And So It Begins….

[Delmar]

Well technically just another domino but here’s the very thing we’ve been debating for months. Players will be employees of and paid by the university. As the great Ric Flair said one time: “ You might not like it but you need to learn to live with it…..”

‘Seismic’ changes are coming to college athletics, not entirely for the better

Possibly as early as next week, college athletics could change forever.

www.ajc.com

 

[VolTull]

Holy sheet.

 

[Delmar]

Just a couple of highlights (or lowlights depending on your point of view):

- Power conference schools will be allowed to pay athletes appr $21 million.

- One FBS AD is quoted as saying that programs are likely to be cut.

 

[VolTull]

"As part of the settlement, according to Yahoo Sports, the NCAA will offer $1 million to $2 million less per school in annual distributions for the next 10 years as part of damages owed to athletes for usage of their name, image and likeness before the NCAA made NIL payments legal in 2021."

Think of this. The NCAA is paying damages to athletes by short-sheeting universities athletic programs.

 

[CAVPUT]

Interesting read. Glad I got to see college sports in a different era. What's about to happen won't look anything like what I will remember.

What I'll be interested in is what happens with the sports that don't generate income or not enough to pay their way....men's tennis, women's sports, etc. This will be a business with employees, collective bargaining and caps. Some D1 football programs will struggle in this new world. Suspect several will bow out of some major sports. This notion of title IX will be kind of hard to rationalize. The minor, non revenue producing sports might go the way of the dodo bird. This looks like we're headed to an NFL/NBA type system. Will the budget allow funding of these minor sports? Will men's major sports simply break off and become their own entity? How will that work with colleges? How will it fly in court when women get pissed that they aren't getting the same kind of money or their support from the college and men's income dries up? Then there's the common fan. It's already ridiculously expensive to get season tickets and attend games. Cable, streaming services and the like are also taking a huge bite of the fans apple. With our inflation and economy, a lot of folks are having to make hard decisions about their money. At some point, a tipping point is reached. Happened with me and professional sports. Haven't watched a pro contest in a long, long time. Probably Mannings last season. Even longer for the other pro sports. Yeah, this is gonna be interesting. Wanna bet the last thing considered is the common fan? Yeah, me too.

 

[vols 30]

It was so much better b4 mega conferences, NIL, and the transfer portal. Yes, I know we've benefitted from all three, but I'd still go back to the old ways in a second.


There is zero conference pride today due to expansion. Recruiting transfers is or almost as important as recruiting high school kids. Especially basketball. Look at UT's basketball roster this fall. It feels like a NBA team that signed multiple free agents.

This is better?

 

[CAVPUT]

It was so much better b4 mega conferences, NIL, and the transfer portal. Yes, I know we've benefitted from all three, but I'd still go back to the old ways in a second.


There is zero conference pride today due to expansion. Recruiting transfers is or almost as important as recruiting high school kids. Especially basketball. Look at UT's basketball roster this fall. It feels like a NBA team that signed multiple free agents.

This is better?

Conference pride? Doesn't exist. Doubt it ever did....at least with the athletes. It's always been about the money either under the table or getting to the league it's just out in the open now. Pretty sure this evolves into what the professional sports look like. What I'll be watching is the fan response. How many check out? What happens with home viewing and how expensive do they try to make it? Why do I get the feeling that what's now a tipping point becomes a breaking point with fans?

 

[vols 30]

Conference pride? Doesn't exist. Doubt it ever did....at least with the athletes. It's always been about the money either under the table or getting to the league it's just out in the open now. Pretty sure this evolves into what the professional sports look like. What I'll be watching is the fan response. How many check out? What happens with home viewing and how expensive do they try to make it? Why do I get the feeling that what's now a tipping point becomes a breaking point with fans?

I think pride was there somewhat b4 expansion. I used to watch every SEC game I could. Now, it's only UT Games.

I'd rather watch ETSU play Mercer than watch a Texas/Missouri game

 

[wmcovol]

I’ve noticed listening to baseball games this season instead of teams being littered with Jr colllege transfers, they’re now full of transfers from other D1 programs. Not near as many JC guys in the SEC anymore.

 

[CAVPUT]

I’ve noticed listening to baseball games this season instead of teams being littered with Jr colllege transfers, they’re now full of transfers from other D1 programs. Not near as many JC guys in the SEC anymore.

While there are exceptions, I never considered juco guys worth the risk. With academic requirements being so incredibly low and kids knowing what was required to qualify, that they still weren't able to make the grade so to speak led me to question the work ethic, the intelligence or both. Just preferred HS kids in most cases.

 

[Delmar]

Interesting read. Glad I got to see college sports in a different era. What's about to happen won't look anything like what I will remember.

What I'll be interested in is what happens with the sports that don't generate income or not enough to pay their way....men's tennis, women's sports, etc. This will be a business with employees, collective bargaining and caps. Some D1 football programs will struggle in this new world. Suspect several will bow out of some major sports. This notion of title IX will be kind of hard to rationalize. The minor, non revenue producing sports might go the way of the dodo bird. This looks like we're headed to an NFL/NBA type system. Will the budget allow funding of these minor sports? Will men's major sports simply break off and become their own entity? How will that work with colleges? How will it fly in court when women get pissed that they aren't getting the same kind of money or their support from the college and men's income dries up? Then there's the common fan. It's already ridiculously expensive to get season tickets and attend games. Cable, streaming services and the like are also taking a huge bite of the fans apple. With our inflation and economy, a lot of folks are having to make hard decisions about their money. At some point, a tipping point is reached. Happened with me and professional sports. Haven't watched a pro contest in a long, long time. Probably Mannings last season. Even longer for the other pro sports. Yeah, this is gonna be interesting. Wanna bet the last thing considered is the common fan? Yeah, me too.

You saw what that AD said. Programs will be cut.

 

[CAVPUT]

You saw what that AD said. Programs will be cut.

No doubt. There are programs and then there are women's programs. That's what will be fun to watch. Sad that many sports will be effectively made into club sports, but the almighty dollar rules in this day and time.

 

[Delmar]

No doubt. There are programs and then there are women's programs. That's what will be fun to watch. Sad that many sports will be effectively made into club sports, but the almighty dollar rules in this day and time.

Yes it will. Got no idea how Title 9 fits with all of this.

 

[VolPack22]

Only way they could keep all the sports would be to cut football scholarships to 70 and something close to a 50/25/25 split of the $21M that’s being floated out there. Only 70 players are allowed to play anyways so might as well cut them down. Even then, several big time universities will be cutting non-revenue sports programs. Luckily, Tennessee is in good shape financially in the short term, but it will only be a matter of time before they start asking for more money and upping that $21M to $30M, and then $40M, and so on.

Football = $10.5M
Basketball = $5.25M
Remaining Sports = $5.25M

 

[Orange.]

...Only 70 [football] players are allowed to play anyways so might as well cut them down...

That's not exactly right. Anyone on the team can play, scholarship players and walk-ons.

The 70 player limit is on the travel squad for away games. But they don't have to be the same 70 players each time. There's no limit on number of players that can dress for a home game. And the travel squad limit of 70 doesn't apply to non-conference away games when air travel and/or overnight lodging are not involved.

We have played walk-ons. Dramatically, we were so depleted at DB in the '22 win over Bama that we played a walk-on DB during parts of that game. He did well and contributed to our win.

 

[Orange.]

Only way they could keep all the sports would be to cut football scholarships to 70 ...

Crazy talk. Football is one of the sports. Why would they want to cut scholarships? They would not be happy. And they're paying all the bills, with some little help from men's basketball.

The biggest win is more scholarships for baseball, which is good news.

 

[VolPack22]

Crazy talk. Football is one of the sports. Why would they want to cut scholarships? They would not be happy. And they're paying all the bills, with some little help from men's basketball.

The biggest win is more scholarships for baseball, which is good news.

You cut scholarships to pay less players. Companies do it all the time. You lay off employees to pay less heads. Would you rather pay 70 employees or 85 employees whenever those 70 can get the same responsibilities done that the 85 would. It’s smart business sense.

 

[VolPack22]

That's not exactly right. Anyone on the team can play, scholarship players and walk-ons.

The 70 player limit is on the travel squad for away games. But they don't have to be the same 70 players each time. There's no limit on number of players that can dress for a home game. And the travel squad limit of 70 doesn't apply to non-conference away games when air travel and/or overnight lodging are not involved.

We have played walk-ons. Dramatically, we were so depleted at DB in the '22 win over Bama that we played a walk-on DB during parts of that game. He did well and contributed to our win.

If the NFL can operate a 17 game regular season with 53 active players (only 48 actually dress) and 16 practice squad players (ie walk ons), then college teams can do a 12 game regular season with 70 players. 85 has always been a ridiculously high number anyways. Some of the fat needs to be trimmed.

 

[Orange.]

You cut scholarships to pay less players. Companies do it all the time. You lay off employees to pay less heads. Would you rather pay 70 employees or 85 employees whenever those 70 can get the same responsibilities done that the 85 would. It’s smart business sense.

I don't really want to discuss it. It's awkward. But I have to say that your analogy is not friendly to your case. What "smart business sense" (as you call it) would do and "companies do ... all the time" would be to shutter all the money-losing businesses. That would be everything but football and mens basketball. I'm not advocating that.

Also I need to remind you that rosters are not 85. That is the scholarship limit. Many rosters are well over 100 (including non-scholarship players). The idea to cut them to 85 (or 90, or 95) is already a cut.

Btw, I made a mistake earlier when I said all of the football players can play. In SEC games, the home team can dress as many plays as they wish, but only 80 can play.

In baseball, the home team may dress 35 eligible players, but only 27 student-athletes shall be allowed to participate in a series. The 27 participating student-athletes for both the home and visiting team must be declared prior to the first game of a Conference series and may not be changed during the course of the series.

If the NFL can operate a 17 game regular season with 53 active players (only 48 actually dress) and 16 practice squad players (ie walk ons), then college teams can do a 12 game regular season with 70 players. 85 has always been a ridiculously high number anyways. Some of the fat needs to be trimmed.

Pro teams have reserve rosters and the ability to bring in even players from other teams' reserve rosters in case of need. College teams don't have that luxury. Part of the larger college roster is also due to player development.
---
Overall, I think it's a bad look for baseball to want to make cuts to the football team. Why don't we look at cuts to baseball to help out women's tennis?

And you know I am a big Vols baseball fan. I'm cheering on the BaseVols in most every game thread. I just get tired getting great news about remedying the undersupply of baseball scholarships and all the sudden somehow football has to get blowback when the plan is for football to pay for all of this.

I've heard a lot of people in our baseball forum bemoan the small number of shared scholarships that Title IX imposed on baseball. It's never been the fault of football that baseball doesn't have more scholies. I'm happy to get more for our baseball team, who is kicking a-- nd taking names.

 

[VolPack22]

I don't really want to discuss it. It's awkward. But I have to say that your analogy is not friendly to your case. What "smart business sense" (as you call it) would do and "companies do ... all the time" would be to shutter all the money-losing businesses. That would be everything but football and mens basketball. I'm not advocating that.

Also I need to remind you that rosters are not 85. That is the scholarship limit. Many rosters are well over 100 (including non-scholarship players). The idea to cut them to 85 (or 90, or 95) is already a cut.

Btw, I made a mistake earlier when I said all of the football players can play. In SEC games, the home team can dress as many plays as they wish, but only 80 can play.

In baseball, the home team may dress 35 eligible players, but only 27 student-athletes shall be allowed to participate in a series. The 27 participating student-athletes for both the home and visiting team must be declared prior to the first game of a Conference series and may not be changed during the course of the series.


Pro teams have reserve rosters and the ability to bring in even players from other teams' reserve rosters in case of need. College teams don't have that luxury. Part of the larger college roster is also due to player development.
---
Overall, I think it's a bad look for baseball to want to make cuts to the football team. Why don't we look at cuts to baseball to help out women's tennis?

Scholarship rosters are 85, most big time programs have close to 120. Why the heck do you need 120 players to run a collegiate football team?

If you cut the scholarship players down to 70, you can still have like 25 or so walk ons if you want. You tell me how they are going to spread $21M across 600 student athletes? That’s not a whole lot once you break down. That’s $35k per student athlete. Oh but wait those football players and basketball players aren’t playing for that little money. We already have a QB with a $8M NIL deal. The going rate for a starting QB is only going to go up. And what about those hot shot WRs that want their cut? Or those RBs that want to get insurance because the NFL RB contracts are not worth near as much as other positions? Or those guys in the trenches that get beat up every day? $21M is not going to be enough to satisfy these players and everyone knows it. So what do you have to do to circumvent that? You have to make cuts somewhere. And guess what, we only had an $11M gap in revenue vs expenses so you’re already going to have to pull from somewhere else to make up that $10M. You either have to cut an entire sports program or cut 15 scholarships from football. Which would you rather do? Or would you rather pay $1000 per ticket for nosebleed seats to circumvent the issue?

 

[Orange.]

Don't make me give your the Kim Caldwell stare down, John.

 

[BigOrangeTrain]

This will definitely level the playing field

 

[CAVPUT]

Crazy talk. Football is one of the sports. Why would they want to cut scholarships? They would not be happy. And they're paying all the bills, with some little help from men's basketball.

The biggest win is more scholarships for baseball, which is good news.

Agreed. Universities will simply need to focus on the main sports that generate the revenue. It's now an out and out arms race and will remain so until athletes are employees and there's some sort of cap/collective bargaining. Even then, I think you focus your efforts and finances toward the success and health of men's football and basketball. Probably baseball, too. Other sports, both men and women, will simply be casualties. Just make them club sports and if they don't survive, that's just the reality of collegiate sports in this new world. Unless they can support themselves, women's sports and the minor men's sports will have to make some changes and accept a new reality.

 

[macrovol]

Amateurism is dead. As a golfer I wonder how this will affect qualifications for the US Amateur and thousands of loal amateur tournaments.

 

[CAVPUT]

Amateurism is dead. As a golfer I wonder how this will affect qualifications for the US Amateur and thousands of loal amateur tournaments.

Golf will join all the other "non-profitable" sports for both men and women that will be fortunate to still offer a scholarship. Schools are about to start employing players with all the attendant features of being an employer. They've been rolling in money for a long time and they've not shown any inclination to share the wealth which is why we're where we are. When the dust settles, this will be treated just like any other business. Decisions will be made with an eye on expenses and profits. If a sport doesn't carry it's own weight and turn a profit, I think it gets cut or becomes akin to a club or intramural sport. This entire thing will revolve around men's football and basketball and every other sport will be at risk or at least facing major changes.