College football in the era of NIL
Forget fidelity to one's university
As I watched Saturday night's USC-UCLA game, I kept thinking there's something wrong with college football. Back when I was an undergrad at SC in the mid-1960s, All-Americans like Tim Rossovich, Ron Yary, Adrian Young and, yes, O.J. Simpson, were on full scholarship. As a student in the stands, I knew I would see them play year after year. Not so now.
Today's name, image and likeness (NIL) has dramatically changed the focus of the game. Once football meant loyalty and fidelity to one's university. Sometimes, it even meant graduating with a degree as well. Today, the NIL is a marketing scheme that allows players to pursue a different dream. It's all about the Benjamins now. Here are two examples:
First, he’s a 19-year-old sophomore who doesn’t want to stand on the sidelines for another year. Don’t worry, he probably can cash in on $100,000 NIL bucks if he enters the transfer portal. Second, my guess is if Colorado's Shedeur Sanders wasn't the son of the team's coach, he easily could match his current NIL 'salary' of $6.2 million by playing somewhere else.
Before I left for college in 1966, my dad used to take me to Stanford football games. I remember him telling me then, "These players should get paid like the pros." Well, dad, many of them are now. So much so, I can't help but think I'm watching two corporations cautiously fighting off unwelcome take-over investors instead of seeing two teams playing their hearts out for sports glory.
I wonder how many SC Trojans and UCLA Bruins will be back next year? Chances are some of their best players already are planning to transfer. Oh, and make more than a few bucks doing so. I hate to say it, but my guess is one day USC's legendary motto might need to change from "Fight On!" to "Pay Up!"
OK all you Monday morning quarterbacks, what do you say?
-DF
Well, like the rest of America, athletes have become commodities to be sold and traded like baseball cards. College football had been the highlight of the season for me, much more fun than pro ball. Amateur scholarship athletes playing their hearts out for the glory of their school while they still manage study towards a degree, for the most part. Aspirational examples to those talented younger kids thinking about going to college more than playing in the NFL or the NBA.
But now that the college landscape has been commodified, and NIL means the athletes are loyal only to their agents, if that, and colleges are more interested in broadcast royalties than their students, it's just as well that student-athletes get paid, like your father presciently said. After all, baseball players in the minors get paid, and since college football is little more than the NFL minor league, so should the footballers.
It's too bad that colleges & universities can't find a way to use their funds generated by sports royalties to fund scholarships for deserving non-athletes. Maybe they could charge the NIL millionaire athletes room and board for taking up space on the campus.