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Key Takeaways
- The College Sports Commission (CSC) is urging schools to sign an agreement that outlines new rules for paying players, with a deadline of having all 68 schools from the four largest Division I conferences on board.
- The agreement includes language that forbids schools from suing the agency, which has been met with resistance from some state attorneys general.
- School presidents from Arizona, Washington, Virginia Tech, and Georgia have released a statement urging their colleagues to sign the agreement, citing the need for stability in college sports.
- The CSC is open to tweaking the language of the agreement, but warns that significant changes could water down its effectiveness.
- The consequences of not signing the agreement are unclear, with some believing the CSC could still enforce its rules and others thinking it could lead to the shutdown of the entire system.
Introduction to the College Sports Commission
The head of the College Sports Commission, Bryan Seeley, has urged schools to sign an agreement that outlines new rules for paying players, saying "If there was a time to stick out your neck, it’s now." Seeley made the comments during a presentation at the NCAA convention, where he thanked leaders from four schools who have already backed the agreement. The agreement, which was sent out nearly two months ago, is an 11-page document that all 68 schools from the four largest Division I conferences need to sign for it to go into effect.
The Agreement and Its Controversies
The agreement outlines the CSC’s role in monitoring how schools pay out the $20.5 million they’re allowed to spend on players’ name, image, and likeness, as well as how the CSC regulates third-party payments to players. However, the most contentious part of the agreement is language that forbids schools from suing the agency. This has been met with resistance from some state attorneys general, including Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has called the agreement a "power grab." Other state AGs have followed suit, directing their state’s schools not to sign the agreement. As Seeley noted, "My sense is that the vast majority of schools want to sign this, but I suspect if a school wants this, you’re thinking, ‘Why am I going to stick my neck out [if other schools won’t also sign]’".
Support for the Agreement
Despite the controversy, some school presidents have come out in support of the agreement. On Tuesday, school presidents at Arizona, Washington, Virginia Tech, and Georgia released a statement urging their colleagues to sign on. The statement read, "Stability is not created by new rules alone, but by a willingness to live by them." Seeley latched onto this statement, using it to plead with other schools to sign the agreement. He emphasized that the CSC is not trying to fix problems from the outside, but rather is relying on schools to work together to address issues. As he said, "I’m not of the belief that college sports is fundamentally broken and the sky is falling, but there are definitely problems… No one from the outside is coming to fix those problems. We’ll either collectively come together to fix those problems or they won’t be fixed."
Potential Consequences and Next Steps
The consequences of not signing the agreement are unclear, with some believing the CSC could still enforce its rules and others thinking it could lead to the shutdown of the entire system. Seeley gave a nod to proposals, now stalled in Congress, that could add muscle to many of the CSC’s functions. However, he emphasized that the CSC cannot wait for congressional action and must work collectively to address issues in the interim. As he noted, "But we don’t know when that help is coming, and in the interim we should be working hard collectively to try to fix some [of the issues]." The CSC is open to tweaking the language of the agreement, but warns that significant changes could water down its effectiveness. Seeley cautioned that some proposed changes "would water the document down such that it has no enforcement… and would make it meaningless." Ultimately, the fate of the agreement and the future of college sports hang in the balance, as schools weigh the risks and benefits of signing on to the new rules.
https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/47612821/regulatory-body-urges-colleges-agree-pay-play-rules