseball has ****** scholarships. Some of that is Title IX driven, but the reason it gets hammered rather than football or basketball is that since there has been minor league ball for forever, college baseball just hasn't taken off like college football or basketball.

Both of you can be right at the same time. The 'pay for play' faction thinks it's all about talent, the 'keep it amateur' faction thinks it's all about the brand of the schools. It's both.

 

[Smoked Toag]

They getting rich on your back.

Who is they? Be specific.

 

[Smoked Toag]

If you're going to give them a piece of the pie, it should come from the TV money, since that is what is controlling everything and is what is causing everything to blow up.

It should not be on the alumni/fans/donors to keep up with the Joneses. Our money should go to the schools. TV money can flow to the players. This is where academic greed comes into play - for so long they tried to hide that money. Can't hide it anymore.

 

[Go Budaw]

Okay, but I don’t think college baseball teams are outdrawing MiLB clubs. The Barrons and Nashville Sound are each averaging 7-9K per game. Huntsville’s team is close to 6K. Those numbers would put them in top 95%+ of all D1 baseball programs. The MS Braves show 3K per game. That might be more than all but a handful of SEC schools.

I doubt college hockey is outdrawing ‘minor league’ hockey as well. Our local minor league hockey club has quite a following.

Of course they aren’t….college baseball is a pretty obscure sport to 95% of the country. But the best brands (SEC teams) still attracted the most talent long before NIL ever became a thing.

 

[The Peeper]

Soooo, sports message boards are only for supporting stories, not speaking out against them? That sounds a little like Gene's page. I didn't see anywhere that he said he was "done with college sports" either.

I'm guessing, but don't care enough to look but that I could click your profile and find a past post where you complained about MSU sports, which following your logic here means that you aren't still a fan?

 

[paindonthurt]

Except a college football player gets more than just his education paid.

And very few engineering students get their education paid as a BS student while “working as an engineer”

 

[ronpolk]

Both of you can be right at the same time. The 'pay for play' faction thinks it's all about talent, the 'keep it amateur' faction thinks it's all about the brand of the schools. It's both.

Correct. It is both.

 

[Hot Rock]

Who is they? Be specific.

For one coaches. Players are the ones not able to walk and get brain injuries. If there is a enough money to pay a coaching staff 10 million then it should be three times that allotted for the players. For those of you saying s scholarship is reward enough. I say, bull ****. You can work and go to college and come out just about as well and not have a limp or a headache for the rest of you life.

Plus, there is lots more TV money now than ever before. Back in the day, NFL players got chump change too.

 

[Dawgg]

OK junior ,

LIKE TODAY, they had the best gear available at that time. FWIW they played the "game" because they loved it and wanted to get an education and for your info UNLIKE TODAY most of them already had character when they walked on campus. MOST IMPORTANTLY the game is still causing concussions and spinal injuries even with all the new gear .

The injuries were immaterial to the point I was making. Your 'Pepperidge Farms Remembers' post is referencing something imaginary.

Few things here:
1. The point is that it's foolish for you to believe there was some sort of inherent virtue that existed in your "time" that doesn't exist today. That being said, your elders felt the same way about your generation and their elders felt the same way about theirs. Part of the dogma of reaching middle age, I guess.

2. If you really believe that college players truly played the game simply out of love for the game or to get discipline or for mostly free college and had no interest in receiving financial benefits, then you're delusional. Please post on here that recruits/players didn't take payments from booster networks, agents, or gamblers before NIL. For 17 sakes, the SMU death penalty happened 35 years ago, the Miami Pell Grant scandal is over 30 years old, and CCNY & Kentucky's point shaving happened 70 years ago. Tell me more about this virtuous time of yours.

3. In 1982, Jackie Sherrill signed the richest deal in college sports history to become the head coach and athletic director at Texas A&M. His base was $95,000 a year with perks that could put it at $280,000. Now, adjusted for inflation, that's about $860,000 today. Kirby Smart just signed a deal that's going to put his pay around $11,000,000 a year. In 1986, the SEC distributed about $15 Million (total) to its members. Adjusted for inflation, that's about $40 Million today.Last year, the SEC distributed $777 Million with each school getting over $50 Million. You can't tell me that 30-40 years ago, if you dangled those numbers in front of a college kid, he wouldn't have started doing the math and saying "hey, I'm the one doing two-a-days. I'm the one getting injured. I'm the one in the trenches. Shouldn't I be getting a bigger piece of this pie?"

 

[Seinfeld]

This has been on my mind for a few weeks now, but I haven’t gotten around to putting it in writing. Started when I was looking into some MSU budget info not long ago, and I saw that we had $113M in AD revenue last year. My mind immediately jumped to… how in the **** did we bring in $113M last year, yet we’re also asking fans for $25/mo in order to fund NIL?

Well, the short answer is that while football operated at a surplus, and men’s basketball broke even, there was $20M in expenses for other sports that were entirely unsubstantiated by their own revenues. And this is just operating expenses mind you, and there’s no telling what the gaps would be when we start talking facility upgrades and such.

Bottom line, people tend to forget that these schools are operating as non-profits, and as much as players scoff at this, there aren’t too many people at the universities outside of a few coaches and ADs getting rich. Splitting the pie is gonna have a lot more to do with what you mentioned than a redistribution of wealth.

 

[Smoked Toag]

For one coaches. Players are the ones not able to walk and get brain injuries. If there is a enough money to pay a coaching staff 10 million then it should be three times that allotted for the players. For those of you saying s scholarship is reward enough. I say, bull ****. You can work and go to college and come out just about as well and not have a limp or a headache for the rest of you life.

Plus, there is lots more TV money now than ever before. Back in the day, NFL players got chump change too.

So.....why didn't you just say "coaches", rather than "they". Saying "they" makes it sound like there is some mysterious boogeyman sitting in an office smoking a cigar figuring out ways to screw people. That's what the 'pay-for-play' faction wants you to think, and that **** just ain't true. And for the record, I totally agree.....it's COACHES that have ruined this, they are the only ones "getting rich". You may blame the NCAA or administrators or whoever, but it's only coaches that are getting rich. Maybe a lot of other people collectively (i.e. people who make a salary working for the NCAA or a college athletic department) are leaching off of it, but definitely not getting rich. Maybe Greg Sankey and other commissioners. And then the ADs.

But I still tend to think that because people are saying "they" rather than getting specific, it's just a function of the sport out-growing itself. There's nowhere else for the money to go. It SHOULD come from the TV deals, but looks like the NCAA/ADs aren't going to allow that, which gives the players more of a voice to *****.

 

[Go Budaw]

As I have posted before The major colleges need to offer a professional sports curriculum. Every other person goes to college to prepare them for their future of choice, Do the same for these people. You can have true academic courses for those that choose to go to the new curriculum. Have classes on law for contracts, finance, communications, business, psychology, Kineseology, etc. along with expansion on the physical requirements necessary to succeed in your chosen sport. Those that want to study for other futures are welcome to do so.

Completely agree. (Fill in the blank sport) Playing and Coaching should be an actual degree program for each sport. All “curriculum” is driven by the coaches and athletic academic support staff. Practice hours, film review, weight training, conditioning, etc all earn official credit hours. Players stay eligible as long as they stay in the good standing of their coaches…..simple as that. Its a viable career path, not only for players reaching the professional ranks but also for coaching and athletic training career opportunities. For players that really do want to pursue an actual academic degree, they can do so as a double-major, and its no different than it is now.

If we’re gonna go down this ridiculous NIL path, its simply an absurd proposition for these high profile athletes who show up with six and seven figure sums already in their pockets that have to sit through Intro to Theater or Business Calculus or whatever the 17 else they would have to pass to stay eligible. The first universities who actually figure this out and cut out the traditional academic side entirely will also have at least a short term to intermediate term recruiting advantage. Take a school like MSU, we might not be able to match the NIL monies of other schools. But if we can take the above steps and at least be able to pitch a quality of life improvement (WAY more free time) to players in all sports, we could be more competitive. Might as well be a school like us to lead it; it’s not like we ever will have some pristine academic reputation to protect.

 

[PooPopsBaldHead]

Bottom line, people tend to forget that these schools are operating as non-profits, and as much as players scoff at this, there aren’t too many people at the universities outside of a few coaches and ADs getting rich. Splitting the pie is gonna have a lot more to do with what you mentioned than a redistribution of wealth.

Yup. I would love for someone to publicly explain this to the players.

Let's use football/NFL as the example. In the NFL, the players get 48% of revenue. So all NFL revenue is added up, divided by 32, and multiplied by 48% to create the following season's salary cap. If that same model took place in college football, I would guess $80 million of Mississippi State's revenue is directly created by football. This is how it should go:

"So football players, you get $39 million. We will subtract out your tuition, room, ,meals, books, etc. Now we are left with $34 million. This is your salary for the season. But unfortunately, we have been spending that money on scholarships for all of the other sports outside of men's basketball, plus their equipment, staff, travel, facilities, etc."

"Gonna need you to walk down there and tell them all that they don't get any more scholarship money or any other kind of support from the athletic department moving forward. They are now all regular students and are more than welcome to create a club team."

"Oh, you know what, that's actually still not enough Mr. Football Player. Turns out we are still a few million dollars in the red. Gonna need to let go of those GA's and a good chunk of the training staff, but you're more than welcome to hire your own personal trainers with your own money."

"Cool? Thanks Bubby."

They'd all become absolute pariahs and would be begging for the old days as the entire world turned on them.

 

[Bulldog Bruce]

I have in the past mentioned this to past ADs and even one of our Presidents. Nothing has come to fruition. It always bugged me when I was there staying in MacArthur hall and the Architecture building was across the street with it's lights on all night because those people that wanted to be architects where allowed to full bore study to be architects. I had to do business and then switched to physical education and had no desire to do either at that time. I had to use all that extra time to do the thing I actually wanted to do.

 

[57stratdawg]

I know there is value in the school’s brands, but the Supreme Court killed the NCAA’s business model. This thread is full of “IM DONE!”. I don’t see why anyone would be pissy at the players. If you’re really set on seeing legally uncompensated players - shouldn’t you be mad at the Court?

It passed 9-0, BTW.

 

[Go Budaw]

I know there is value in the school’s brands, but the Supreme Court killed the NCAA’s business model. This thread is full of “IM DONE!”. I don’t see why anyone would be pissy at the players. If you’re really set on seeing legally uncompensated players - shouldn’t you be mad at the Court?

It passed 9-0, BTW.

I think most people who are “done” are done not because players are being paid, but rather due to the inequality and lack of the actual payments following the spirit of the ruling. That spirit is players actually making money on their likeness and not just a quid pro quo.

In college football, MAYBE 1% of players are legitimately able to make any decent money off their likeness and their likeness alone.

By “legitimately”, I mean either of the following:
1) Player sells some token / memorabilia that they wore, used, etc that is NOT in any way associated with the school. Game worn cleats, socks, wrist band, etc. Or they sell autographs or Instagram likes / comments or what have you.
2) Player endorses a business or product, business pays player for endorsement, and business actually increases revenue from said endorsement by an amount that exceeds what they paid the player.

Ask yourself how many players can legitimately make even a 5-figure sum under either of the above criteria….let alone these high six-figure and seven figure sums that are seen above? You could probably count them on one hand. But instead, you have even the walk-ons at non-powerhouse schools like BYU making absurd sums like $25k per year.

That’s the issue. Even if every Power 5 scholarship football player made $5 million per year (no more, no less) there wouldn’t be an issue….because that’s equitable. But it’s completely unregulated and therefore the spirit of competition has been completely destroyed. Coaches no longer recruit players, alumni and boosters do. Its nothing more than a giant fundraising competition between schools. And by the way, the court didn’t pass anything related to NIL yet.

 

[johnson86-1]

I know there is value in the school’s brands, but the Supreme Court killed the NCAA’s business model. This thread is full of “IM DONE!”. I don’t see why anyone would be pissy at the players. If you’re really set on seeing legally uncompensated players - shouldn’t you be mad at the Court?

It passed 9-0, BTW.

No, it didn't. The court ruled on a cap involving educational related benefits. Kavanaugh also wrote a concurrence that indicated he would be willing to do away with amateurism altogether, but it's unclear how many judges would go that far. It does seems likely the NCAA would lose if they litigated over amateurism, but it's a moot point because enough states have passed statutes that the NCAA can't really operate as they did before.

Unfortunately, the only way to have college sports that aren't a massive drain on the potential resources available to the universities is to pass federal legislation exempting schools from certain aspects of antitrust (and pre-empting certain state laws outlawing school enforced amateurism) in order to allow schools that want to to sponsor amateur athletic competition. That's extremely unlikely to happen.

 

[Smoked Toag]

I know there is value in the school’s brands, but the Supreme Court killed the NCAA’s business model. This thread is full of “IM DONE!”. I don’t see why anyone would be pissy at the players. If you’re really set on seeing legally uncompensated players - shouldn’t you be mad at the Court?

It passed 9-0, BTW.

You're not wrong. There's really no one to blame. The system just got too big and blew up.

 

[Emma’s Dad]

Just wait until Title IX and notions of equity get factored in, alongside union membership and collective bargaining. If we pretend these are “student athletes”, the women’s bowling team will want to be treated equitably (that is, not in relation to their financial contribution to the athletic program but on equal footing). Someone will argue (logically, I might add) that Joe QB’s NIL deal is made valuable because of the platform provided by the college, not just the player’s value as a free agent. The “disenfranchised” members of the women’s bowling team (those with little economic value or physical ability as compared with Joe QB) will seek equity and a piece of the NIL money too. Then the schools and NCAA will have a problem: are the athletes student athletes or professionals plain and simple. The teams and players with high value (football) will separate from the schools to protect their financial value and to avoid sharing with the smaller sports. And then donor support will crater because most of us watch and support college sports because of the connection with our school. The golden goose will have choked on dollar bills.

 

[Dawgzilla]

At some point you have to wonder if Universities should even be in this business? For me, that point has already passed, but as you get closer and closer to professional teams that just use the school as their base of operation you have to wonder what the point is.

As for the analogies between football players and regular old college students, the biggest difference I see is that the athletes don't need school to learn their profession. They just need football (or basketball, or whatever). The engineering student that could get paid by a Fortune 500 company to earn a degree is learning things they would not learn on the job. The athlete is certainly still developing and probably not ready for the big leagues, but they don't need their college classes for that development.

I get that college sports, and football specifically, do a lot for alumni relations and even student recruiting. We need big entertainment events that bring alums back to campus. And the sports teams build licensing revenue and create exposure. But, does a not profit organization need to be in the professional sports business?

I think not. Let the professionals have their developmental leagues, and leave college sports to the students. If we didn't have sports scholarships, we wouldn't have to worry about Title IX so much.

 

[GhostOfJackie]

Congress really needs to step in here. With their track record, Congressional action of the only way to solve this problem.

 

[thatsbaseball]

I fear that, as the game becomes more openly all about the money, the fact that although the percentage of college players making it to the league is not going to change the emphasis on education for those who won't make it is going farther down the priority list. I can see a bunch of kids getting a couple hundred thousand for playing college ball and figuring they've got it made for life only to find out in their mid twenties they're as broke as they were in high school.

 

[mcdawg22]

Soooo, sports message boards are only for supporting stories, not speaking out against them? That sounds a little like Gene's page. I didn't see anywhere that he said he was "done with college sports" either.

I'm guessing, but don't care enough to look but that I could click your profile and find a past post where you complained about MSU sports, which following your logic here means that you aren't still a fan?

It isn’t about complaining. I complain all of the time about MSU athletics. It’s the people who say 17 the athletes I’m done with them. Or I’m done with college sports. What’s the point of posting on a sports message board that revolves around college sports if you are done with college sports? (Not directed at you.) The Walking Dead got to a point where I was done with it. I don’t go to Walking Dead message boards and tell everyone I’m done with it.

 

[The Peeper]

Yep with the US Govts record of running the USPS, Social Security, Medicare, and the national debt, NIL should be a piece of cake

 

[philduckworth]

I've never understood why Football and the 85 scholarships aren't excluded from Title IX since there is no female equivalent.