Let all the Bulldog faithful rally behind the men who now wear the red and black with two words, two simple words which express the sentiments of the entire Bulldog Nation: Auburn Sucks.
As an add-on to JP’s MBG post this morning, I came up with a question. In the NIL era, what player do you wish we had done more to retain? That eliminates a certain QB in 2019. As an addendum to that, what player who transferred would regret his decision if subject to this?
For me, the answer is one and the same although I think the decision at the time was deeper than money.
Bear Alexander would have probably been the next Georgia DT first round selection in 2024 if he stayed and got with the program.
Spring Kirby is much more fun to listen to than Fall Kirby. I know some of you really don’t like Pate (I have my problems with him, too), but this is a pretty good discussion across a number of topics.
The one benefit of the chaos of the current state of the college football NIL market is this:
"I talked to an NFL scout last week…"
"Last year rounds 6 and 7 wiped out from NFL, this year rounds four through seven wiped out from NIL."@AndrewBrandt discusses the impact NIL has on the NFL Draft on this week's Business of Sports:9 pic.twitter.com/ssnS9suUys
The union closed shop with a rookie salary cap and scale doesn’t allow players to be eligible for their league until 3 years out of high school. The owners and player personnel people of the teams have taken advantage of the college football system as a free minor league for decades are crying because the back end of the draft has dropped off due to free market NIL.
A player with eligibility remaining with a late 3rd round or later grade can improve his draft stock and get paid for it instead of rolling the dice in the draft and betting he can make a team. He likely is able to make as much or more with less risk by returning to college for that 4th or 5th year.
NFL insiders cannot let this stand.
The law of unintended consequences is still the 1972 Miami Dolphins.
Pass the Kleenex.
Maybe this will bring the NFL to the table to discuss how they can work more effectively with the power brokers of college football.
Josh Pate serves up a softball to Sarkisian. I understand Pate wants access over being a real interviewer, but the follow-up questions that could come from this were many (yes, he has done that with Kirby as well).
"High school kids have agents. How do we still motivate these guys to understand the value of team?"
Listening to Sark talk about culture of team first while he parks Lamborghinis in front of the football facility for high school recruiting visits makes me laugh.
It would appear the Chambliss camp is losing in the court of public opinion and the sports media at this point. Tom Mars now says Chambliss isn’t trying to challenge the NCAA’s rules. He just wants his medical redshirt that Ferris State didn’t apply for. It seems this esteemed member of the bar doesn’t understand the concept of precedent.
Trinidad Chambliss’ attorneys filed a response today in the Chambliss vs NCAA case. The filing claims that Chambliss’s case was “neither manufactured nor contrived.” It stresses that they’ll be no grand harm to the college sports industry if Chambliss gets a sixth year. pic.twitter.com/lQZW7EGJcv
Of course, all of this probably won’t matter in a state court in Oxford, Mississippi. The judge will be facing reelection and knows a politician’s first job is to get reelected.
I don’t give a rat’s ass about the terms of the contract. If this goes through, college basketball no longer exists.
Former Charlotte Hornets player and UCLA standout Amari Bailey is making plans to return to college. He is the first player who has played in regular season NBA games to push for college eligibility. Details: https://t.co/VRjrBQnt7a
All of this can be traced back to the NCAA’s decision not to fight the temporary restraining order Diego Pavia got to maintain eligibility combined with the NCAA’s asinine decision to allow colleges to recruit international basketball players who were either professionals or semi-professionals. IF this happens, every NFL player who washes out with “eligibility” remaining is going to apply for reinstatement to return to college.
Do you want to watch former NFL players who couldn’t cut it back on a college gridiron near you? I can tell you I don’t, and if it happens in Athens, it’s probably the end of my love of college football.
How does a state court have the ability to enforce its will outside of the state of its jurisdiction?
Here's the wording of Duke's TRO ruling. Essentially, Mensah cannot enroll at another school, play football at another school or license his NIL to another school. https://t.co/vgJERcHU0Apic.twitter.com/zJjU74sqs8
The first one I assume says that any dispute between Mensah and Duke University is to be litigated under the laws of North Carolina.
The 2nd one is the one I’m really interested in is the case of the former G-League basketball player at Alabama. I don’t see how a state court judge can say the NCAA’s rules don’t prohibit them from ruling he cannot play in a game in Tennessee and they can’t enforce their rules in the case. If this were a federal court, I would get it.
One more step to the destruction of college sports as we have know them.
Please help this guy who isn’t an attorney but stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night.
SEC wants 16, and the B1G wants 24. I’m assuming the desire for 24 is purely a play for Fox by the Yankee conference to force the division of TV rights.
If Sankey doesn’t hold the line on this, he’s pretty much useless. I’ve become resigned to the fact they are going to expand. 16 seems right to give the top 4 a play-in game. The question is how far will they go with games on campus.
Let’s be clear…Cignetti has won one game against a Top 10 opponent and just became the third highest paid coach in college football, just below Ryan Day and a step above Lincoln Riley.
First, I don’t see how Indiana has the money to post this salary for him. Second, it feels like “we know you’re not going to be here forever and will likely leave for greener pa$ture$, so let’s thank you for making Indiana relevant by getting you paid wherever you go next”.
We have a lot of problems to solve as a country, but the President has decided to wade into the NIL mess created by the NCAA, its membership, the jackass-in-chief Mark Emmert, and the antitrust plaintiff’s bar with an executive order called “Saving College Sports.” I’m not going to get into the constitutional law of this order or the politics of this, and this is not the space to debate either of those topics … Derek can take that up on Wednesday if he so desires.
After reading the order, here are a couple of items I thought were interesting:
Overall, did the NCAA’s attorneys write Section 1 of the order?
The rationale for the order is all wrapped up in the NCAA’s past arguments for maintaining the façade of amateurism and current arguments for some kind of antitrust exemption. Olympic sports, academics, state laws, system where schools can buy the best players, and women’s sports are all arguments of the NCAA for intervention.
“It is common sense that college sports are not, and should not be, professional sports …”
We all need to face that college football and men’s basketball especially in the Power 4 conferences are now professional sports. The college sports industry made all of the decisions since NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma and the University of Georgia in the interest of generating more money over time.
The bag men plus the facilities arms race show that college athletes have a market value. Church steeples, Trans Ams, McDonald’s bags, and $100 post-game handshakes were the underground labor market while $10,000 massage chairs, miniature golf courses and other perks in athletic buildings showed how player compensation was hung up on the balance sheets of these associations. Eventually, that market value led to the O’Bannon decision on the EA Sports NCAA game franchise where the NCAA hid behind the fig leaf of jersey numbers while the demographics just happened to match the individual players represented leading to the total cost of attendance (TCOAS) scholarship. Of course, additional litigation has essentially blown up the guardrails of the TCOAS into pay-for-play thinly veiled as NIL.
The bottom line is that as the money in these 2 sports exploded, those participating were being left behind.
“… [I]t is the policy of the executive branch that third-party, pay-for-play payments to collegiate athletes are improper … This policy does not apply to compensation provided to an athlete for the fair market value that the athlete provides to a third party.”
The executive branch appears to be lining up behind the House settlement on this topic. Payments made by NIL collectives? Bad. Payments made similar to the Olympic model? Good. I admit I’m on the side of the Olympic model, but that doesn’t mean I agree with this mechanism.
I’m sure Jeffrey Kessler and his firm are already lining up to go after the order for injunctive relief. I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt on their motivation … therefore, I lean that Kessler wants the best for the members of his class. I also am cynical about actions like this based on my day job. If there wasn’t a pot of money at the end of the rainbow for his firm, his firm probably wouldn’t be interested.
Is Section 4 an attempt at an antitrust exemption by fiat?
What does “unreasonably challenged” mean? I don’t think any of the NIL litigation to this point has been unreasonable. I also don’t think anyone wants the “rights and interests of student-athletes” harmed and the “long-term availability of collegiate athletic scholarships and opportunties” reduced.
I’m not sure the Attorney General and the Chair of the FTC can do a damn thing if NIL makes a school decide to shed sports.
“Protecting Development of the United States Olympic Team”
What sports at this point purely depend on amateurs generally and college athletes specifically for participation in the Olympics?
Tackle football isn’t an Olympic sport yet. Basketball? That ship sailed a long time ago with the 1992 Dream Team on the men’s side and soon thereafter with women. Swimming? Katie Ledecky famously left the Stanford swim team while remaining in school to pursue endorsements while also swimming professionally, and Michael Phelps never put on the maize and blue while attending Michigan to train with his long-time coach. Gymnastics? Many of the women are past their prime at college age, and the GOAT never wore a college leotard. Hockey? The Miracle on Ice was a long time ago, and the Olympics are now the NHL all stars playing for country. Track and field? Most of the US athletes are professionals now across the board even though they were collegiate athletes at one time.
Summary
Is this order like Texas football … all hat, no cattle?
It would seem so because there is no real policy, and any policy is likely to go down in flames under judicial oversight.
Is this order telling Congress what framework the President is willing to sign in a bill like the SCORE Act?
In my opinion, winner, winner, chicken dinner. He is telling the 535 members of Congress he is willing to sign a bill that reforms some of the problems of college sports while maintaining that student-athletes are not employees with collective bargaining rights.
What do you think? Let us know in the comments. Keep it civil and out of the political realm. If you want to do that, take it to the Playpen.
