O'Bannon judge rules NCAA violates antitrust law
- Thread starter soxhop411
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It makes sense, though I liked the pretense of amateurism as much as the next guy. Maybe it was time for the Empress to point out major college football and basketball franchises aren't wearing any clothes.
The questions are:
How many major college franchises can the system support? Sixty-five (the power five plus ND) seems like far too many.
Will the fans remain on board as the powerful become more powerful and the weak become completely irrelevant?
What is there to appeal, exactly? Not that the NCAA won't mind taking a shot at it. All I can see is the problem that Wilken made her opinion fairly clear before the trial started.
The questions are:
How many major college franchises can the system support? Sixty-five (the power five plus ND) seems like far too many.
Will the fans remain on board as the powerful become more powerful and the weak become completely irrelevant?
What is there to appeal, exactly? Not that the NCAA won't mind taking a shot at it. All I can see is the problem that Wilken made her opinion fairly clear before the trial started.
My favorite part is that the NCAA's own economist called the NCAA a cartel in his own textbook previously.
It's interesting. Back of the napkin, but if you extrapolate the $5,000 maximum to 100 players (85 football and 15 basketball), that's $500,000 per school. (Or 1/12 Nick Saban's salary.) $500,000 x 128 FBS schools = $64 million per year, maximum. There are going to be many schools that don't make enough in licensing and merch do pay that much.
If the NCAA signs a new deal with EA for the football game, that could cover a chunk of that. EA makes minimum $100 million revenues on that game (2m copies x $50 avg sale price), not including DLCs. If the deal was $20m, then that's almost a third of the maximum NIL costs each year
In other words, there are explicit revenue streams out there to cover some if not all of these costs.
edit- I mistakenly put $5,000 as the minimum; it's themaximum lowest the cap can be if there is a cap.
If the NCAA signs a new deal with EA for the football game, that could cover a chunk of that. EA makes minimum $100 million revenues on that game (2m copies x $50 avg sale price), not including DLCs. If the deal was $20m, then that's almost a third of the maximum NIL costs each year
In other words, there are explicit revenue streams out there to cover some if not all of these costs.
edit- I mistakenly put $5,000 as the minimum; it's the
So, while this ruling only applies to revenue sports directly, how will it impact other sports where initial eligibility demands strict amateurism? If it becomes ok for football and basketball players to receive pay as part of their NCAA experience, how can NCAA justify excluding athletes in the grounds that they have previously received pay for play. This could have huge ramifications for baseball and hockey, and likely other sports...
Fred not Lynn said:
Oh yeah, the non-revenue sports are the big loser in this. I think you have to seriously question why schools (especially those that are cash-strapped) are even giving athletic scholarships in the first place now. They were needed to keep the facade of the amateurism going, but that is no longer possible.
I have to wonder if this legalizes (or will be eventually) third party payments; the kind of stuff that went on at SMU in the 80's; Miami in the 90s, etc.
Fred not Lynn said:
This decision isn't for pay for play, this was just name, image, and likeness (NIL) rights. (there's another lawsuit for pay for play.) If the schools collect funds based on NILs, then they'll have to put money, up to $5,000/yr, into a trust.
So, lets say the school puts a player's photo on a schedule, and the schedule is sponsored by Wendy's. A portion of the money Wendy's paid would have to go into that fund. Right away, the money from video games, autograph sessions, jersey sales, apparel deals, etc, would go into the fund. Anything that is sponsored by an outside entity that has players' NIL on it would have a portion of the payment to the school go to the players.
Indirectly, this opens the door for any athlete to profit off of their likenesses. Think back to when Tiger Woods was at Stanford. He couldn't sign an endorsement deal until he went pro. If schools are allowed to pay for NILs, we aren't far from athletes signing endorsement deals. And if an exceptional non-revenue athlete, like an olympic gymnast, wants to sign an endorsement deal, they could eventually do that.
I think this could start the fall of many dominos...but somehwere down the line I see the end of a baseball player losing eligibility by signing a contract and playing in the minor leagues, or a hockey player losing eligibility by playing Major Junior.
The $5000 figure seems confusing. The words were that the NCAA can cap pay for NIL but it doesn't have to, and if they cap it, the cap must be at least $5000. So, it seems like $5000 is neither a minimum nor a maximum. It also isn't clear if the cap is set by schools, conferences, or the NCAA. Schools or conferences may try to cap it, but competition among schools for top athletes should erode the cap. If the NCAA sets the cap, then it shouldn't be long before the antitrust argument gets applied to the cap as well.
I'm not sure it spells the end for scholarships for non revenue sports either. Alums who participated in those sports are often fiercely loyal, and could set up scholarship funds for those specific sports.
I'm not sure it spells the end for scholarships for non revenue sports either. Alums who participated in those sports are often fiercely loyal, and could set up scholarship funds for those specific sports.
If my read is correct, there is a conditional 2-step cap...can't cap at less than the cost of attendance, and not less than $5,000. So if one athlete's attendance costs are $15,000, then the cap is set equal to or greater than that amount. But if another althlete's attendance costs are $2,500 (I can't imagine where this would be), then the cap is $5.000.
Yeah it's a bit confusing. My read is that if the athletic department doesn't bring in enough to pay $5000, they can pay less, but if they can pay more than, the least they can pay is $5000
I'd imagine this has Title IX ramifications as well? I don't see a way around schools paying football and men's basketball players and not equally paying athletes in women's sports, right? I realize this is referring to names and likenesses only for those two sports, but it's a good question. I can't imagine the female athletes aren't going to be pissed the men get at least a $20K trust fund when they graduate while the ladies work just as hard and get nothing. The problem is that female athletes aren't generally going to generate as much income from NILs, yet Title IX explicitly forbids men from getting advantages that women aren't offered.
I really don't see how this ends well for either smaller schools or non-revenue-generating sports. Ironically, it's going to deprive a shit-ton kids who actually want an education and a degree by way of an athletic scholarship from getting that education, because the elite few who are only in college to get paid for playing are sucking up the athletic department funds.
This (and athletes getting paid in general) is going to hurt college sports and athletes far, far more than help them. A ton of sports are going to get dropped by a ton of schools in service to basketball and football. Say goodbye to a huge number of programs across the country: baseball, hockey, rugby, men's soccer, golf, wrestling, tennis, volleyball, cross country, track, fencing, field hockey, lacrosse, swimming and diving, rowing/crew, skiing, gymnastics, equestrian, water polo, rifle and bowling. Not every school will drop every one, but a good number of schools will. Athletes will have fewer and fewer opportunities to go to college on a scholarship, unless they are an elite basketball or football player, or a woman playing basketball, soccer or softball (likely the strongest women's sports). Women will have more sports to choose from, but as discussed earlier, women tend not to earn much for a university.
Alternatively, even more schools will drop football, meaning a bunch of boys who can't play basketball so they turned to football in hopes of scoring one of the few athletic scholarship opportunities available to them will have even fewer chances to get one.
Ultimately, I think this is bad for collegiate athletes and American sports in general. I don't think schools should be allowed to earn millions on the backs of uncompensated athletes, but I also don't want to destroy college athletics for the vast majority of the student-athletes, the ones that lack the ability, the desire and/or the genitals to play football or men's basketball.
I really don't see how this ends well for either smaller schools or non-revenue-generating sports. Ironically, it's going to deprive a shit-ton kids who actually want an education and a degree by way of an athletic scholarship from getting that education, because the elite few who are only in college to get paid for playing are sucking up the athletic department funds.
This (and athletes getting paid in general) is going to hurt college sports and athletes far, far more than help them. A ton of sports are going to get dropped by a ton of schools in service to basketball and football. Say goodbye to a huge number of programs across the country: baseball, hockey, rugby, men's soccer, golf, wrestling, tennis, volleyball, cross country, track, fencing, field hockey, lacrosse, swimming and diving, rowing/crew, skiing, gymnastics, equestrian, water polo, rifle and bowling. Not every school will drop every one, but a good number of schools will. Athletes will have fewer and fewer opportunities to go to college on a scholarship, unless they are an elite basketball or football player, or a woman playing basketball, soccer or softball (likely the strongest women's sports). Women will have more sports to choose from, but as discussed earlier, women tend not to earn much for a university.
Alternatively, even more schools will drop football, meaning a bunch of boys who can't play basketball so they turned to football in hopes of scoring one of the few athletic scholarship opportunities available to them will have even fewer chances to get one.
Ultimately, I think this is bad for collegiate athletes and American sports in general. I don't think schools should be allowed to earn millions on the backs of uncompensated athletes, but I also don't want to destroy college athletics for the vast majority of the student-athletes, the ones that lack the ability, the desire and/or the genitals to play football or men's basketball.
We aren't the only ones looking for clarifications
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/11338781/ncaa-seeks-clarification-ed-obannon-ruling
Translation: "We're not sure precisely when we have to stop ripping off our student athletes, so we need a clarification, and frankly this uncertainty throws the whole ruling about us ripping them off into question."
Honestly, if it wasn't for the IOC, the NCAA would be the most RICO-ish organization in sports. Although I suppose FIFA would have a claim.
Honestly, if it wasn't for the IOC, the NCAA would be the most RICO-ish organization in sports. Although I suppose FIFA would have a claim.
Old Fart Tree said:
Yeah, pretty much as soon as you start scrutinizing the NCAA in any type of legitimate fashion, you realize pretty quickly that the only reason it actually exists is to bargain for its members in terms of media deals and to keep labor costs down for the product. Other than that, the entire thing pretty much falls apart under any type of in-depth analysis.
