Steve Spurrier offers solution for the transfer portal/NIL
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — One thing that Steve Spurrier never had to deal with as a head coach of more than 25 years at the college level was the transfer portal or NIL. The current model doesn’t leave a lot of downtime for not only head coaches, but their assistants, graduate assistants, recruiting personnel, or anyone in the business.
“I don’t think, in between the games themselves, is no fun for these coaches. Most of them I ask them if they have a little time to play golf? They say they might have about two weeks a year to play golf, whereas back in the 90s, we had an offseason,” Spurrier told Zac and Jay of WDAE radio in Tampa Bay. “We could play as soon as recruiting was over in February, we’d play golf until, oh about August or something like that. Yeah, it’s no fun.”
There has been internal discussions across college football campuses among athletic directors, coaches, and staff. The current model isn’t sustainable for the college game and we’re seeing college coaches who have the opportunity to go to the NFL jump at the chance. Speaking with the media prior to his Gator Caravan meeting in Jacksonville, Florida Gators head coach Billy Napier offered his perspective.
“I just think we’ve got to get some type of rhythm to our calendar if not we’re going to run our people in the ground, I think so it’s just non-stop and I think it’s important we adjust for the quality of life of the assistant coach but also our personnel staff, our recruiting staff, the ability for the second tier some of our quality control analysts, interns to be involved, a little bit more hands-on from a football standpoint. We’ve got the infrastructure to execute it.”
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Steve Spurrier offers a potential NIL solution
There’s also the issue of NIL. Name, Image, and Likeness have taken over college sports with some athletes reportedly making a million dollars or more through sponsorship deals or through collectives. We’re likely heading towards a time where schools will just be able to outright play players themselves but does that make student-athletes employees? Maybe independent contractors? What does that do to scholarships and how does Title IX limit or change what schools can do moving forward? While the schools and the NCAA figure out how to fix the mess the NCAA refused to do anything about for more than a decade, Spurrier offered an idea of how to even the playing field now.
“They’ve gotta do something about it. I think they gotta come up with a budget. The Power Five teams, you’ve got $30 million to spend. If you want to give it all to the quarterback, that’s your business. But put a limit and let them spread it out and go from there. It will help even out things a little bit as far as getting recruiting back into the game. Right now it’s just about whoever’s going to pay the most money. That’s not the way it should be. And, actually, those teams that pay the most money don’t win all the time anyway. I think Texas A&M Miami and Southern Cal have been three of the biggest spenders here in the last couple years or so but they have not won big. You still gotta have good attitude, good teamwork and players playing for each other out there.”
