Jay Bilas called for a collective bargaining agreement in college sports, thus creating another de facto professional sports entity. With the way NIL is running the college space, in addition to player movement with the transfer portal, Bilas called for a CBA. “I think collectively bargaining is the way to go,” Bilas said, via Jeff […]
Jay Bilas called for a collective bargaining agreement in college sports, thus creating another de facto professional sports entity. With the way NIL is running the college space, in addition to player movement with the transfer portal, Bilas called for a CBA.
“I think collectively bargaining is the way to go,” Bilas said, via Jeff Goodman. If you wanted college football and basketball to look similar to the pros, here it comes.
Funny enough, Bilas suggested coaches salaries were bound to be capped after the House settlement came down. If players, in college football for example, were to have a CBA, NIL could be changed entirely.
“The one thing I think that maybe people aren’t thinking about is if Congress comes in and they’re going to limit the players, they’re not going to let the coaches make the kind of money they’re making,” Bilas said, referring to coaches’ salaries. “They’re going to say, ‘All right, you get a cap now too.’
“So, head coach at Alabama, you’re not getting $12 million while the players are getting limited. You’re going to be limited, too, and we’re going to limit things across the board and make things a little more sane. I think that’s a reasonable possibility that that could happen.”
Bilas cited reasonability due to some NIL figures being out of control or absurd compared to others. Yes, revenue sharing aims ot fix that issue, but there’s no stopping outside collectives.
Not to mention player freedom is paramount these days. There’s currently two transfer portal windows in college football. The portal ended up giving a lot of power back to the players since coaches are free to move, seemingly, whenever.
One of the biggest arguments in favor of the players having more freedom to transfer was the fact that coaches can often move without penalty from one school to another (buyouts aside). But now, compensation as an additional factor to consider?
He also believes the carousel has not stopped spinning when it comes to NIL and NIL-related changes. He still sees some major shifts coming in the next few years, even though the NCAA is now better positioned post-House settlement.
“I think it puts them in an advantageous position to be able to marshal more resources to acquire better talent, absolutely,” Bilas said of schools. “And that’s kind of the thing now, is people are going to have to make decisions. This current system with the $20.5 million cap under the House settlement is only going to last for a certain amount of time. Like, there’s no way this lasts for longer than four or five years, at the most.
“All this does is give the NCAA a chance to — it gives them some time to breathe without getting challenged in court, so that they can come up with a long-term solution, whether that’s collective bargaining, I think that’s one option. Try to collectively bargain with the players where you can get to a number everyone is satisfied with. Or go to Congress and basically say to Congress, ‘Look, you told us to get our act together. We settled this case. We paid past damages and we’ve got this framework. Take this framework and settlement and make it law so that you can help protect us.’”
Thomas Goldkamp contributed to this report
Category: General Sports
