What you end up with is a watered down version of basketball that no one cares about cause these guys don’t have much pro potential and the focus switches to something else (ala Women’s College Basketball)
I never said these players shouldn’t be compensated for their name image and likeness, I’m saying that it has to be controlled. The sports are being watered down because the focus is more on being paid. Mind you, the NCAA and the colleges are not footing the bill so it bothers me when people act as if the NCAA and the schools are not still profiting off of these kids.
Not even sure how to respond to this.
All I’m saying is that you have to put protocols in place to keep some level of control. Lots of people and social media with no understanding of internal workings of how this sports operates are influencing these decisions and causing chaos.
And I do believe these schools are operating at a financial loss in a lot of these situations while people believe they are “generating millions”. I happen to know for a fact that there are schools that are operating with 8 figure deficits just to try and keep up.
I think we’re a lot closer to the same viewpoint on this than it might have come off. I 100% agree that it needs better management and oversight for it to work as intended. It’s the Wild West right now out there, and it for sure has an impact on the court, pools and fields. But until it’s better regulated, I’m totally ok with the players going out and getting everything they can for themselves
And while I would prefer that the people actually making money off the play of the players were the ones footing the bill for the NIL, that’s the line in the sand that’s been drawn by the NCAA, who are, curiously, the ones who have the most to gain by not footing the bill from their own pockets. But can you blame them if they have businesses practically falling over themselves to dole out NIL money to these players? And as long as they’re getting something “valuable” back in exchange for those NIL dollars, it would seem that the system is “working” for all parties involved.
The one place that I feel we do differ is that people will care less if the product isn’t as good on field/court. Ratings would suggest otherwise. People still care. A lot. And while there were still a fair number of upsets and instability within the bracket this year, it still wound up being largely chalk at the end, save for a Cinderella run by NC State (Damnit. Damnitdamnit. (Still waiting for Marquette to hit some 3’s)). As far as I can tell, NIL has just meant that people are talking about college sports even more than before. Whether it’s trying to figure out how the hell it works and what it means, or about the unknown it brings to the sports, and rarely in a bad way.
While I’m sure there are some schools out there that are operating at a loss, my guess would be that they might not have the benefit of a robust football and basketball program to help foot the bill. And a lot of these schools will have to decide what it is they want to do and where they want to dig their heels in against the system. It will mean they lose out on some prospects for sure, but I don’t see how that’s any different than what pulls people to different professional sports teams when they’re free agents. I’m a huge Brewers fan, and I know that every year the Yankees and Mets and the Effing Dodgers will outspend Milwaukee by a mile. Does it suck? Sure does. And I won’t say it doesn’t. But does a salary cap fix the problem? Probably a little, but there will still be huge disparities. Same in the NCAA.
And do I think a bunch of people with no business making real decisions on the issues forced the hand of the NCAA into making this decision? Yup! Do I care? Not really. The powers that be dragged their feet on this issue for far too long. They could have worked on how to roll this out in a coordinated and meaningful fashion, but they chose to count their money instead. I’m just happy that anyone gave traction to the problem and got the ball moving. Now they need to figure out how to level the playing field as much as possible for all parties involved to corral the instability.
TLDR: NCAA bad! Product good (enough, for now)
