B1G/SEC Developing Plan to Share Revenue with Players
The SEC and B1G are developing a plan to share revenue with players.
The SEC and Big Ten are at the center of developing a revenue sharing plan with players that would redefine college athletics for the future, CBS Sports has learned.
April 30th, 2024 at 12:11 AM ^
Just to be clear, what I've got so far is:
- McDonald's bags = GOOD
- Cheeseburgers = BAD
- FBI Wiretaps = Hear (Self) Say
- SEC is cheating so bad that even Kentucky can steal from the B1G and still be irrelevant
The B1G is collaborating with the SEC "for the benefit of student athletes" and the PAC 12 is gone...let that sink in.
April 30th, 2024 at 12:22 AM ^
After reading that list. Jet fuel... it's not just for breakfast anymore!
Question wrt #2. What part of the cheeseburger is the "bad" part. The beef, cheese, or the bun?
Individually each of those ingredients is legally permissible. It's only when they're assembled in an unlicensed fabrication shop (i.e. the Brown Jug) that they transmute into one of the most heinously illegal substances known to mankind.
I thought it's only legal if you put money in the bag the cheeseburger came in to pay the players, and the food portion was the illegal part?
April 30th, 2024 at 10:11 AM ^
It may simply be a question of scale. 2 - 4 hamburgers is a violation. 250,000 hamburgers gains you admiration for its sheer audacity.
April 30th, 2024 at 10:20 AM ^
Leads me to a historical question...what makes a bagel OK but a bagel with cream cheese not OK.
April 30th, 2024 at 10:38 AM ^
While it's stupid this was ever a rule, I concede that putting cream cheese on a bagel transforms it from a heavy snack to a light meal. There's something about a bagel and schmear that's more satisfying than eating 2 bagels, or a tub of cream cheese on its own.
April 30th, 2024 at 11:21 AM ^
I appreciate the clarification.
April 30th, 2024 at 11:48 AM ^
Where does a fragel fall on this list? I miss the Bagel Factory.
It's always the extra ingredient, ie cheese. Also cream cheese, as accompanyin a bagel.
For the benefit of the players..lol
Money and control
My first thought was 'About Time', but Kickass straightened my out by reminding me that the institutions have 150 years of only looking at ways to exploit student athletes, so what's the likelyhood that gonna change now?
That's my thought. As players move ahead to form unions, they'd rather impose the system than develop it in tandem with the, ahem, employees, let alone have it imposed upon them.
.
Feels like Pettiti is just Sankey's little sidekick. You see Sankey everywhere. You used to see more of Delaney and Warren. What does Pettiti do every day? Just wait for Sankey or Columbus to call him up and tell him what his agenda is for the day?
I think you’ve described the current B1G Commissioner accurately.
April 30th, 2024 at 10:53 AM ^
Please don't smear Delaney's god name (cough, cough) with that of the completely forgettable and irrelevant Kevin Effin Warren
April 30th, 2024 at 12:38 PM ^
The buckeyes didn't even think Warren was a god.
April 30th, 2024 at 12:31 AM ^
I can't remember where I heard it (Matt Brown or Cover 3 maybe?) but it was mentioned that players could be employees of the conferences to avoid Title IX issues since the conferences are separate entities from the Universities. Wonder if that's part of why it's being worked on at the Conference level.
I hope they immediately unionize and stick it to both conferences.
Time for an encampment!
April 30th, 2024 at 12:19 PM ^
That could backfire. Not sure how strong fans’ appetite is to support collective action when the players are now getting NIL and have the right to transfer without penalty, in addition to their scholarships.
College athletics has always been a different beast than the pros. The less it differentiates itself from the pros, the more the fans are likely to see it as an inferior version of the latter, and potentially tune out.
April 30th, 2024 at 12:40 PM ^
If the conference and/or schools can pay the players, why would they need NIL? Hopefully, the schools get money to spend proportionally to the number of viewers.
If players can get paid by both the conference/school AND boosters - why wouldn't they?
That would get around the Title IX issues, but not the restraint-of-trade issue if they try to require that their employees be enrolled in a university.
Even if you can't require they be enrolled at a university I would imagine you could require them to be on a team that is broadcast as part of a TV contract or some such thing which is not possible without being enrolled at a university
That gets around Title IX, but...
- You can't make them be students
- You can fire them
- It violates the mission of most public universities
This is more a reference of getting around the issue of sharing revenue with non-revenue sports.
*not a lawyer, genuinely curious if anyone knows the answer - the courts have already established that different responsibilities of university employees can lead to different pay without violating Title IX (for example the men's and women's basketball coaches don't make the same salary). Why couldn't that same argument be applied to revenue vs. non-revenue sports? Maybe some amount would have to be shared but the majority generated by football/men's basketball could stay with those programs no?
Coaches aren't students and the schools don' receive Federal funding for them I would assume is why it's not a problem. Need to receive Federal funding for the Federal government to have jurisdiction generally (same thing in Healthcare if you don't take Medicare/caid funding you're not subject to HIPAA for example).
That makes sense, appreciate the answer!
I have a copy of Title IX on my wall. It states:
No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.
I do not believe revenue sharing, tied to the revenue generated by the sport, will violate Title IX. For example, WBB players could get paid while men tennis players will not. If that is tied to the revenue generated by those two sports, Title IX will not be violated.
April 30th, 2024 at 10:46 AM ^
But if you can no longer afford to offer scholarships to non-revenue sports due to revenue sharing it would. I think that was part of the point. The scholarships (or whatever replaces them) would be paid via the conferences and there would no longer need to be matching scholarships in non-revenue (or we can just say women's sports since that's what would really be at issue) sports.
I am not sure that will violate Title IX. Let's say we do away with scholarships, and athletes become responsible for all their expenses. In return, there will be revenue sharing linked to the revenue generated by the sport. This would be terrible for college sports, but in my opinion, it will not violate Title IX. This is similar to different departments on campus receiving different levels of funding. For example, nursing or psychology (having many female students) could get less funding compared to engineering as long as there is a legitimate reason not related to sex. At our institution, departments' fundings depend on a number of factors, including size, external grants, national rankings, etc. No one has mentioned that we violate Title IX.
Yeah, dunno for sure as it was just a comment that going through conferences as the employer of the athletes might be the best way to go. The mentioned issues with Title IX and scholarships but didn't get into it much more than that. Probably helps with other stuff like contracts not being subject to FOIA at state schools and whatnot as well.
Why can't going to school be a requirement for their employment? I have to take continuing education classes for my job.
April 30th, 2024 at 10:04 AM ^
You have to take continuing education classes related to your job function.
You can require employees to take classes related to their job. You can't make them take classes unrelated to their job.
April 30th, 2024 at 10:17 AM ^
- It violates the mission of most public universities
We are way beyond that. And not just the swamp that is major college athletics, when these schools collectively have put multiple generations in crushing debt with it’s ever growing costs. It is what it is that’s life but miss me with that sancity of the college mission bs.
If student athletes become University employees - doesn’t the value of their scholarship become a taxable benefit?
And, if it is taxable - it’s a liability of about $80K / year - since - I believe - Michigan’s policy is to pay the University out of state tuition for all student athletes.
Would the Athletic Department also pick up the tax liability for the scholarship?
April 30th, 2024 at 11:02 AM ^
GSIs at Michigan are employees of the university who receive full tuition remissions, which are not taxed, so too do doctoral students on fellowships. I assume that would be the same in this case, even though it would mostly be undergrad, not grad tuition.
April 30th, 2024 at 11:03 AM ^
Congress can always rejigger this or change how tuition reimbursement works in this type of circumstance. Since it seems to be a bipartisan issue in not siding with the NCAA I wouldn't be surprised if they make carve outs for whatever is agreed to in the end.
Or the employee could always just be grossed up to cover the taxes as well.
April 30th, 2024 at 12:37 AM ^
Warde says that's not very transformational.
Warde is along for the ride on this one. No chance he gets interviewed, questioned, or requested by media regarding this issue. Whatever Skankey and Petitti say is good, Warde will echo.
"Redefine" in a very positive way, I'm sure.
I'm all for college kids getting paid for something they spend a lot of time on, but this is going to be NIL on Tony Mandarich-level steroids. And it's going to further separate the haves (those two conferences) and the have-nots (literally everyone else).
Just one of many ways the sport will be less enjoyable for future fans.
So now, there will be revenue sharing, and then the boosters will pay on top of that to pull guys to their teams. This effectively gets players well payed, but doesn’t solve the challenges with keeping donor money out of the picture.
Maybe the conference payouts can be designed in such a way that they include contract agreements to clamp down on the constant transfer portal tampering. If the player is contractually bound to 2 or 3 years at a school, then that gets rid of at least a substantial component of the "re recruit your whole roster every year" problem.
Perfect solution! Make rules that make illegal the tampering that is already illegal. That'll fix it once and for all!
I'm saying that if contracts bar the players from transferring, tampering would be pointless. If the player is locked in somewhere until 2027, why would anyone waste time trying to tamper in 2024, etc.?
Contracts can't be broken? By whom? Either side? That won't be abused by both sides, no sir.
Everyone thinks they have a great solution the current mess. Which was created by all those same geniuses who had solutions to the old mess.
Unbalanced systems change organically over time. And all systems are unbalanced. Michigan is always going to be one of those places that follows the explicit current rules and not the unwritten implicit rules. Just the way it is and has been. Accept that and be glad we get to win a championship every 25 years or so.