NCAA moves towards athletes getting paid

[Bluedog]

Coach K is going to have to start getting in the business of balancing activeness on Instagram for players (and how to best do #ads) and generate income while ensuring they're staying focused on competition...or maybe Dave Bradley will teach that. I recognize the Duke basketball program already does media and social media training for its players but clearly things will be changing if this comes to fruition.

[devilseven]

Coach K is going to have to start getting in the business of balancing activeness on Instagram for players (and how to best do #ads) and generate income while ensuring they're staying focused on competition...or maybe Dave Bradley will teach that. I recognize the Duke basketball program already does media and social media training for its players but clearly things will be changing if this comes to fruition.

I am not sure the players will have enough time for actual practice and competition after having spent so much time with agents, sponsors, and social media,

[Bluedog]

I am not sure the players will have enough time for actual practice and competition after having spent so much time with agents, sponsors, and social media,

That is absolutely a concern and reality. These guys already effectively have two jobs - academics and athletics. Adding social media influencer/sponsor is really time consuming (and I'm being serious about this. It's a full time job for many.) Maybe it'll even the playing field as the elite recruits won't improve at all and the middle of the road ones without large sponsorships will...

I think there will be a large variance in approaches. Some guys could just have one or two big deals that they consistently promote and go to, while others will have tens or hundreds of small ones... This is going to be mighty interesting to see play out.

[1991 duke law]

That is absolutely a concern and reality. These guys already effectively have two jobs - academics and athletics. Adding social media influencer/sponsor is really time consuming (and I'm being serious about this. It's a full time job for many.) Maybe it'll even the playing field as the elite recruits won't improve at all and the middle of the road ones without large sponsorships will...

I think there will be a large variance in approaches. Some guys could just have one or two big deals that they consistently promote and go to, while others will have tens or hundreds of small ones... This is going to be mighty interesting to see play out.

Frankly, why don’t we simply be honest and move towards a college G league. Why bother having kids “attend classes“ when there is no interest in a college degree - instead, pay them to play and represent the University. And they do not have to waste their time going to classes as that will only eat into their time training to get into the NBA or NFL. After all, if the education is irrelevant and an annoyance, why do it.

The diminished excess cash available to colleges now that they are paying players will allow or necessitate the elimination of some non-revenue sports such as baseball, lacrosse etc. And crazy as this may be, Duke and other colleges may have to end providing scholarships to men and women for fencing, swimming and other never watched sports. They may be compelled to give that scholarship money to reward academic achievement or - heaven forbid - lower the insane college tuition now charged. And imagine this, high school students may not have to focus on endeavours that they have no real interest in just so they were able to get an edge for admission into a college.

And additionally, should women athletes take issue with the fact that the men are getting paid and they are not (as women sports are not generating the gate revenue or tv interest to of men’s bball and football) colleges can do what may be inevitable – have the college system limit their focus to academics (like many division IIII schools I believe). And everyone can then cry that the goose has finally been killed and there are no more golden eggs.

Admittedly, some of this is said tongue-in-cheek. But not entirely. I absolutely love college basketball and football. So this commentary is not said as someone who is a hater on collegiate sports. But once we get to the point (perhaps we are at that point - or got there a long time ago) where everyone openly admits that education is not the primary focus of some groups of student athletes, that may be the time to finally throw in the towel.

I appreciate that college is and should be a steppingstone for advancement of the students career. And one can argue that for the student athlete, it is playing professional sports and therefore academics is rightfully secondary. However, that is oxymoronic to the purpose of college - it is to educate and not to be a steppingstone for a career that does not require a college education. That is why a kid who wants to become an electrician or plumber, will not spend four years at Duke prior to attending trade school.

This is a obviously a fascinating topic and I realize has been discussed on multiple threads over multiple years. And there are a myriad of excellent arguments and perspectives. But as tuitions continue to skyrocket and the competitiveness to get into schools such as Duke continues to increase, and has student athletes (bball and football players) complain that they are not getting compensated for their efforts, one can start asking very legitimately whether the colleges still need or should maintain collegiate athletics.

Not meaning to be provocative just expressing a point of view.

[Billy Dat]

Kevin White made a pretty strong anti Name-Image-Likeness (NIL) statement earlier this morning. You'll have to be signed in to see the image of the statement below. It was too long for me to transcribe. I thought K was in favor of NIL so this seems like, perhaps, a topic on which K and White are not aligned? White seems to suggest that the majority of college athletes are not in favor of this legislation, which could be true considering that most college athletes couldn't benefit from it.


Kevin White NIL.jpg

[uh_no]

Kevin White made a pretty strong anti Name-Image-Likeness (NIL) statement earlier this morning. You'll have to be signed in to see the image of the statement below. It was too long for me to transcribe. I thought K was in favor of NIL so this seems like, perhaps, a topic on which K and White are not aligned? White seems to suggest that the majority of college athletes are not in favor of this legislation, which could be true considering that most college athletes couldn't benefit from it.


Kevin White NIL.jpg

given they can't figure out how to do security, parking, concessions, or alcohol sales, are you surprised that he is not in favor of something else the department would have to figure out how to deal with?

[sagegrouse]

Kevin White made a pretty strong anti Name-Image-Likeness (NIL) statement earlier this morning. You'll have to be signed in to see the image of the statement below. It was too long for me to transcribe. I thought K was in favor of NIL so this seems like, perhaps, a topic on which K and White are not aligned? White seems to suggest that the majority of college athletes are not in favor of this legislation, which could be true considering that most college athletes couldn't benefit from it.

I wouldn't worry about the divergence of Kevin White and Mike Krzyzewski. While Coach K has come out in favor of rewards to the athletes, I suspect he has the same concerns as Kevin White about the distortions in the recruiting process and, to a lesser extent, tensions in the locker room. Is this a case of a globally famous coach trying to ride over the top of this wave and letting others deal with the inherent difficulties? I expect Coach K does not want to spend all his time talking about this issue with the press.

It was notable that Kevin White and "his friend" Bubba Cunningham, UNC athletic director, are joined at the hip. I just checked the bios, and Bubba, who graduated from Notre Dame, was on the athletics department staff there from 1988-2002 -- the last two years while Kevin White was Notre Dame AD.

Kindly,
Sage Grouse
'Seems to me a possible solution is to ban all discussion of "economics" for players during the recruiting process and to prevent "athletic boosters" from contacting recruits directly'

[Billy Dat]

Bilas' clap back against White's NIL statement:

@JayBilas
This is stunning in its tone deafness. It says, “the money is ours, to pay ourselves fair market value, and should not be re-directed’ to where clear value lies. We shall call for strict equality here only, as we fail to provide equal resources to each sport or athlete.” (1/2)
Further, “We are worried about recruiting, and know the most important key to winning and financial gain is procuring athletes. We point to a hand-picked ‘relative few’ that parrot us, but ask you to ignore the athletes that will benefit most. It’s OUR MONEY, not theirs.” (2/2)

[Nugget]

Bilas' clap back against White's NIL statement:

@JayBilas
This is stunning in its tone deafness. It says, “the money is ours, to pay ourselves fair market value, and should not be re-directed’ to where clear value lies. We shall call for strict equality here only, as we fail to provide equal resources to each sport or athlete.” (1/2)
Further, “We are worried about recruiting, and know the most important key to winning and financial gain is procuring athletes. We point to a hand-picked ‘relative few’ that parrot us, but ask you to ignore the athletes that will benefit most. It’s OUR MONEY, not theirs.” (2/2)

White's statement is, in my opinion, a remarkable combination of (i) tone deafness and (ii) irrelevance/futility.

NIL rights are coming by state law within a year whether the NCAA likes it or not. What are they going to do - - declare all of the athletes from schools in Florida, California and Illinois ineligible?

So, the NCAA's great hope is Congress (Congress!!!) riding to its rescue with legislation to override the states and impose a standard system? Congress already had a difficult enough time getting anything done and, despite Anthony Gonzalez's expressed hope in this piece, https://www.cbssports.com/college-fo...nly-hindrance/ , I am extremely skeptical they would do it here.

They certainly aren't (in my opinion) going to unify to pass legislation where the key provision in it -- what, from the NCAA's point of view is its essential purpose to differentiate it from the various states' laws -- is to have "guardrails" purportedly aimed at limiting use of NIL as a recruiting tool when, in reality, what that means is compensation caps on the relatively few athletes in FB and BB (disproportionately African-American) who would be able to benefit from NIL rights. No way does that pass Congress in this environment.

I know many here are critical of him, but I think Gary Parrish has been writing (and on his podcast, speaking) coherently about this -- there simply is no practical way to prevent NIL rights from potentially being a recruiting tool and no reasonably enforceable "guardrail." The NCAA needs to accept that or else close up shop.

And, if it means that a local booster pays an Alabama FB player or Kentucky or Duke BB player $500,000 directly and reduces contributions to the Iron Dukes or other school's booster club by the same amount, then the school will just need to figure out how to adjust for that -- whether it's by lowering the coach's salary or reducing the travel budget or buying fewer flatscreens for the $50 million weight room/study center/lounge or cutting scholarships for the (disproportionately middle class and upper-middle-class) athletes in the Olympic (i.e., non-revenue-producing sports, then that's what the schools will have to do. Again, the NCAA can either adjust to that reality or close up shop.

White's statement is just sticking his head in the sand.

[Billy Dat]

White's statement is, in my opinion, a remarkable combination of (i) tone deafness and (ii) irrelevance/futility.

White's statement is just sticking his head in the sand.

I agree, which is what confuses me. Duke and White are usually quite adept at maneuvering Duke to take advantage of these various sea changes. K was also in favor of the NIL law that passed in Cali. Something about this doesn't seem to add up to me.

[Hingeknocker]

I agree, which is what confuses me. Duke and White are usually quite adept at maneuvering Duke to take advantage of these various sea changes. K was also in favor of the NIL law that passed in Cali. Something about this doesn't seem to add up to me.

Add me to the list of people who is incredibly disappointed with White's statement. It is tone-deaf and one of the more egregious "head in the sand" statements I can remember seeing.

That said, I think there are two explanations for what White has done, both of which hinge on his adoption of "olympic sports" as the basis for the statement.

1) He genuinely believes that the olympic sports would come under serious threat if NIL rules are adopted, and is doing whatever he can to protect them. The problem with this approach is that you still need to justify why someone like Cassius Stanley should be prohibited from earning money based on his value so that a swimmer can receive a scholarship, and White does not do this.

2) He is using "olympic sports" as a smokescreen, given that it's basically the only remaining hope for someone like Kevin White to save his multi-million dollar salary.

[JasonEvans]

I agree, which is what confuses me. Duke and White are usually quite adept at maneuvering Duke to take advantage of these various sea changes. K was also in favor of the NIL law that passed in Cali. Something about this doesn't seem to add up to me.

I really don't get what White's point was here. He says he's worried about recruiting; about how non-star athletes get treated; about how resources get allocated; and so on.

Yup, I worry about that too. We are about to embark into the unknown and there will be both positive and negative consequences that no one can foresee. That is what comes with major rules changes to any organization.

But the solution is not to continue doing things the manifestly unfair way you have been doing them for decades. The solution is not to continue to take advantage of these young (mostly minority) men and women and deny them the ability to profit off their remarkable skills. You do the right thing and allow them to make money and then you try to control the negative stuff that crops up as best you can. And the worst part is that White (talk about an unfortunate name at this time on this issue!?!?!) doesn't seem to have any solutions. He's just wringing his hands and saying he is worried. Sigh, that is not leadership.

-Jason "I'll just say that I'm glad Duke's most prominent athletic figure is on the right side of this..." Evans

[House P]

I really don't get what White's point was here. He says he's worried about recruiting; about how non-star athletes get treated; about how resources get allocated; and so on.

Yup, I worry about that too. We are about to embark into the unknown and there will be both positive and negative consequences that no one can foresee. That is what comes with major rules changes to any organization.

But the solution is not to continue doing things the manifestly unfair way you have been doing them for decades. The solution is not to continue to take advantage of these young (mostly minority) men and women and deny them the ability to profit off their remarkable skills. You do the right thing and allow them to make money and then you try to control the negative stuff that crops up as best you can. And the worst part is that White (talk about an unfortunate name at this time on this issue!?!?!) doesn't seem to have any solutions. He's just wringing his hands and saying he is worried.

This particular statement led me to wonder about the makeup of the NCAA student-athlete advisory committee

"You can dismiss our concerns as those of athletics directors eager to preserve the status quo. Much harder to dismiss is the voice of the student-athletes themselves. The NCAA student-athlete advisory committee, made up entirely of undergraduate athletes, has expressed concern that 'there are a plethora or potential unintended consequences' to permitting the use of NIL."

According to the NCAA,

"The Division I National SAAC consists of one student-athlete from each of the 32 Division I conferences. Members are selected from a pool of three nominees from each of the represented conferences."

The full list is here, but it appears that the committee includes two power conference athletes from revenue sports: Romaro Gill from Seton Hall (basketball) and Ryan Cassidy from Rutgers (football). For the record, Gill was a starter for a tournament quality team while Cassidy appears to be the 3rd string long snapper for Rutgers. So, while White's statement may appear to convey something like "we asked the athletes and they don't even want this", it should probably read more like "we asked a group of athletes who are unlikely to benefit from this ...". While the committee may represents NCAA athletes on the whole, White's argument would be much more compelling if he quoted a group of major conference, revenue sport athletes.

For the record, the ACC representative on the committee is a soccer player from NC State, Leon Krapf. I wonder how many high profile NCAA football or basketball players give a Krapf about how Leon feels about this issue.




No, I am not proud of the fact that I couldn't resist the opportunity to make a cheap joke based on a college kid's last name.

[House P]

This particular statement led me to wonder about the makeup of the NCAA student-athlete advisory committee
The full list is here

I just realized that I didn't include the link to the list of NCAA student-athlete advisory committee members. Here is the list.

[Phredd3]

Duke is a value-add to any potential recruit. Their NIL rights are vastly increased by being associated with Duke, even if the Duke name cannot be used in the NIL marketing. How do you compensate Duke for that, or is it something that Duke is just supposed to accept? Or should it expect Duke players to also be Duke donors? Can it negotiate for that directly?

What about the impact on the non-revenue athletes who can't do this? Do we really think it is OK just to stop offering scholarships in, say, swimming and diving? Or fencing? Or volleyball and field hockey? Is there any impact on Title IX (which last I checked, hasn't gone away)?

There are all kinds of problems and questions associated with this ENORMOUS rule change, some of them quite problematic, in my view. I think many folks are awfully quick to just say, in essence, "Shut up and deal with it."

[Hingeknocker]

Duke is a value-add to any potential recruit. Their NIL rights are vastly increased by being associated with Duke, even if the Duke name cannot be used in the NIL marketing. How do you compensate Duke for that, or is it something that Duke is just supposed to accept? Or should it expect Duke players to also be Duke donors? Can it negotiate for that directly?

What about the impact on the non-revenue athletes who can't do this? Do we really think it is OK just to stop offering scholarships in, say, swimming and diving? Or fencing? Or volleyball and field hockey? Is there any impact on Title IX (which last I checked, hasn't gone away)?

There are all kinds of problems and questions associated with this ENORMOUS rule change, some of them quite problematic, in my view. I think many folks are awfully quick to just say, in essence, "Shut up and deal with it."

To me the only people who have said "Shut up and deal with it" are the coaches and administrators who have said that to the players for, like, a century. YMMV, of course.

And yes, if the only way a fencer can get a scholarship is by denying Cassius Stanley making money he deserves, then the fencer shouldn't get a scholarship. My strong, strong belief however is that the schools could afford the entite fencing team if they wanted to. They might have to, you know, cut back on some coaches' and administrators' salaries. Or put a few less flat screens in the basketball team's dining room. Might be hard, but I bet they could do it.

[Billy Dat]

Rutgers assistant coach Brandin Knight takes his shot at Duke:

@bknight20
I know I will catch flack for this. I’d rather hear this come from someone who does not already have exclusive advantages in recruiting. Their resident spot with ESPN programming and advertising and relationship with USA basketball is not something that is fair across the board.

[sagegrouse]

Rutgers assistant coach Brandin Knight takes his shot at Duke:

@bknight20
I know I will catch flack for this. I’d rather hear this come from someone who does not already have exclusive advantages in recruiting. Their resident spot with ESPN programming and advertising and relationship with USA basketball is not something that is fair across the board.

Hah! "Unfair" and proud of it!

[Bay Area Duke Fan]

"Duke AD's tone-deaf comments show college brass is still digging in against athlete compensation"


https://sports.yahoo.com/duke-a-ds-t...9.html?src=rss

[Nugget]

What about the impact on the non-revenue athletes who can't do this? Do we really think it is OK just to stop offering scholarships in, say, swimming and diving? Or fencing? Or volleyball and field hockey? Is there any impact on Title IX (which last I checked, hasn't gone away)?

I'm not sure that the result would be fewer scholarships for non-revenue sports (as opposed to all the other things that could be cut/reduced) if NIL rights for the stars resulted in some loss of funds into the Athletic Dept, but it is obviously one possibility. However, I don't see that as a difficult trade-off -- why should the athletes in the revenue sports have to continue subsidizing scholarships for those in the non-revenue sports?

The Olympic athletes in figure skating, swimming and the glamour track and field events make 100x the money that those in cross-country skiing or kayaking or (except for those who look like Allison Stokke) pole-vaulting do, and yet the Olympics are fine.

You are correct that Title IX would be an issue, so the brunt of any cuts would fall harder on Men's swimming and diving/fencing/wrestling, etc. than the Women's programs.