Last week, the NCAA’s most powerful conferences made an urgent plea to congressional leaders: We need your help to save college sports — and we need it now.
Commissioners from the Big Ten, Big 12, Atlantic Coast Conference and Southeastern Conference have quietly lobbied leaders from both parties — including Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell and House Democratic leader House, Hakeem Jeffries – to support legislation that would set national standards for how college athletes can benefit. on their name, image and likeness.
Their warning: A Supreme Court ruling two years ago clearing the way for companies to pay student-athletes led to a complex series of state laws that have harmed college sports and could, ultimately, lead to the collapse of sports programs across the United States.
“The risk is permanent damage to an enterprise that has meant enormously to our country, and to those who have benefited from these experiments,” James Phillips, the ACC commissioner, said on Inside Politics Sunday. “.
SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey made a grim prediction if Congress doesn’t act.
“The risk is that states will put up walls around their recruiting grounds, thinking that somehow gives them a competitive advantage,” Sankey said. “The risk is that more and more young people sign agreements that they do not understand. The risk is that we move further and further away from the academic nature of university sport.
In their first-ever joint interview, the four power conference leaders told CNN that the current landscape has created serious instability in which college athletes are increasingly transferring to different universities based on different states’ rules regarding profiting from their name, image and likeness, or NIL. The growing use of the transfer portal by athletes, they said, has become problematic in college sports, particularly for student-athletes seeking to earn a college degree.
And, they say, college promoters have taken advantage of the current patchwork of laws to help their universities recruit top athletes by promising big salaries — to the detriment of universities in other states that are forced to play by one set of rules different.
They say it’s time to establish a national standard to level the playing field.
“You have a system where everything becomes very transactional, in terms of moving student-athletes around and it shows on the field,” Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti said. “You’ll see huge player movements, but there’s also another aspect, which is that a lot of student-athletes just don’t end up anywhere. And that’s a problem. Because the grass is not always greener, there is not always a deal done.”
Petitti added that programs “can go up and down very quickly” with players choosing to transfer, while the ACC’s Phillips said “multiple moves have demonstrated over the course of the student-athlete’s career that they are less likely to graduate.”
Multiple proposals have been put forward by lawmakers for a federal NIL law, although getting floor time for a bill, let alone getting it signed into law, will be a daunting task. The focus now is on efforts by Sen. Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, and Cory Booker, Democrat of New Jersey, to try to reach bipartisan agreement on a proposal. The four commissioners met with the two senators last week.
“I’m convinced there is a bipartisan path and the urgency to do something is there,” Booker, a former college football player, told CNN. “I think everyone who has a football or basketball player in their state is interested in doing it.”
Among the obstacles facing leaders: the Republican Party’s resistance to enacting federal legislation while Republicans often defend states’ rights.
Asked if there had been any resistance to the push for a national standard, Sankey, the SEC commissioner, said, “Of course. Questions about this: why, why is this necessary? Today, our federal government plays a role in interstate commerce, that’s the reality. There is interstate activity, it is national activity.
NIL agreements come from a change in NCAA policy in 2021 that allowed student-athletes to take advantage of sponsorship opportunities — a decision that came after the Supreme Court ruled that student-athletes could receive payments related to their education in a case that reshaped the landscape of college sports.
Student-athletes have benefited — with well-known names in college sports like basketball player Caitlin Clark and football player Caleb Williams appearing in ads for major national brands like State Farm and Wendy’s.
Supporters of a national standard say its implementation would help protect student-athletes by putting in place critical safeguards when they sign up for potentially lucrative opportunities.
“We need protection for our student-athletes. You know, some of the situations they find themselves in, trusting advisors who steer them in the wrong direction ends up being really counterproductive and harmful,” Phillips said.
Jim Dedmon/USA Today Network
ACC Commissioner James Phillips speaks to the media during ACC Media Days at the Westin Charlotte.
In some cases, he said, “agents end up taking a larger share of the revenue than goes to the student-athlete or their family.”
Brett Yormark, commissioner of the Big 12, said it’s difficult for student-athletes to adjust to different rules in different states.
“We believe it is positive for student-athletes to be able to showcase their name, image and likeness in all the right ways. But we need guardrails around it,” Yormark said.
In the absence of federal legislation, a number of states have passed their own laws, creating a legal patchwork across the country.
“This has created a disparity between states, where lawmakers are now changing their laws for competition purposes. It certainly created economic opportunities for young people, but it introduced an unregulated market,” Sankey said.
“What we hear consistently, from young people, from those on our campus involved in recruiting, is that the current environment doesn’t make sense,” he said.
Asked whether McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer had expressed interest in a national standard, Sankey said “both were very interested and, in fact, both were considering one about each other and the importance of having conversations on both sides of the aisle.”
There is bipartisan support in Congress for legislation establishing a national NIL standard, but some Republicans have cautioned that any new law must be developed with minimal government intervention and without creating new federal agencies to develop or enforce rules, a potential sticking point in any negotiation.
Cruz told CNN that he thinks the “chances of passing NIL legislation are about 60/40” and that he feels “cautiously optimistic.”
“I think we risk doing enormous damage to college sports if Congress doesn’t step up and take action. It’s the Wild West right now, and all the senators and their universities in their states are telling them that this chaos makes no sense,” he said.
Cruz introduced a bill to codify NIL rights. Separately, Booker released his own NIL bill with Republican Sen. Jerry Moran of Kansas and Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut.
Cruz and Booker held discussions about the two proposals and the NIL issue as part of an ongoing effort in the Senate to find a way to pass bipartisan legislation.
Cruz told CNN he had “very positive conversations” with Booker. “I think we’re making progress, but we’re not there yet,” he said.
Additionally, Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama, a former head football coach at Auburn University, and Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia introduced an NIL bill.
“There are enough positives in all of the bills, to be honest, that we can work with some combination,” Petitti said. “The effort has been, especially over the last few months, to try to bring people together. A lot of staff spends time on it. How can we get these employees to come together and come together to have something.
“Our elected officials are showing tremendous interest,” Phillips said. “They understand, I think, what’s at stake. I think at the heart of it all, for all of us and for everyone who loves college athletics, is this idea of opportunity for young people .
CNN’s Ted Barrett and Wayne Sterling contributed.
