A new era of pay-for-play is here for college football

[aubiefifty 18,248]

A new era of pay-for-play is here for college football

By Joseph Goodman | jgoodman@al.com

6-7 minutes

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Bo Jackson reshaped the Iron Bowl rivalry when he chose the Tigers and coach Pat Dye over Alabama.

Don’t want to make anyone feel too old, but that was two generations ago this spring. This fall will be the 40th anniversary of Jackson’s freshman season at Auburn. No pressure, Tank Bigsby, but given the historical nature of the Iron Bowl rivalry, it’s worth noting that Auburn’s current coaching staff has already announced its intentions to feature Bigsby this fall.

We’ll see.

Auburn’s spring scrimmage is Saturday, April 9. Alabama’s A-Day, featuring Heisman Trophy winning-quarterback Bryce Young, is a week later. Both teams practiced this week as attention in the state shifted from the NCAA Tournament back to college football.

In the 40 years since Jackson changed the Iron Bowl, Auburn and Alabama are 20-20 against each other on the field. That’s amazing, isn’t it? What a game. What a state. What will the future hold for Auburn and Alabama?

We like to compartmentalize our college football into eras, and a new one began this spring with the proliferation of “NIL collectives.”

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What are NIL collectives? They’re not as fun as the Iron Bowl that’s for sure, but they could determine the future of this rivalry and the further financial impact of college football in the state. “NIL collective” is the new term for a company formed by boosters and fans of a team to raise money for their players, and it’s totally legal. Boosters can’t pay players directly, but their collectives can give money to third-party companies that then distribute that cash in creative ways for the use of a player’s name, image and likeness.

In other words, now you, too, can pay players like a big mule and consider yourself an SEC bagman.

Every offensive linemen who goes to Texas, for example, now gets $50,000. Jimbo Fisher doesn’t want to admit it, but NIL collectives for Texas A&M helped the Aggies land their No.1-ranked recruiting class. Tennessee recently received a commitment from a five-star quarterback in California, and that wasn’t happening before this new age of NIL. The rumor is that the player is in line to receive $2 million per year by way of Tennessee’s NIL collective.

No one anticipated this development when NIL was made legal by the NCAA on July 1, 2021, but it didn’t take long to get here. While SEC coaches are forming teams this spring, SEC boosters are forming NIL collectives in the name of school pride. In this league, which they say always means a little more, that’s kind of a scary thought.

I’m happy for college football players who are finally getting paid for sacrificing their bodies in the name of a game that makes hundreds of millions of dollars for universities. Gotta tell you, though. I’m not thrilled by the idea of NIL collectives. In its current form, it looks like college football is barreling towards an arm’s race without sufficient guardrails.

Don’t believe anyone who says they know where college football is heading, but y’all best bring your pocketbooks along for the ride. Maybe NIL collectives will turn into the checks-and-balances system that college football has badly needed, but it’s hard to see a clean path to that future.

The lawyers would call it something different, but the real-world application of NIL collectives is pay-for-play. And so I’m left wondering, as reports surface of multi-million dollar deals for players who are still in high school, how much money an NIL collective would have paid to get Bo Jackson to Auburn?

Or Derrick Henry to Alabama.

Or Leonard Fournette to LSU.

How much money are fans willing to pay for high school quarterback Arch Manning, who is the No.1-ranked prospect for the 2023 recruiting cycle? Boosters can’t buy victories, but they can now indirectly buy players through shell companies that are above board. The richest alumni bases have always had an advantage, so maybe this is just a situation of the rich getting richer.

On the other hand, perhaps wealthy alums of smaller programs will be more willing to pay for players than they were for coaches and facilities.

Leave it to SMU to come up with the perfect name to sum up this new trend in college football.

It was SMU, remember, that was given the death penalty for paying players. That was 1987. In 2022, one of SMU’s NIL collectives is called “Pony Up.”

For the Iron Bowl rivalry, there was everything before and after Bo Jackson. For the SEC at large, there was an era before Nick Saban and then everything since. This new age of NIL collectives feels just as significant as those milestones.

Before “Bo Over The Top,” which is the given nickname for the 1982 Iron Bowl, Auburn had only won four games against Alabama from 1959 to 1981. Despite Saban building one of the greatest dynasties in sports history, the Iron Bowl rivalry enters the 2022 season dead even over the last 40 years.

How much is Bo Jackson worth to Auburn? Many millions. Just keep this in mind when it comes to the Iron Bowl, though. Sometimes the romanticism of college football cannot be bought. As a new era of NIL collectives begins, it’s worth remembering that Jackson says he turned down $5 million from the New York Yankees to play football for the Tigers.

Joseph Goodman is a columnist for the Alabama Media Group, and author of “We Want Bama: A season of hope and the making of Nick Saban’s ‘ultimate team’”. You can find him on Twitter @JoeGoodmanJr.

[Mikey 16,781]

On 3/25/2022 at 11:26 AM, aubiefifty said:

No one anticipated this development when NIL was made legal by the NCAA on July 1, 2021, but it didn’t take long to get here.

Quote is from the article. I think many on this board anticipated the rich getting richer, though the exact mechanism was not yet known. Few, if any college football fans are against players getting money for playing, they earn it. Anyone who had football or scholarship athletes in other sports in their classes at Auburn knows those athletes earn what they get. However, I'm not certain that this current NIL system doesn't mark the end of college sports as we have known them.

[WarTim 3,525]

It’s over

[russnagel1 27]

No one may have anticipated the exact development of the NIL collective. Anyone that didn't know this would turn into pay for play is extremely naive. I thought the NCAA fought NIL to the bitter end. Once California made it legal, there was not much the NCAA could do after that.

[DAG 34,763]

A lot of pocket watching going on 

[W.E.D 11,071]

Good for the players. They deserve it. Glad it's above the table now and everyone sees it

[aubaseball 2,819]

16 minutes ago, W.E.D said:

Good for the players. They deserve it. Glad it's above the table now and everyone sees it

I completely disagree.  They don’t deserve it.   You earn it.   And that’s the problem.   A kid coming out of high school and never playing a down of college football doesn’t deserve a million dollars.   Meanwhile, the track, baseball, tennis, swimming and so on, have to pay to play sports.   Why don’t they deserve a full scholarship?   Until that is fixed, everything else is just bullsh*t.   
 

[AUApostle 7,762]

44 minutes ago, aubaseball said:

I completely disagree.  They don’t deserve it.   You earn it.   And that’s the problem.   A kid coming out of high school and never playing a down of college football doesn’t deserve a million dollars.   Meanwhile, the track, baseball, tennis, swimming and so on, have to pay to play sports.   Why don’t they deserve a full scholarship?   Until that is fixed, everything else is just bullsh*t.   
 

A 5-star recruit who has played the publicity game correctly is highly valued and is entitled to whatever some poor soul is willing to pay him.  Compensation in nearly every profession is part meritocracy, part all that other stuff we generally loathe.

Why does a D1 tennis player “deserve” compensation?  If enough people want to watch them play or if enough t-shirts are sold because of their presence on the team, they’ll get it.

[W.E.D 11,071]

1 hour ago, aubaseball said:

They don’t deserve it.  

Market says otherwise 

[DAG 34,763]

1 hour ago, aubaseball said:

I completely disagree.  They don’t deserve it.   You earn it.   And that’s the problem.   A kid coming out of high school and never playing a down of college football doesn’t deserve a million dollars.   Meanwhile, the track, baseball, tennis, swimming and so on, have to pay to play sports.   Why don’t they deserve a full scholarship?   Until that is fixed, everything else is just bullsh*t.   
 

How you going to speak on what another person deserves ? They aren’t forcing the schools to pay them . You deserve what you negotiator and whomever is willing to pay you. So let me guess , if a school offered you six figures out of high school you would refuse it because it’s unfair to the softball players, right ?

[W.E.D 11,071]

1 hour ago, aubaseball said:

Meanwhile, the track, baseball, tennis, swimming and so on, have to pay to play sports.   Why don’t they deserve a full scholarship?   Until that is fixed, everything else is just bullsh*t.  

I know this is difficult to comprehend with your obvious bias in your username, but those sports being in nearly zero money and probably are drains to the university.

Also, the university isn't paying these kids, so it really doesn't matter what scholarships are being paid or not when this isn't a school money stream 

[aubaseball 2,819]

1 hour ago, AUDevil said:

A 5-star recruit who has played the publicity game correctly is highly valued and is entitled to whatever some poor soul is willing to pay him.  Compensation in nearly every profession is part meritocracy, part all that other stuff we generally loathe.

Why does a D1 tennis player “deserve” compensation?  If enough people want to watch them play or if enough t-shirts are sold because of their presence on the team, they’ll get it.

I didn’t say compensation.  I said full scholarship 

[Sizzle 3,948]

Pay for play is nothing new. Bama didn’t just start randomly dominating for no reason. Same for early 2000’s USC

[aubaseball 2,819]

It’s ok fellas to disagree.  You think they deserve it because they were good in high school.   Got it.   I don’t think that is what everyone was shooting for when this thing started.   It’s what I knew would happen.   So the fourth string lineman (that will never see the field) deserves 50k a year to ride the bench (UT).   Got it.   
 

As far as the other sports, if you think it is fair that the University is making all that money but can’t afford to give full rides in other sports, you either didn’t play or don’t have a kid trying to get a scholarship in those sports.  

[aubaseball 2,819]

1 hour ago, DAG said:

How you going to speak on what another person deserves ? They aren’t forcing the schools to pay them . You deserve what you negotiator and whomever is willing to pay you. So let me guess , if a school offered you six figures out of high school you would refuse it because it’s unfair to the softball players, right ?

Again, not what I said.   I think the baseball player and the softball player deserve full rides.   

So if the boosters/money people are getting these kids to sign, why does the Athletic department need to spend all that money on recruiting?  Why couldn’t some of that money go to full scholarships in other sports?

[aubaseball 2,819]

1 hour ago, W.E.D said:

Market says otherwise 

Market!!! What a joke.   This nothing more than rich boosters wanting to throw money at a kid they have no idea if he is going to be any good or not.   

[W.E.D 11,071]

6 minutes ago, aubaseball said:

Market!!! What a joke.   This nothing more than rich boosters wanting to throw money at a kid they have no idea if he is going to be any good or not.   

Just like they did before.

But you nailed it. It's ppl unrelated to schools doing this. Crying about a scholarship provided by the school isn't even the same discussion 

[ThurstontheWelshCorgi 576]

it's ironic to me that the previous debate was "should we pay all college athletes x amount of dollars" to "let's just give a handful of stars bookoo amounts of money".

 

[JDUBB4AU 5,287]

Guys y’all are compiling about NIL? We get NCAA football back on Xbox  finally lol

The game was never pure. The NCAA has been ruining college football since it’s inception. 

[DAG 34,763]

1 hour ago, aubaseball said:

Again, not what I said.   I think the baseball player and the softball player deserve full rides.   

So if the boosters/money people are getting these kids to sign, why does the Athletic department need to spend all that money on recruiting?  Why couldn’t some of that money go to full scholarships in other sports?

What? You legit just said a high school player doesn’t deserve that money . Then turned around and cited, how other sports individuals have to pay to play. So once again , I just asked you what would you do if you were offered that money? Would you say no because other athletes aren’t  getting full rides? It’s a pretty simple question and a scenario you specifically put out there.

 

[W.E.D 11,071]

36 minutes ago, DAG said:

What? You legit just said a high school player doesn’t deserve that money . Then turned around and cited, how other sports individuals have to pay to play. So once again , I just asked you what would you do if you were offered that money? Would you say no because other athletes aren’t  getting full rides? It’s a pretty simple question and a scenario you specifically put out there.

 

He's clearly got some bias towards baseball.

[woodford 3,732]

40 minutes ago, JDUBB4AU said:

Guys y’all are compiling about NIL? We get NCAA football back on Xbox  finally lol

The game was never pure. The NCAA has been ruining college football since it’s inception. 

Agreed. NCAA is the problem. It can't be reformed, so we need a new league imo.

If anyone is getting mad/upset that a HS kid can make 6-7 figures to play college sports they are 1 or 2 things:

1. Envious

2. Socialist

 

The best players have always gotten paid. Always. This is a fact. This is nothing new. The only thing different about it is that the numbers are going up because you can legally pay and companies can sponsor.

The fact this is an Auburn board and some people aren't comfortable with kids getting paid. Boy, do I have some stories for you.

[japantiger 4,118]

I don't see the NCAA surviving very long.  Not sure why the major conferences are letting them get in the way of further liberalization of the compensation rules, set the terms of playoffs, etc., any longer.  The NCAA doesn't really work in anyone's interest but the NCAA's.  

As I have said before, some of this will be ridiculous for a while until folks figure out what kind of spending actually makes sense.  Just like with most sports endorsements, a few will hit it big...most won't.  But, many will get some $$ that will make a big change to their financial circumstances...hope they can manage it and it helps propel them to a better life.

[casatiger 514]

1 hour ago, woodford said:

Agreed. NCAA is the problem. It can't be reformed, so we need a new league imo.

If anyone is getting mad/upset that a HS kid can make 6-7 figures to play college sports they are 1 or 2 things:

1. Envious

2. Socialist

 

The best players have always gotten paid. Always. This is a fact. This is nothing new. The only thing different about it is that the numbers are going up because you can legally pay and companies can sponsor.

The fact this is an Auburn board and some people aren't comfortable with kids getting paid. Boy, do I have some stories for you.

I like stories.  

[Sizzle 3,948]

2 hours ago, woodford said:

Agreed. NCAA is the problem. It can't be reformed, so we need a new league imo.

If anyone is getting mad/upset that a HS kid can make 6-7 figures to play college sports they are 1 or 2 things:

1. Envious

2. Socialist

 

The best players have always gotten paid. Always. This is a fact. This is nothing new. The only thing different about it is that the numbers are going up because you can legally pay and companies can sponsor.

The fact this is an Auburn board and some people aren't comfortable with kids getting paid. Boy, do I have some stories for you.

Cam didn’t come to Auburn just because of his love for Auburn