Operation 1,000 — THIS SATURDAY. @ 3 PM EST Join TFL Virginia Tech for a Twitter Football League NIL extravaganza as we look to gather Hokie Nation to beat ewVA while also raising funds towards the Virginia Tech NIL Market! 
The college football legend was on hand to deliver a speech at the University of Alabama last week for its Class of 2025 alongside the U.S. President – and the two are now set to link up once more
Nick Saban is set to play a major role in Donald Trump’s commission into college athletics following on from crunch name, image and likeness (NIL) reform meetings with the U.S. President.
The former Alabama head coach recently met with the 78-year-old ahead of last week’s commencement address at the University of Texas for the Class of 2025, where both were on hand to speak to students inside Coleman Coliseum. There was a notably awkward moment when Trump called for Saban to return to the football program as the latter welcomed him on stage.
The President was also met with a standing ovation when speaking about transgender athletes in sports, pledging to defend the sanctity of women’s athletics. But it was his meeting with Saban prior to the event that has proved to be most interesting, with Trump now said to be considering an executive order after the Crimson Tide legend noted how the college sports landscape has changed for the worse.
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With Trump on the same wavelength, it appears a match made in heaven, and the politician has now gone to extra lengths to work alongside Saban by putting him in charge of co-chairing his commission into college athletics, CBS Sports reports.
The move will see Saban serve alongside Texas businessman Cody Campbell, founder of Texas Tech’s Matador Club NIL collective and chairman of the Texas Tech board of regents. The commission would examine prominent issues facing college sports, most notably the transfer portal.
Other issues set to be addressed include the unregulated booster compensation that goes directly to athletes, the employment of college athletes and Title IX, Yahoo Sports reports. Any executive order, however, would likely still need congressional action, NCAA president Charlie Baker stated last month.
Since 2021, the NCAA has allowed college athletes to profit from NIL, providing them with a way to earn money while not being directly paid by their institution. It has resulted in many students, those who play college football and basketball, especially, to become millionaires before they’ve even turned professional.
As of this fall, the NCAA is also set to allow college athletes to participate in revenue sharing following the settlement of lawsuits brought forward by former athletes. However, Saban’s concern about NIL and the influx of money damaging college sports has influenced Trump to take a stand.
Since calling a day on his coaching career at the collegiate level, Saban has joined ESPN for its “College GameDay” program, and admitted earlier this year that NIL was an issue following his decision to step down as Alabama head coach.
“Now, I think everybody is frustrated about it. We had an SEC conference call, 14 coaches on there, and there’s not one guy you can talk to who really understands what’s happening in college football and thinks that it’s not an issue,” Saban told ESPN.
According to the Wall Street Journal, however, Saban is not asking to end NIL deals outright. Instead, he wants to reform how players and universities approach the topic. Regardless, Trump and his administration are working on language to potentially change NIL deals.
With NIL rules becoming a hotly debated topic of conversation, considering the thousands of players entering the transfer portal, Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville gave his two cents on the matter during an appearance on 100.9’s ‘The Game with Ryan Fowler’, where he stated he was all for change to NIL rules. The Republican senator, however, claimed it was the Democrats who held up any potential changes to the rules.
“I think we can get it on the floor, the problem is getting it past a Democrat group that really wants nothing to do with making this country better,” he said. “They don’t care about college sports or education; they worry about the power that they control in this country.”
