NCAA Board of Governors accepts $2.8B settlement proposal

aubiefifty · May 23

al.com

Published: May. 22, 2024, 10:08 p.m.

5–7 minutes

Sports

NCAA Board of Governors accepts $2.8B settlement proposal, could pave way for paying players

University presidents around the country are scheduled to meet this week to vote on whether to accept a proposed settlement of an antitrust lawsuit that would cost the NCAA nearly $3 billion in damages. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)AP

As the NCAA moved closer Wednesday to a $2.8 billion settlement that could resolve three antitrust lawsuits — with the Big Ten the latest conference to give its approval — it was uncertain whether a fourth case will also be part of the agreement.

Attorneys in Fontenot v. the NCAA said they would like their case to the stay in federal court in Colorado instead of being moved to California and combined with another antitrust lawsuit involving college sports. They said they won’t know whether their claims would be covered by the settlement until they have all the details of the proposal.

“One way or the other, they have to deal with us or I just don’t see how a settlement ultimately gets done,” said George Zelcs, one of the plaintiffs’ attorneys. “They have to either include us or get an order that requires us to be involved in it. All of which we have arguments against as well.”

The NCAA and five major college conferences named in the House v. NCAA lawsuit that is at the center of settlement talks have asked U.S. District Judge Charlotte Sweeney in Colorado to combine the Fontenot case with Carter v. the NCAA, which is being heard in the Northern District of California.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs in House v. the NCAA have given the defendants a Thursday deadline to agree to a settlement. As expected, the NCAA completed its three-part approval process Wednesday night with its 15-member Board of Governors voting unanimously to accept the proposal — with one member abstaining — according to two people with direct knowledge of the vote. The people spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the NCAA was not publicly revealing its internal process.

The Big 12 and Atlantic Coast Conference presidential boards voted to move forward with the settlement on Tuesday. Big Ten presidents voted to approve the deal Wednesday during spring meetings in Los Angeles, a person with direct knowledge of the decision told AP on condition of anonymity because the conference was not making its internal discussions public.

Southeastern Conference and Pac-12 presidents are scheduled to meet Thursday and consider the settlement agreement.

Under terms of the proposed agreement, the NCAA will pay $2.77 billion over 10 years to former and current college athletes who were denied by now-defunct rules the ability to earn money from endorsement and sponsorship deals dating to 2016. The NCAA and conferences also would agree to establish a revenue-sharing system, with schools allowed to spend up about $21 million a year on their athletes.

House and Hubbard v. NCAA have already been combined in the Northern District of California and are being overseen by U.S. Judge Claudia Wilken, who has ruled against the NCAA in several high-profile antitrust cases in recent years.

Carter is being overseen by U.S. Judge Richard Seeborg. Fontenot would be added to Seeborg’s cases.

Former Colorado football player Alex Fontenot filed his lawsuit last November, claiming NCAA rules have illegally prevented college athletes from earning their fair share of the millions of dollars in revenue schools bring in. Garrett Broshuis, Zelcs’ colleague at the law firm Korein Tillery, said the Fontenot case should not be combined with the other three because they have fundamental differences.

“House was focused on name, image and likeness issues, which is really just a small segment of the overall revenue that the NCAA and the conferences and their members are bringing in,” Broshuis told AP. “Our case is instead focusing on what would be the true free-market value of the services being provided by these athletes.”

Broshuis said the Carter case focuses on just basketball and football players from Power Five conferences — ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and SEC.

“Whereas the Fontenot proposed class is broader than that. Revenue is revenue no matter what sport,” he said.

The House case is a class-action lawsuit that seeks back pay for college athletes who were denied name, image and likeness compensation dating to 2016. The NCAA lifted its ban on athletes earning NIL money in 2021.

Steve Berman, one of the lead attorneys in House, said in a statement to AP the issues in Fontenot completely overlap with the other cases and the settlement — if approved — “will release all of their claims.”

“And as for their claim they are waiting to see if they want to be part of it, they already laid out objections to the court in Colorado without even seeing the agreement, a completely irresponsible thing to do,” Berman said. “Even more so when they haven’t contributed to the momentum that allowed us to accomplish this as opposed to being Johnny come lately.”

___

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy

AU9377 · May 24

Note that former student athletes eligible for damages include only those that were active from 2016 forward. Student athletes prior to 2016 are not eligible for damages. There are so many missing parts to this moving forward. It is obvious that there is still no real plan or consensus, other than everyone believing that they are entitled to as much money as they can get as quickly as they can get it.

aubiefifty · May 24

2 hours ago, AU9377 said:

Note that former student athletes eligible for damages include only those that were active from 2016 forward. Student athletes prior to 2016 are not eligible for damages. There are so many missing parts to this moving forward. It is obvious that there is still no real plan or consensus, other than everyone believing that they are entitled to as much money as they can get as quickly as they can get it.

i agree but i also admit all this mess is above my pay grade. the older i get the more i hate complicated.

JerryAU · May 24

2 hours ago, AU9377 said:

Note that former student athletes eligible for damages include only those that were active from 2016 forward. Student athletes prior to 2016 are not eligible for damages. There are so many missing parts to this moving forward. It is obvious that there is still no real plan or consensus, other than everyone believing that they are entitled to as much money as they can get as quickly as they can get it.

I wonder if this time frame is for back-pay for student-athletes from 2016 to June 2021? The SCOTUS ruled on NIL in June 2021, so in effect, student-athletes were allowed to pursue payment through NIL at that time, which should/would relinquish schools from the responsibility of back-pay for those players from June '21 going forward.

Edited May 24 by JerryAU

JerryAU · May 24

1 minute ago, aubiefifty said:

i agree but i also admit all this mess is above my pay grade. the older i get the more i hate complicated.

:bow: AMEN!

AU9377 · May 24

12 minutes ago, JerryAU said:

I wonder if this time frame is for back-pay for student-athletes from 2016 to June 2021? The SCOTUS ruled on NIL in June 2021, so in effect, student-athletes were allowed to pursue payment through NIL at that time, which should/would relinquish schools from the responsibility of back-pay for those players from June '21 going forward.

My first thought was that before 2016 the statute of limitations has run and they are prevented from suing. You could also be correct. I will read more about it over the weekend.

There are still so many problems out there. Title IX is still in full force and that means that you will have to make a reasonable effort to make pay across the sports as equitable as possible. Scholarship numbers will also require additional women's sports teams at most Power conference schools.

More than anything, Congress has to get off its lazy ass and get an anti-trust exemption pass in order to restore some sense of structure.

Edited May 24 by AU9377

DAG · May 24

Should’ve been done a while ago. Maybe could’ve avoided the headaches we are seeing now .

AU9377 · May 24

11 minutes ago, DAG said:

Should’ve been done a while ago. Maybe could’ve avoided the headaches we are seeing now .

Absolutely. A comprehensive plan that would allow a reasonable stipend that is incapable of being used as an inducement in recruiting is essential for the sport to continue to grow. NIL being used as a pay to play scheme is a recipe for system wide failure and the loss of opportunity for many of the most deserving student athletes.

If university presidents have any integrity at all, they must insist that guardrails be placed that require minimum educational pursuits. If not, the teams should not be part of the university. I would rather the system be scrapped totally and we adopt the Ivy league model than we totally capitulate and treat the athletes as simply employees and not students.

Edited May 24 by AU9377

TigerOne · May 24

This will end the fun factor in college ball. It’s now semi pro ball with paid athletes who can and will leave anytime. It boils down to who can buy the best athletes. Expect the fans to pay more, a lot more.

why bother taking classes at all now?

They are working full time now.

Fans are already caring less and less. Sure we want Auburn to win but it’s damn near impossible now. Losses don’t really matter as much anymore.

Edited May 24 by TigerOne

aubcali · May 24

29 minutes ago, TigerOne said:

This will end the fun factor in college ball. It’s now semi pro ball with paid athletes who can and will leave anytime. It boils down to who can buy the best athletes. Expect the fans to pay more, a lot more.

why bother taking classes at all now?

They are working full time now.

Fans are already caring less and less. Sure we want Auburn to win but it’s damn near impossible now. Losses don’t really matter as much anymore.

Life is meaningless.

NCAubs · May 24

26 minutes ago, aubcali said:

Life is meaningless.

I am not sure how serious you were on this thought but I chortled.

aubiefifty · May 24

13 minutes ago, NCAubs said:

I am not sure how serious you were on this thought but I chortled.

chortled? anyway i see you are in NC. how much would you charge to go roll another's house with tp who is a member here?is chortling coughing and laughing at the same time? i am impressed in truth as i have not heard that in years.

autigeremt · May 24

1 hour ago, TigerOne said:

This will end the fun factor in college ball. It’s now semi pro ball with paid athletes who can and will leave anytime. It boils down to who can buy the best athletes. Expect the fans to pay more, a lot more.

why bother taking classes at all now?

They are working full time now.

Fans are already caring less and less. Sure we want Auburn to win but it’s damn near impossible now. Losses don’t really matter as much anymore.

It sure takes the appeal out of it. If there's no contracts in place in the next couple of years, I might just focus on the Steelers and high school ball and just peek in at Auburn from time to time.

NCAubs · May 24

6 minutes ago, aubiefifty said:

chortled? anyway i see you are in NC. how much would you charge to go roll another's house with tp who is a member here?is chortling coughing and laughing at the same time? i am impressed in truth as i have not heard that in years.

$1500 a day plus expenses.

aubiefifty · May 24

1 minute ago, NCAubs said:

$1500 a day plus expenses.

hell i want you to roll his yard not kill him...........

JuscAUse! · May 24

6 hours ago, TigerOne said:

This will end the fun factor in college ball. It’s now semi pro ball with paid athletes who can and will leave anytime. It boils down to who can buy the best athletes. Expect the fans to pay more, a lot more.

why bother taking classes at all now?

They are working full time now.

Fans are already caring less and less. Sure we want Auburn to win but it’s damn near impossible now. Losses don’t really matter as much anymore.

I will say I "might" agree with you. For once. Assuming nothing is done to level the money by some entity, and unlike most here I do not trust the Fed government to make it better, no matter what they do, I don't see it going in any direction other than your post.

AU9377 · May 25

8 hours ago, JuscAUse! said:

I will say I "might" agree with you. For once. Assuming nothing is done to level the money by some entity, and unlike most here I do not trust the Fed government to make it better, no matter what they do, I don't see it going in any direction other than your post.

The federal govt has to do one thing. They have to pass an exemption to U.S. anti-trust laws. They are the only entity that has the power to do that. If that is not done, we are doomed.

aubiefifty · May 25

al.com

Goodman: Is a legal decision the death of college sports? Hardly

Updated: May. 25, 2024, 8:27 a.m.|Published: May. 25, 2024, 6:56 a.m.

5–7 minutes

Auburn quarterback Cam Newton gets around Alabama defensive lineman Marcell Dareus in the first quarter of the 2010 Iron Bowl at Bryant-Denny Stadium. (The Birmingham News, Hal Yeager)BN

By

Joseph Goodman | jgoodman@al.com

This is an opinion column.

_____________________

The NCAA canceled amateurism hours before the beginning of Memorial Day weekend.

Talk about an all-time sentence.

Talk about an all-time Friday news dump.

As if there wasn’t already enough to talk about at SEC spring meetings next week, amateurism is dunzo. School is out for summer … and when everyone returns to campus they’ll be ready to negotiate new salaries.

The NCAA acknowledged as much in a statement after its attorneys were run over like the Notre Dame football team in the 2013 BCS national championship game. The governing body of collegiate athletics was facing the weight of three class-action lawsuits that could have ruined college sports for everyone. A deal had to be settled, and the NCAA finally — after decades of hypocrisy and gaslighting — rolled over.

It couldn’t game out its ruse any further.

There’s a lot we don’t know about the future of collegiate athletics. At this point, we can only speculate about how paying players will change college football. Immediately, in the hours after a historic legal settlement that could reshape American sports and the collegiate model, we only know this for sure. The NCAA was peddling a sham all along.

Goodman: Birmingham-Southern is going down swinging

Life’s a Process: Miss Terry lobs a grenade into the group text

Goodman: Where is the hottest seat in college football?

House vs. NCAA is a class-action lawsuit led by former swimmer Graham House. It’s an antitrust case against the NCAA contending that athletes should have been paid for the use of their name, image and likeness from 2017-2020. Part of the settlement will pay billions to former athletes. The most significant part of the settlement’s framework will affect the future of college sports by establishing a revenue sharing model between athletes and their universities. According to the terms of the deal, approximately $22 million of annual athletic budgets for power conference schools will go to athletes beginning with the fall semester of 2025.

That changes everything.

For college sports, these are historic days.

There are some doomsday scenarios out there. Don’t listen to any of them. Allowing athletes to share revenue with universities will only make collegiate athletics that much better for everyone.

When money is at stake, people tend to care a little more about keeping that bread in their pockets.

Major college sports have changed dramatically over the last year, but they’re not nearly finished evolving. This upcoming week, schools in the SEC will welcome Texas and Oklahoma to the SEC spring meetings. Those schools officially join the SEC on July 1. Next season, an expanded playoff in football will allow more teams to compete for a national championship.

By themselves, those two changes were enough to remake the landscape of major college football. This legal settlement wipes the landscape away like a violent mudslide following an erupting volcano.

The topography will be different when the chaos finally settles, but the seeds of new life remain embedded in the overturned earth. Fans of college football will still enrich America’s unique collegiate experience.

And with rivalries fueling everything, the arms races will never be over.

This settlement isn’t the death of college sports. It’s just the beginning of something new. The Iron Bowl still matters and maybe even more than ever before. Look at this way. Long the beating heart of college football, Alabama is suddenly the epicenter for major professional sports.

Alabama and Auburn will still be competing for national titles every year. That much I know for a fact. The future is tough to predict, but some things will never change.

And if revenue sharing leads to a new division in college football, then maybe UAB, Troy, Jacksonville State and South Alabama can now have shots to win a national championship, too.

The NCAA’s version of shamateurism might be dying, but the spirit of collegiate athletics lives on. Why do I know this? Because education still matters. Because college athletics, for all of its contradictory problems, were never morally corrupt. That’s important to understand. There was always more good than bad. Don’t confuse what’s happening now with the death of anything. This is just our legal system righting a wrong.

College sports will continue to change, but the lifeblood of America’s collegiate experience remains forever constant. Chasing a better future, fighting for the prize, the hunger for competition never dies.

SOUND OFF

Got a question for Joe? Want to get something off your chest? Send Joe an email about what’s on your mind for the mailbag. Let your voice be heard. Ask him anything.

Joseph Goodman is the lead sports columnist for the Alabama Media Group, and author of the most controversial sports book ever written, “We Want Bama: A Season of Hope and the Making of Nick Saban’s Ultimate Team.”

aubiefifty · May 25

al.com

Current, former NCAA athletes likely to be paid soon

Published: May. 24, 2024, 9:37 a.m.

9–11 minutes

The NCAA and the nation’s five biggest conferences announced Thursday night that they have agreed to pay nearly $2.8 billion to settle a host of antitrust claims, a monumental decision that sets the stage for a groundbreaking revenue-sharing model that could start steering millions of dollars directly to athletes as soon as the 2025 fall semester.

NCAA President Charlie Baker along with the commissioners of the Atlantic Coast Conference, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and Southeastern Conference released a joint statement saying they had agreed to settlement terms. They called the move “an important step in the continuing reform of college sports that will provide benefits to student-athletes and provide clarity in college athletics across all divisions for years to come.”

Terms were not disclosed, though some details have emerged in the past few weeks. They signal the end of the NCAA’s bedrock amateurism model that dates to its founding in 1906. Indeed, the days of NCAA punishment for athletes driving booster-provided cars started vanishing three years ago when the organization lifted restrictions on endorsement deals backed by so-called name, image and likeness money.

The deal still must be approved by the federal judge overseeing the case and plaintiffs will have the opportunity to opt out or challenge terms of the agreement. If it stands, it will usher in the beginning of a new era in college sports where athletes are compensated more like professionals and schools can compete for talent using direct payments.

“There’s no question about it. It’s a huge quantum leap,” said Tom McMillen, the former Maryland basketball player and congressman who has led an association of collegiate athletic directors the past eight years.

Now it is not far-fetched to look ahead to seasons where star quarterbacks or top prospects on college basketball teams are not only cashing in big-money NIL deals but have six-figure school payments in the bank to play.

“This landmark settlement will bring college sports into the 21st century, with college athletes finally able to receive a fair share of the billions of dollars of revenue that they generate for their schools,” said Steve Berman, one of the lead attorneys for the plaintiffs. “Our clients are the bedrock of the NCAA’s multibillion-dollar business and finally can be compensated in an equitable and just manner for their extraordinary athletic talents.”

There are a host of details still to be determined, but the agreement calls for the NCAA and the conferences to pay $2.77 billion over 10 years to more than 14,000 former and current college athletes who say now-defunct rules prevented them from earning money from endorsement and sponsorship deals dating to 2016.

“Even though it was only because of the overwhelming legal pressure, the NCAA, conferences and schools are agreeing that college athletes should be paid,” said Ramogi Huma, a former UCLA football player and longtime advocate for college athletes. “And there’s no going back from there. That’s truly groundbreaking.”

Some of the money will come from NCAA reserve funds and insurance but even though the lawsuit specifically targeted five conferences that are comprised of 69 schools (including Notre Dame), dozens of other NCAA member schools will see smaller distributions from the NCAA to cover the mammoth payout.

Schools in the Big Ten, Big 12, ACC and SEC are likely to end up bearing the brunt of the settlement going forward at an estimated cost of about $300 million each over 10 years, the majority of which would be paid to directly to athletes.

“The settlement, though undesirable in many respects and promising only temporary stability, is necessary to avoid what would be the bankruptcy of college athletics,” said Notre Dame President Rev. John I. Jenkins.

PAYING ATHLETES

In the new compensation model, each school will be permitted but not required to set aside up to $21 million in revenue to share with athletes per year, though as revenues rise so could the cap.

Athletes in all sports would be eligible for payments and schools would be given the freedom to decide how that money is divvied up among sports programs. Scholarship limits by sport will be replaced by roster restrictions.

Whether the new compensation model is subject to the Title IX gender equity law is unknown along with whether schools will be able to bring NIL activities in-house as they hope and squeeze out the booster-run collectives that have sprouted up in the last few years to pay athletes. Both topics could lead to more lawsuits.

THE CASE

The class-action federal lawsuit at the center of the settlement, House v. the NCAA, was set to go to trial in January. The complaint, brought by former Arizona State swimmer Grant House and Sedona Prince, a former Oregon and current TCU basketball player, said the NCAA, along with the five wealthiest conferences, improperly barred athletes from earning endorsement money.

The suit also argued that athletes were entitled to a piece of the billions of dollars the NCAA and those conferences earn from media rights agreements with television networks.

Amid political and public pressure, and facing the prospect of another court loss that some in college sports claimed could reach $20 billion in damages, NCAA and conference officials conceded on what has long been a core principal of the enterprise: that schools don’t directly pay the athletes to play beyond a scholarship.

That principle has been dented numerous times over the last decade. Notably, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled against the NCAA in 2021 in a case related to education-related benefits.

The narrow focus of the Alston case didn’t collapse the collegiate sports system, but the strong rebuke of the NCAA’s model of amateurism flung the door open to more lawsuits. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, a former Yale athlete, put it bluntly: “The bottom line is that the NCAA and its member colleges are suppressing the pay of student athletes who collectively generate billions of dollars in revenues for colleges every year.”

THE OTHER CASES

The settlement is expected to cover two other antitrust cases facing the NCAA and major conferences that challenge athlete compensation rules. Hubbard vs. the NCAA and Carter vs. the NCAA are also currently in front of judges in the Northern District of California.

A fourth case, Fontenot vs, NCAA, creates a potential complication as it remains in a Colorado court after a judge denied a request to combine it with Carter. Whether Fontenot becomes part of the settlement is unknown and it matters because the NCAA and its conferences don’t want to be on the hook for more damages should they lose in court.

“We’re going to continue to litigate our case in Colorado and look forward to hearing about the terms of a settlement proposal once they’re actually released and put in front of a court,” said George Zelcs, a plaintiffs’ attorney in Fontenot.

COLLEGE ATHLETICS OVERHAUL

The solution agreed to in the settlement is landmark, but not surprising. College sports has been trending in this direction for years, with athletes receiving more and more monetary benefits and rights they say were long overdue.

In December, Baker, the former Massachusetts governor who has been on the job for 14 months, proposed creating a new tier of Division I athletics where the schools with the most resources would be required to pay at least half their athletes $30,000 per year. That suggestion, along with many other possibilities, remain under discussion.

The settlement does not make every issue facing college sports go away. There is still a question of whether athletes should be deemed employees of their schools, something Baker and other college sports leaders are fighting against.

Some type of federal legislation or antitrust exemption is likely still needed to codify the terms of the settlement, protect the NCAA from future litigation and pre-empt state laws that attempt to neuter the organization’s authority. As it is, the NCAA is still facing lawsuits that challenge its ability to govern itself, including setting rules limiting multiple-time transfers.

“This settlement is also a road map for college sports leaders and Congress to ensure this uniquely American institution can continue to provide unmatched opportunity for millions of students,” the joint statement said. “All of Division I made today’s progress possible, and we all have work to do to implement the terms of the agreement as the legal process continues. We look forward to working with our various student-athlete leadership groups to write the next chapter of college sports.”

Federal lawmakers have indicated they would like to get something done, but while several bills have been introduced, none has gone anywhere.

Despite the unanswered questions, one thing is clear: Major college athletics is about to become more like professional sports than ever before.

___

Follow Ralph D. Russo at https://twitter.com/ralphDrussoAP and listen at http://www.appodcasts.com

___

AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/college-football

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

aubiefifty · May 25

cbssports.com

How historic House v. NCAA settlement will impact college athletics on and off the field for years to come

Shehan Jeyarajah

10–13 minutes

A major turning point in college athletics came to fruition Thursday when the NCAA Board of Governors and every Power Five conference agreed to settlement terms in the landmark House v. NCAA lawsuit. The resolution promises to change the college athletics enterprise forever by effectively ending its long-standing amateurism model.

For the first time, schools will directly share a portion of revenue with athletes. Scholarship and roster rules are expected to change. Major athletic departments will help pick up a massive check in back damages. Most significantly, the case should help provide some legal protection for college athletics as it heads into the future of the NIL era.

The proposal, now green lit by college athletics decision-makers, heads back to the plaintiffs for approval. Then, the full group will go in front of a judge to formalize the settlement and institute it. This process could take several weeks.

Here's how the inevitable settlement will impact athletic departments and the on-field product in the coming years.

The Big Ten, SEC win again

The financial hit for athletic departments, especially among power conferences, will be exorbitant. The NCAA will take on a lion's share of the cost via reserves, insurance and budget cuts, but the schools themselves are still on the hook. According to documents obtained by Yahoo Sports, power-conference schools are expected to fork up as much as $30 million per year over the next 10 years to cover revenue-sharing distribution, back damages and expanded scholarship costs.

If you wonder why Texas and Oklahoma went to the SEC, while USC and UCLA defected to the Big Ten, the potential cost of litigation played a significant role. A massive new Big Ten television contract could essentially fully cover the cost of the new reality for the Trojans and Bruins.

For other schools, it won't be as simple. The ACC's total ESPN television contract cleared $30 million annually per school only in the past few seasons. The ACC and Big 12 both distributed approximately $44 million per school overall. For comparison, the Big Ten TV contract alone could be worth more than $75 million per school annually. New money from the expanded College Football Playoff could provide some buffer, too, as Power Four schools jump from $5 million per school to at least $12 million per school under the new system.

What will your school owe in back damages?

The settlement comes out to nearly $2.8 billion in damages over the next 10 years. The NCAA will take on 40% of the total cost, with 60% coming from withheld distributions to Division I institutions. Out of that latter number, 40% will be paid by the legacy Power Five, 17% from the Group of Five and 22% from the Football Championship Subdivision, with other compensation coming from non-football conferences. The cost to legacy Power Five schools will be between $1 to $2 million over the next 10 years, based on a memo obtained by Yahoo Sports. Group of Five schools will lose approximately $400,000 annually, with FCS programs losing closer to $280,000. However, the settlement price is only one small piece of the much larger cost.

Where will the money come from?

The entire system of college athletics was built on the idea of an unpaid labor force. With the highest cost in the sport eliminated, universities were free to spend nearly unlimited money on coaching and administrative salaries, facility upgrades and more. According to a USA Today analysis, programs wasted nearly $200 million on coaching buyouts alone during the 2023 season, an incomprehensible, and frankly offensive, amount of waste.

Considering that the bulk of coaching salaries come from booster fundraising, it remains unlikely that high salaries will go away completely; however, programs will have to be much smarter about spending limited resources. The focus on facilities has lessened as name, image and likeness (NIL) payments take focus, and that should only increase now.

Of course, some athletic departments may have to make difficult decisions to deal with budget shortfalls. Especially for those on the periphery of the Power Four, cutting sports or scholarships could be on the horizon. Stanford, which has the biggest athletic department in the nation, is set to receive approximately 30% of an ACC revenue share to start when it switches conferences this fall.

Roster sizes, scholarships could change dramatically

The NCAA is considering removing the cap on guaranteed scholarships across sports. Instead of limiting compensation, the NCAA would attempt to protect competition by focusing on roster sizes.

Right now, football teams can field 120 players but are limited to 85 scholarships. In a future system, rosters could shrink to 100 players, but all of them could be on scholarship. That's not even counting supplemental income from revenue-sharing. There are already examples of programs using direct NIL payment to get around scholarship rules, like former five-star defensive back Cormani McClain transferring from Colorado to Florida.

But while football is the big fish, other sports could truly reap the benefits. Baseball teams are limited to 11.7 scholarships on a 39-man roster. That could change, but the Title IX implications could also be significant as schools would then have to fund 27 additional scholarships for women's sports.

The increased scholarship obligations will be yet another major cost for universities. Not every program will be able to handle them, which will create yet another gap.

Revenue-sharing is coming

The NCAA and college football have fought hard against direct pay-to-play payments from universities to players over the years, but that effort ends with this case. As a condition of the settlement, athletic departments can begin directly sharing revenue from television contracts and ticket sales with athletes.

On the program level, the settlement would create a system in which approximately $20 million is distributed to players. That amount represents an estimated 22% of annual revenue for Power Four schools, but it will hit many programs disparately. UCLA's 2022-23 operating revenue, for example, was approximately $105 million, per Sportico. Ohio State's, conversely, was nearly $280 million.

The cost could also prove overwhelming to the Group of Five. For example, Louisiana-Monroe reported a total athletic budget of only $19.4 million. While ULM, and programs like it, will not be required to pay athletes, it will only increase the divides between the haves and have-nots.

But how revenue-sharing will work is undecided

While the settlement opens the door for revenue-sharing, it does not set any terms for the practice. Those details will be ironed out over the next several months. The details could radically impact how effective the practice is over the next several years.

Now, the vast majority of NIL collectives pay money to football and men's basketball players. For example, Washington basketball transfer Great Osobor reportedly landed a $2 million NIL deal, which would take up nearly 10% of a university's entire revenue-sharing budget. With factors like Title IX taken into account, the NCAA will have to set ground rules on how money is divided.

Potentially, the NCAA could decide that all athletes at a school or in a specific sport should receive the same payment instead of negotiating and offering individualized contracts under the cap. That would seemingly keep the door ajar for collectives as a supplemental form of income.

In some ways, NCAA president Charlie Baker tried to prepare for this moment. Last year, he proposed a revenue-sharing model in which schools could opt into a new legal classification of college football, similar to how the Power Five was granted "autonomy status" to make rules. Football Bowl Subdivision competition would look exactly the same, but behind the scenes, certain schools could have status to make rules for themselves.

Under Baker's proposal, programs that opted in would directly pay a certain amount of their players through a trust, with a minimum of $30,000 per year for half of their athletes. Membership in the top division would require opting into these payments and fielding a certain number of sports. Baker's proposal could set guidelines for how the NCAA hopes to approach revenue-sharing heading forward.

Role of collectives remains up in the air

The first few years of the NIL era have been strange and put exorbitant pressure on fans to essentially crowdsource big-time football programs through collectives. With revenue-sharing entering the picture, the pressure on collectives to provide a primary income for revenue sport athletes on campus will decrease, a huge win for fans.

The NCAA is optimistic that the settlement will reinforce NIL guardrails, which have been gutted after numerous court losses. That could lead to collective operations moving in house. Several schools have already hired specific staffers and liaisons to deal with NIL in anticipation of the shift.

However, collectives could fight the change and claim they exist for legitimate endorsement purposes, which could soon lead to more court cases. The NCAA has lost almost every court case it has fought on NIL grounds.

Amazingly, other sports have slowly started taking the lead from college athletics. The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority signed every player on the WNBA's Las Vegas Aces to a $100,000 per year sponsorship, which could potentially double salaries. The biggest complication? The WNBA can collectively bargain to create rules against payouts like that, whereas college athletics can't. There's essentially still no legal recourse for outside pay-for-play.

Sign In

NCAA Board of Governors accepts $2.8B settlement proposal

Recommended Posts

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

AU9377 5,922

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

JerryAU 1,822

Link to comment

Share on other sites

JerryAU 1,822

Link to comment

Share on other sites

AU9377 5,922

Link to comment

Share on other sites

DAG 34,553

Link to comment

Share on other sites

AU9377 5,922

Link to comment

Share on other sites

TigerOne 1,187

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubcali 449

Link to comment

Share on other sites

NCAubs 423

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

autigeremt 7,131

Link to comment

Share on other sites

NCAubs 423

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

JuscAUse! 1,630

Link to comment

Share on other sites

AU9377 5,922

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

TigerOne 1,187

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aucom96 1,648

Link to comment

Share on other sites

aubiefifty 18,113

Link to comment

Share on other sites

TigerOne 1,187

Link to comment

Share on other sites

woodford 3,713

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

Create an account