The evolution of the NIL

College football alone is estimated to generate over 5 billion dollars a year which is

more than the GDP of Paraguay. so it would come as no surprise that players finally are

allowed to receive compensation. but has the nil destroyed college sports and why was

it banned in the first place?





The original ban on paying players came from the NCAA to save them from lawsuits.

The NCAA feared that if players were paid by the university then in fact if they were

injured they should receive workers comp not only that but with head injuries on the rise

many were scared of lengthy lawsuits coming from long lingering from their playing

days. The NCAA classified college sports as amateurs meaning no player could be paid

under NCAA rule. but for most people, no one saw this as a problem as college sports

were relatively seen as amateurs and rarely were shown on TV. but as the 80s and 90s

rolled around technology got better and better. We saw an explosion in college sports

things like March Madness became as big as the Super Bowl and advertisers poured

money into making the NCAA which once had been set to make the games more safe

was now a company that was in charge of all college sports and all of the revenue. the

problem became obvious how is it fair that the players who were bringing in all these

advertisers' attention and revenue were not allowed to get paid? but the NCAA finally

went too far with their realization of Ncca sports, ed banan was a star for uccla and

when talking to talking to his friend he was told that his son could play as him in a video

game. As you can imagine this puzzled Ed who hadn't received a single cent. he sued

the NCAA and after winning the case against both NCCA and

However, since the explosion of college sports in the 80s and the explosion of revenue,

many schools saw oppurontity to go around NCAA and use their funds to pay players to

come to the schools. multiple schools were caught including Smu and Washington

state. But many more went under the radar. the way they paid them was simple the

player would meet with a booster middle man the booster would in turn compensate

them with car money expensive dinners etc. Rumors of this at big security schools like

Mississippi State came to light but with no proof as the NCAA was not a governmental

body and had no access to players' parent's tax returns etc few teams were ever

convicted. then comes the case of Reggie Bush who was stripped of his Heisman

trophy. bush was a phenomenon he was the best player on the best team and won two

national titles. bush was accused of taking money from an outside source the NCAA

convicted even tho there was no hard evidence that Bush ever actually; ly accepted a

quid pro quo. In hindsight, this is ridiculous the USC football program generates 53

million dollars each year especially nowadays when USC quarterback Caleb Williams

the projected number 1 pick is making 2 million dollars a year. Even to this day, the

NCAA has declined to give Reggie Bush back his Heisman trophy. People were finally

fed up with the NCCAS rules so in 2019 California was the first state to allow players to

be paid for their Name image and Likeness the flood gates were finally open when in

June of 2021 the supreme court ruled in favor of athletes getting paid justice brett

summed it up the best “Nowhere else in America can businesses get away with

agreeing not to pay their workers a fair market rate on the theory that their product is

defined by not paying their workers a fair market rate”





The nil deals changed college football in an unprecedented way. and it wasn't just in

football every sport every athlete was taking part livy Dunne a gymnastics star at LSU

became the third highest-paid athlete making 3.2 million a year. especially in football

teams the most lucrative of sports in college no longer was big names that got you

players places like Alabama were turned on their heads the whole realm of recruiting is

now less about what coaches or culture the team has but purely about how much the

school can give you in nil deals. and this is where we have seen the biggest shift

college athletes are now essentially minor league athletes similar to baseball hockeys

minors. nowadays a new player transfers every day with many athletes going from

school to school to see who will pay them the most many have found this to be getting

out of control. some would argue that this ruins the nature and purpose of college

sports. but with the amount of revenue the schools are bringing in it's obvious there

needs to be some change or regulation.in 2022 the NCCA finally started investigating

the effects of nil in college sports but any regulation may now be seen as unlawful as

after the Supreme Court the NCAA has little leverage anymore. It is a very complex

issue but its clear some regulation is needed if the college sports head towards pros. I

think that a salary cap could be an effective way to solve the level playing field. with

Power 5 teams all having the same amount of money they can spend on players. also,

they can give scholarships. Making it so players are still quietly compensated for their

play.

A revolution has come to college sports and we are only seeing the early stages of what

is to become a controversial and groundbreaking time in collegiate sports. nil has

exploded and has opened up a new frontier that we are now only just exploring. but nil

might hurt more then it harmed but wel, just have to see