Tony Petitti shares thoughts on NIL, transfer portal issues

Tony Petitti shared his thoughts on the evolving world of NIL and the transfer portal, during his first Big Ten Media Days as commissioner.

He was asked about “putting the horse back in the barn,” presumably to turn back the clock before the madness. But the commissioner put it into perspective on how to move forward.

“One of the things that we’re most focused on is the incentives for students that are considering leaving,” Petitti said. “When you have a system that’s providing potential benefits for entering the portal, a lot of athletes unfortunately aren’t realizing those benefits when they enter the portal. There is a little bit of the grass is greener on the other side.

“When I spend time with our coaches, the portal is an absolute priority. I think the combination of what’s happening in terms of the benefits that are being provided with the freedom to move, that combination really came together at the same time.”

Petitti mentioned how it creates many incentives, and it continues to evolve.

“You’ve seen this system now operate together,” Petitti said. “It’s creating all kinds of different incentives that are fueling lots more kids to get there.

“I think when I talk to our leadership, what I get is the real deep concern about what’s going to happen with graduation as students move at the levels that we’re seeing today. Moving credits and major changes, all those things are important. I think we’re going to see the results of that pretty shortly with the data that comes out from this flood.”

Petitti hammered home focusing on the incentives regarding NIL and the ability to transfer.

“The first idea is, what can you do around the incentives,” Petitti said. “We need to really spend a lot of time on that. That’s what I think our focus is. That’s why I talk about the difference between true NIL and NIL that really isn’t NIL. We got to do a better job of explaining what each thing is, right? They’re two very different things.”

Tony Petitti opens up on NIL, transfer portal

Tony Petitti wanted to focus on what “true NIL” could be in the world of college athletics. He clarified the actual meaning.

“Look, I want to provide some clarity with what true NIL means,” Petitti said. “When I say ‘true NIL’ I mean the ability of a student-athlete to take advantage of their marketing rights from either local or national companies. That depends on your ability, your exposure you receive, the strength of your social media, all those factors. All of that is great. That should be unlimited.

“What we’re seeing, though, is a sense of, because there’s been a lack of enforcement around traditional things like inducements for pay-for-play, we’re seeing money move in different places. It’s away from our member institutions.”

However, to make sure it doesn’t get out of control, if it is, Petitti wants to be able to enforce certain rules on NIL and the transfer portal.

“I think what we can do is, number one, we have very long-standing rules to address this,” Petitti said. “We need to have the ability to enforce our rules. Partly we need support from Congress to be able to be put in a position to do that without litigation or anything hanging over our heads. That’s the balance. Try to explain the differences between those two.

“Look, in addition you’re seeing states come forward and pass legislation that is really obviously driven for one thing: to create more competitive power in that state. That’s just not the right place for us to be.”