• The KillerFrogs

FWST: ‘There is no wrong.’ TCU’s Patterson delivers NIL message to local business leaders

Purp

Active Member
Why is it "lunacy"? As a share of revenue for a big time college program, $1mm is a drop in the bucket (and remember, this isn't even coming out of the school's pocket anyway). How is a kid getting that money before playing a game in at the college level significantly different than Joe Burrow getting a $23 million signing bonus before playing a down in the NFL?

I think this is a bit of a stretch. College ball is popular in no small part because of it's exclusive access to the best of the best U-22 talent. In other words, it's not a minor league, it's a young league, and that makes a huge difference. What you're describing would be losing the elite talent and rounding out the roster with NFL rejects, and at that point it's basically the XFL with more established uniforms.
It's lunacy because the kid is still a kid and the financial incentives encourage him to not (and maybe even don't allow for him to) behave like a kid. He's the best player on his high school team and has an entire year of great memories he's forfeiting for himself and his best friends on the team because the university he's committed to enables him to be paid already. It's lunacy. It won't be long and the top freshmen in high school will start getting NIL deals and paying for private trainers so they don't have to develop in their high school programs or 7v7 teams. It's lunacy.

College football is popular because it reaches all the parts of the country nowhere near an NFL franchise and gives them access to a really high level entertainment product. It's also yugely popular because loyalties to universities are tight and often reach back for generations. Tons of t-shirt fans are t-shirt fans because their parent or grandparent or (in my nephews' case) uncle went to a particular school. The rooting interest is a family tradition. So are the sports hating interests. Rivalries are huge and predate the NFL.

What I'm describing would be keeping a lot of the elite talent b/c they'll be making enormous sums on endorsement deals and other arranged payments to encourage them to not enter the NFL draft. The only way the NFL keeps attracting this elite talent is for owners to start distributing more and more revenue to the players in the CBA. And the fringe guys who might not make NFL rosters right now would have much more security in this new pro "college" league and would prefer to not go in the draft. Best case scenario they make an NFL roster at roughly the same pay, but they could get cut at any time and lose their income. The same wouldn't be true in the "college" league.

It wouldn't happen overnight, but there are no limits to the financial incentives that could be offered to players to stay. The bigger the numbers get and the more autonomous the programs in this league become the larger the TV contracts will get. It's just a virtuous cycle to a larger and large pie to share with players until the NFL really starts to get pinched. I can see the NFL having to change its draft structure and the CBA will eventually get shredded as long as this is allowed to metastasize at the "college" level.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
It's lunacy because the kid is still a kid and the financial incentives encourage him to not (and maybe even don't allow for him to) behave like a kid. He's the best player on his high school team and has an entire year of great memories he's forfeiting for himself and his best friends on the team because the university he's committed to enables him to be paid already. It's lunacy. It won't be long and the top freshmen in high school will start getting NIL deals and paying for private trainers so they don't have to develop in their high school programs or 7v7 teams. It's lunacy.

College football is popular because it reaches all the parts of the country nowhere near an NFL franchise and gives them access to a really high level entertainment product. It's also yugely popular because loyalties to universities are tight and often reach back for generations. Tons of t-shirt fans are t-shirt fans because their parent or grandparent or (in my nephews' case) uncle went to a particular school. The rooting interest is a family tradition. So are the sports hating interests. Rivalries are huge and predate the NFL.

What I'm describing would be keeping a lot of the elite talent b/c they'll be making enormous sums on endorsement deals and other arranged payments to encourage them to not enter the NFL draft. The only way the NFL keeps attracting this elite talent is for owners to start distributing more and more revenue to the players in the CBA. And the fringe guys who might not make NFL rosters right now would have much more security in this new pro "college" league and would prefer to not go in the draft. Best case scenario they make an NFL roster at roughly the same pay, but they could get cut at any time and lose their income. The same wouldn't be true in the "college" league.

It wouldn't happen overnight, but there are no limits to the financial incentives that could be offered to players to stay. The bigger the numbers get and the more autonomous the programs in this league become the larger the TV contracts will get. It's just a virtuous cycle to a larger and large pie to share with players until the NFL really starts to get pinched. I can see the NFL having to change its draft structure and the CBA will eventually get shredded as long as this is allowed to metastasize at the "college" level.

The popularity of “college football” is going to wane considerably over time if there aren’t competitive balance measures put in place. There are unintended consequences of all of this stuff unfolding that isn’t being factored into the financial models. It’s a sport without a governing body right now that is getting totally out of control. They need a governing body to take control or it’s all going to fall apart.
 
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Purp

Active Member
Main obstacle would be retaining a tax exemption as a university and I think the NFL knows the universities want to retain that status. Even the top programs aren't making nearly as much as NFL teams and they aren't even paying salaries to their players.

Every NFL team got $300 mil last year just from their TV deal and that doesn't include local revenue like tickets sales and other things. UT makes like $160 mil and then there's a pretty steep drop off. While college football is a big deal it's still way behind the NFL.
No doubt, but as rapidly as all of this recent change has hit college football it won't take long for those issues to get worked out too. If payments are coming from donors and funding sources external to universities then their tax situations likely won't changed. It'll become the largest money laundering operation in history much like modern American political campaigns. I'm not guaranteeing this is going to happen, but I am saying it doesn't take much imagination to get there from where we are now considering where we were just a couple years ago.
 

Eight

Member
The popularity of “college football” is going wane considerably over time if there aren’t competitive balance measures put in place. There are unintended consequences of all of this stuff unfolding that isn’t being factored into the financial models. It’s a sport without a governing body right now that is getting totally out of control. They need a governing body to take control or it’s all going to fall apart.

very much agree

aside from the challenges of certain parties no longer having the control they do now (i.e. conference commissioners for example) it will also require certain individuals on college campuses to openly admit what sports have grown into and that they are a completely different animal than say their business or engineering department
 

Moose Stuff

Active Member
Coaches get paid millions of dollars a year, free to leave for a better offer whenever they want.
They play in stadiums that cost hundreds of millions of dollars, selling anywhere between 50,000 and 100,000 tickets a week, and that doesn't include selling access to club and luxury sections of those stadiums.
Merchandise sales earn tens of millions of dollars, including replicas of the jerseys the kids wear.
Television deals are worth tens of millions of dollars, and in turn draw millions of viewers that command hefty ad rates.

But sure, we can keep pretending that these are just college students and this isn't a defacto professional sports league.

Maybe these kids deserve some piece of pie. The problem with that is it will ruin the sport as it currently stands and I don’t have any interest in what this is turning into. Zero chance there aren’t millions of other people just like me across the country.
 
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Wexahu

Full Member
very much agree

aside from the challenges of certain parties no longer having the control they do now (i.e. conference commissioners for example) it will also require certain individuals on college campuses to openly admit what sports have grown into and that they are a completely different animal than say their business or engineering department

I think they already admit that. So what do you do about it? What is the solution?
 

Moose Stuff

Active Member
The popularity of “college football” is going to wane considerably over time if there aren’t competitive balance measures put in place. There are unintended consequences of all of this stuff unfolding that isn’t being factored into the financial models. It’s a sport without a governing body right now that is getting totally out of control. They need a governing body to take control or it’s all going to fall apart.

100% fact.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
Maybe these kids deserve some piece of pie. The problem with that is it will ruin the sport as it currently stands and I don’t have any interest in what this is turning into. Zero chance there aren’t millions of other people like me across the country.

Maybe they do. But then you gotta tear up Title IV. To me as a fan, it’s not the money. It’s the fact that there is nothing in place to assure even a semblance of competitive balance. It becomes not interesting at all at that point. And yes, I know I’m a broken record.
 

Eight

Member
I think they already admit that. So what do you do about it? What is the solution?

that is the question isn't it.....who provides the leadership to help the conferences realize they are stronger together than apart?

think emmert gave us a bit of a clue in that at some point and time in this evolution of the sport we will see a group of schools come together and form their own group.

who, when, where etc.....no idea, heck if had that power to see ahead i would be off to buy a lottery ticket for tonight

do agree that a huge key in whatever comes next has to be that all members have a chance to be competitive and not just about the money
 

Mean Purple

Active Member
The popularity of “college football” is going to wane considerably over time if there aren’t competitive balance measures put in place. There are unintended consequences of all of this stuff unfolding that isn’t being factored into the financial models. It’s a sport without a governing body right now that is getting totally out of control. They need a governing body to take control or it’s all going to fall apart.
You know what doesn't wane, the popularity of winning. I thin the "alliance" helps with the rest. But America loves a winner.



Note: Patton actually told them to be seated after the famous line.
 

Shorty

Active Member
When was the last time there was parity in college football? NIL certainly won't improve the situation but I don't see it as the total collapse of college football. I'll just go on cheering the football team put in front of me and bitching about it on here regardless of who is on the field.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
that is the question isn't it.....who provides the leadership to help the conferences realize they are stronger together than apart?

think emmert gave us a bit of a clue in that at some point and time in this evolution of the sport we will see a group of schools come together and form their own group.

who, when, where etc.....no idea, heck if had that power to see ahead i would be off to buy a lottery ticket for tonight

do agree that a huge key in whatever comes next has to be that all members have a chance to be competitive and not just about the money

It COULD be a hugely successful thing if a handful of schools would start caring about the sport itself more than making sure they fully capitalize on every built-in advantage they already have. But I understand that’s a pipe dream.
 

Dogfrog

Active Member
The popularity of “college football” is going wane considerably over time if there aren’t competitive balance measures put in place. There are unintended consequences of all of this stuff unfolding that isn’t being factored into the financial models. It’s a sport without a governing body right now that is getting totally out of control. They need a governing body to take control or it’s all going to fall apart.

The popularity of college football is going to drop immediately IMO. College football has long underestimated the unique demand associated with the idea of the amateur athlete seeking a degree. Doesn’t matter that this ideal has been tarnished for years. The original ideal is what propels it, not the quality of football. Hell it’s easy to watch the best football teams if that’s really what you seek, just turn on your TV - the NFL is the very best.

Moving college football player compensation away from the school’s wheelhouse (a degree) and toward their disillusioned fans ability to provide dollars to players is a death knell. Some schools may thrive to the extent their fans never valued degrees very highly anyway, but even Alabama will learn too late how much they miss Mercer, Southern Miss, and NMSU.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
When was the last time there was parity in college football? NIL certainly won't improve the situation but I don't see it as the total collapse of college football. I'll just go on cheering the football team put in front of me and bitching about it on here regardless of who is on the field.

There was WAY more parity 20 years ago than there is today. Sure, it’s never going to be close to NFL-type parity, but it was night and day different not too long ago.
 

Eight

Member
It COULD be a hugely successful thing if a handful of schools would start caring about the sport itself more than making sure they fully capitalize on every built-in advantage they already have. But I understand that’s a pipe dream.

agree that there is great opportunity and it will take someone(s) with vision and the ability to sway some very greedy and egotistical people that they are truly better off working together, but if it can be done i agree there is big opportunity

as far as it being a pipe dream. tcu being in such a situation say 30+ years ago was an even bigger pipe dream so who knows.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
The popularity of college football is going to drop immediately IMO. College football has long underestimated the unique demand associated with the idea of the amateur athlete seeking a degree. Doesn’t matter that this ideal has been tarnished for years. The original ideal is what propels it, not the quality of football. Hell it’s easy to watch the best football teams if that’s really what you seek, just turn on your TV - the NFL is the very best.

Moving college football player compensation away from the school’s wheelhouse (a degree) and toward their disillusioned fans ability to provide dollars to players is a death knell. Some schools may thrive to the extent their fans never valued degrees very highly anyway, but even Alabama will learn too late how much they miss Mercer, Southern Miss, and NMSU.

And ESPN could potentially lose their ass on some of these long term deals they are making, unless [ Finebaum ] gets fixed. That part would be fun.
 

bronco

Active Member
Probably been said before but
We are going to spend a bunch of money recruiting a kid. Then we are going to find a way to get him paid. Then he is going to have a couple of good games and his buddy at LSU is going to tell him they are thin at his position and they can get him more money. Then that kid enters the portal and there is virtually nothing we can do, except money whip him, to keep him here. Then he gets hurt and has made no progress towards a degree.

Sounds good!
 

LVH

Active Member
All this crap is going to destroy college athletics. I hate it and the problem is the big schools have more leverage than the NCAA or any hypothetical governing body so this train is going to have no breaks. Not until this all blows up in an explosion like the train at the end of Back to the Future 3 will people realize that they have been had.

This is the byproduct of listening to all these writers and journalists who hate sports anyway soapbox about how evil the NCAA is.
 

Moose Stuff

Active Member
Maybe they do. But then you gotta tear up Title IV. To me as a fan, it’s not the money. It’s the fact that there is nothing in place to assure even a semblance of competitive balance. It becomes not interesting at all at that point. And yes, I know I’m a broken record.

Not a broken record at all. I agree with you 100%.
 
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