Is The Ultimate Solution Having Football Break Away From The Other Sports?

NIL and college sports as they stand now is by and large unsustainable. Heck college football is barely recognizable from even 5 years ago. College football isn't going in a great direction, but what's even worse is that it threatens to drag down all of college sports with it.

My title says it all, I think it's time for schools to have their football programs formally separated from the rest of athletics. The old regional conferences could be brought back to their original members for the most part. The hardest part about this is that the conferences for football would need to be legally separate from the conferences for the rest of athletics. So yes that means there would be a separate SEC for athletics in general and a separate SEC specifically for football.

The point of all of this would be eventually the SEC and Big Ten both go to 24 schools for football and formally break away from the NCAA. Football players would importantly no longer be classified as "students" or "athletes" and would officially be university employees. As employees they would have a set salary and would be granted all university employees privileges. If they don't want to they don't even have to take classes. If they want to take classes they'll get the standard university employee discount but will have to pay for out of pocket.

Obviously football players get a lot of benefits including medical care, housing and access to nutritionists and better food than the average student or the average employee. This would continue but the football players would have to pay for this now, even if it's a small amount. The football players would absolutely have to pay at least the standard university pricing for university housing if not higher. If needed the football program could even be separated from the general university athletic Department and just be a part of the university as a whole or part of a booster organization (So for UF for example part of the Gator Boosters which of course is affiliated with the university but not directly under university control).

Now before some of you scream Title 9, with this the rest of Athletics would still fall under Title 9. As football players would be university employees Title 9 would no longer apply and universities could rightfully remind the Federal Government that those football players are employees and are no longer getting scholarships, free room and board, free meals and free medical care like the other athletes are receiving. And as employees it's a completely different ballgame. Universities can also remind the Federal Government that a university janitor, for example, doesn't make the same as a university president, and that as employees free market principles apply.

To help reign in all the transfers and job hopping (since as employees it would actually be far similar to job hopping), as employees football players and football coaches would be required to sign two year contracts. They don't have to play for the team during that entire two year period, but each two year contract would have a non-compete clause, just like in the business world. If a player wants to leave before the two years are up that's fine, but they can't play for another SEC or Big Ten team for the remainder of the two years. Same policy for coaches. This would prevent teams from all out poaching other teams not only in between seasons but even during the season.

As a college sports fan I understand college football is going in a different direction. Sadly it might be a direction that makes it unrecognizable to college football 30, 20, even 10 years ago. But with this approach, even if college football screws itself over or otherwise just makes itself NFL Minor Leagues, it doesn't take down the other sports with them. You maintain great events like March Madness and the Men's and Women's College World Series, events I don't want to see destroyed.

You let football go the full on NFL Minor League route while reigning in NIL and the transfer portal for the remainder of Athletics and somewhat maintain the student athlete idea. You also cut down on travel costs as traveling across country long term is going to be unsustainable for all but the revenue generating sports.

I think this idea (or something very similar) long term will be the only way to save college sports in general.

 

I just don't see that happening. If all athletes become employees then free market principles apply for all sports and all sports are determined by the revenue they bring in.

The women's lacrosse team loses money over a multi-year period. The women's lacrosse program is shut down and the women's lacrosse players are laid off just like any standard Company layoff.

The vast majority of men's and women's athletics will not be maintained as the vast majority of men's and women's sports lose money for the University.

What about salary rates? Salary rates for most Companies and even at Universities depends on what you bring in and more specifically how much money (whether donations or grants) you bring in. Once again a University Janitor isn't nearly as important as a University President and obviously a University Janitor isn't paid nearly as much as a University President.

So then get ready for the football team to get a salaried rate of at least $100,000/year while the women's volleyball team maybe gets $20,000/year. And just remember as employees that means no scholarships, no free room and board, no free meals and no free medical care. While a scholarships doesn't match a $100,000/year salary like the football team would get, I think we can agree a scholarship value is much greater than a $20,000/year salary.

The smaller sports would have to spend as much time fundraising as they would practicing and playing. And remember again the free market would apply. If the women's basketball team wants the same pay as the football team, then bring in the same revenue. Even in bad years (too many recently) the football team gets 80,000 in the Swamp regularly and 90,000 for the big SEC games. I just looked up the last regular season game for the women's basketball team, 1,473 showed up at the O'Connell Center. The women's basketball team wants as much pay as the football team. Get at least 20,000 if not closer to 30,000 on average for their games and then the university will look at it. It's not sexist in any way, it's all about revenue and what you bring to the table as a university employee.

Let's remember that for the vast majority of football players at SEC and Big Ten schools, they are there to prepare for a career in football in the NFL. The vast majority of athletes in any sports not named football, basketball and maybe baseball and hockey are there to get an education. You would be rewarding the football players by making them employees and destroying players for the vast majority of non-revenue sports.

And what do you think that's going to do for minorities? As late as the 1960's and 1970's college was largely just for white kids from upper class families. You make every athlete a university employee, you lock out minority kids from college sports again and either eliminate their chances of going to college completely or make them take out student loans that they'll be paying back for decades.

Remember that, Courtney (upper middle class white girl in this example) who wants to play lacrosse at the college level, her parents just end up footing the bill for anything beyond what the university pays Courtney directly. Monique (black girl from a working class family in this example) who wants to play college volleyball, her parents live paycheck to paycheck so she can't afford to go to college. Maybe she gets to play college sports while having to work herself, but she doesn't get to have a college education. Then her college sports days are over and she ends up in a job living paycheck to paycheck just like her parents.

May I also remind you that a lot of athletes are exempt from the standard university admission process as athletes under scholarship. There have been plenty of athletes who attended UF for example who would never have gotten into UF as a regular student. As an employee regular admission standards would apply which means once again minorities would be hurt.

Football players simply have a different sport with a very different model than most other sports. Football players have a great chance to go Pro even for a couple of years, most athletes in other sports do not. It's time they are treated different while still maintaining the opportunities that athletes have today.

 

At the end of the day if the non-revenue sports also demand to be reclassified as university employees and not student-athletes, they will be signing their own death wish. The majority of those athletes do not bring in any revenue to the school. No one outside of family and friends of the athletes care at all about the women's tennis team or the women's soccer team or the men's track and field team.

Sure it's nice to hear if the men's track and field team or the women's tennis team does well, but at the end of the day I could really care less. Football, Basketball and to a lesser extent Baseball and Softball are where my fandom is. I don't really care at all about the other sports and that's how most college sports fans are.

If those sports want to be treated the same as football, then fill up the Swamp with 80,000 or 90,000 fans the same way the football team does each home game. We all know they can't do that because whether it's UF or any other school, 99% of the fan base simply don't care about those sports.

If the non-revenue sports demand to reclassified as university employees, those sports will simply be shut down. And that's what I think my proposal helps to prevent.

 

Most likely that stays the same. My proposal doesn't change anything in terms of how the revenue is spent. We all know football by and large covers every other sports. Only football and basketball bring in money at most schools. So the revenue the school receives from football would still cover a lot of the other sports.

The only difference would be the football revenue would need to cover the salaries of the football players and coaches prior to being distributed to the other sports.

Again this is more about keeping the NCAA and regional conferences in all other sports and officially making football players as employees while still maintaining the other sports at student-athletes.

It's one thing to have a school like UF football team playing a Saturday road game at Oklahoma in football every few years. Are we really going to have the UF men's soccer team traveling to Norman on a Wednesday night? Is the UCLA women's tennis team really going to be able to consistently travel to the midwest for tennis matches? Is the Penn State softball team really going to be able to travel to Los Angeles for a Thursday/Friday/Saturday series? Is the South Carolina Swimming and Diving Team really going to travel to Austin for a midweek meet? That's the part I just don't see as being feasible long term.