NIL

Utah vs. BYU

Chris Hill was poolside Wednesday afternoon when he answered the phone, relaxing after a round of golf. The former Utah athletic director’s playing partner? His longtime counterpart in Provo, ex-Brigham Young AD Tom Holmoe. “When Tom announced his retirement, I told him we’d play a round to celebrate,” Hill explained. (Holmoe stepped down this spring […]

Published

2 weeks ago

June 26, 2025

Your Sports Nation

“When Tom announced his retirement, I told him we’d play a round to celebrate,” Hill explained. (Holmoe stepped down this spring after two decades in charge of BYU athletics.)

“Tom and I always got along. People don’t understand that because of the whole Utah-BYU thing. But the schools had a lot in common, and they still do. They’ll vote the same way on a lot of Big 12 stuff.

“But there are some differences, obviously.”

Hill and Holmoe spent most of their round — call it the Holy Fore! — chatting about their families, but they talked shop, as well.

There was no shortage of topics, what with the chaotic state of college sports, life in the Big 12, the landmark House vs. NCAA lawsuit settlement and BYU’s sudden success on the field (and court).

The era of unchecked NIL has gone exceedingly well for the Cougars, who possess one of the richest donor bases in the country. They aren’t alone — not even in the Big 12. Texas Tech, with funding from oil billionaire Cody Campbell, has acquired football and basketball talent at a rate that exceeds historical norms.

“As a Utah guy, yeah, I’m concerned,” Hill said. “You look at the dollars, and it’s just the reality. Utah has great support, and Utah will be fine. But it’s no secret that BYU has more wealth.”

The Big 12 hopes to end the unchecked NIL sooner than later. Along with the ACC, Big Ten, Pac-12 and SEC — the named defendants in the House antitrust lawsuit — the conferences created the College Sports Commission (CSC) to clean up a marketplace that, for four years, has been tantamount to pay-for-play.

Under the CSC structure, all deals worth at least $600 must be reported to NIL Go, a technology platform created by Deloitte that will determine whether contracts fall within a reasonable range of compensation. Rejected deals can be tweaked and resubmitted. There’s even a pathway to arbitration.

Led by Bryan Seeley, a former chief investigator for Major League baseball, the CSC will have the authority to punish schools for playing athletes whose deals were not approved.

At least, that’s the plan.

“There will be challenges,” Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark explained in early June, following the House settlement. “But we’re very confident.

“Our schools want rules. We’re providing rules, and we will be governed by those rules. And if you break those rules, the ramifications will be punitive.”

Not everyone is convinced the CSC will effectively rein in pay-for-play and create a market of legitimate NIL, where the dollars paid match the services performed.

“In theory, it’s fine,” Hill said. “If they can enforce it, then it’s a different ballgame. But I’m skeptical. I just think they are going to get sued again and again until they can collectively bargain.”

Many share Hill’s gloomy outlook. The House settlement has not been codified by Congress. The NCAA does not have antitrust protection. Dozens of states have their own NIL laws on the books.

There is nothing and no one to stop an attorney from suing the CSC after an NIL deal is rejected. Why should a technology platform created by a company that’s paid by the conference be allowed to determine the reasonable range of compensation for services rendered?

The market determines the market, unless … the rules of the road have been collectively bargained.

You don’t see compensation lawsuits in the NFL or NBA, which have collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) between the leagues and the players’ unions.

But there are CBAs in college sports because there are no unions in college sports. In order to form a union, the athletes must be employees, and the schools do not want athletes to be declared employees.

For many university presidents, athletic directors and conference executives, athlete employment is a non-starter.

Hill disagrees.

“Students can be employees,” he said, referring to non-athletes who work while attending college. “I don’t know what the problem is. Just call them athlete-workers. There’s no reason why they can’t be employees.

“The NCAA is going to get sued again and again until there’s a CBA. I don’t see the end of it until they are employees with a union and contracts and buyouts.”

The timing of Hill’s golf game with Holmoe wasn’t lost on the man who led Utah athletics for 31 years: It came one day after BYU’s latest recruiting success.

On Tuesday, the Cougars secured a commitment from five-star quarterback Ryder Lyons, a rising senior at Folsom (California) High School who will join the team in the spring of 2027, following a one-year church mission.

Lyons, who picked BYU over Oregon, is part of a recruiting class that ranks third in the Big 12.

This, after the Cougars landed AJ Dybantsa, the No. 2 basketball recruit in the class of 2025.

And after they reached the Sweet 16 for the first time in more than a decade.

And after they won 11 football games.

In the world of unchecked NIL, talent follows the dollars. With Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith and others lending their support, BYU has possessed the dollars needed to acquire talent at the highest level.

Hill circled back to the College Sports Commission — the great equalizer, in theory.

“If that’s the reality, then I don’t think there will be much difference between the schools,” he said. “But I think (the commission) will get sued. And I’m worried about it.”

*** Send suggestions, comments and tips (confidentiality guaranteed) to wilnerhotline@bayareanewsgroup.com or call 408-920-5716

*** Follow me on the social media platform X: @WilnerHotline

NIL

Jonathan Perrin Discusses NIL and New Financial Era in College Baseball

Published

5 minutes ago

July 10, 2025

Your Sports Nation

The evolving landscape of college baseball is reshaped by recent NIL regulations and increased scholarships, which will affect recruitment and funding from July 1, 2025. Programs are now allowed to provide up to 34 scholarships and can directly pay athletes as independent contractors. Jonathan Perrin, a former player, highlights the SEC as a prime benefactor, boasting greater resources to attract top talent compared to mid-major programs that will struggle financially. This has intensified the competition among colleges, making it tougher for mid-majors to retain their players. The financial dynamics present new challenges, especially for the competitive structure of Power 4 schools and player development pathways.

By the Numbers

34 scholarships per program available post-July 2025 for full funding.
Players at top programs can earn up to $250K through NIL, exceeding standard pro baseball bonuses.

State of Play

SEC leads in NIL spending, creating disparities in recruitment.
Mid-major programs face challenges retaining talent as players transfer to higher-paying schools.

What’s Next

As colleges adapt to these financial changes, it is likely that the competition for top talent will intensify, leading to further shifts in player development strategies and roster formation, particularly for mid-majors. Programs may increasingly prioritize financial sustainability to remain competitive.

Bottom Line

This new era of college baseball emphasizes a financial arms race in recruitment, where the ability to leverage resources will significantly affect a program’s success on the field and in attracting top talent.

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NIL

The best part of ‘College Football 26,’ plus some hilarious trading cards

The Pulse Newsletter | This is The Athletic’s daily sports newsletter. Sign up here to receive The Pulse directly in your inbox. Good morning! Time to hit the sticks. Video Games? Why ‘College Football 26’ means we’re really back Over the last few days, The Athletic has paid me to play a video game, […]

Published

7 minutes ago

July 10, 2025

Your Sports Nation

The Pulse Newsletter | This is The Athletic’s daily sports newsletter. Sign up here to receive The Pulse directly in your inbox.

Good morning! Time to hit the sticks.

Video Games? Why ‘College Football 26’ means we’re really back

Over the last few days, The Athletic has paid me to play a video game, EA Sports’ “College Football 26.” It’s a great game, and seems like a vast improvement on last year’s re-debut. It was also strangely emotional.

Before I get to my review, let’s start with the latter point:

For may college football fans around, say, 25-45, EA’s NCAA Football franchise was a ritual every year. In its first major run from 1997-2013, the game became a social phenomenon. Some of my fondest memories are staying up late with my best friends in high school playing the game.
That run ended because of what we now know as an NIL issue, which has been somewhat sorted out in this new era of college football. Now, players are paid, and their real names are on the backs of their jerseys in the game. So long, QB #13. Hello, properly compensated LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier.
The fact that this sequel game is here — and improved, by the way — hit me unexpectedly. This is really happening every year again, and a new generation of middle-school and high-school kids will hopefully have similar experiences. While I’m not chugging energy drinks at 1 a.m. while running roughshod over my friends with C.J. Spiller, I feel more connected as a college football fan again. Very cool.

I asked The Athletic’s Chris Vannini, a reviewer and in-house expert on the game, why it’s important:

“Video game culture is pop culture, and a lot of people got back into watching real college football through the video game. For any sport to survive and thrive in the future, it always needs a new generation of fans. This helps.”

Now, about the game: It has an obviously similar gameplay to last year’s game, with noticeable small improvements. Motions are smoothed a little bit. College coaches are now in the game. But I want to focus briefly on the new Road to Glory mode, inspired by Jason Kirk’s excellent review earlier this week, because I had a blast with it. Four things that happened:

I made my name Chris Blaze and decided to be a total jerk.
I started as a blue-chip recruit and immediately tanked myself down to a two-star.
I still told Brian Kelly I never wanted to play for LSU anyway (a lie) after he said I wouldn’t get an offer.
I committed to Tulane, but on Signing Day I faked picking the Green Wave hat (a thing you can actually do) and instead opted for Nebraska.

I am biding my time behind Dylan Raiola, but sad to report the game does not think Nebraska will be good. I plan to transfer four times, though.

It’s a good game. Let’s keep moving:

News to Know

More NBA funny money
Chet Holmgren and the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder agreed to a five-year max extension yesterday that could be worth up to $250 million. It comes eight days after the franchise signed MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander to a $285 million supermax extension, and Jalen Williams’ payday is coming soon, too. Next year is the last season before this team becomes prohibitively expensive, as our experts wrote.

Also in extension news last night: Devin Booker signed a two-year, $145 million max extension to stay in Phoenix. I’ll stay in any bad situation for $72 million a year. Booker is still just 28 and will have made over $520 million by the end of this deal, when he’ll be just 32. Excuse me while I fall over repeatedly.

It’s Sinner vs. Djokovic
Poor Ben Shelton. He bowed out in the Wimbledon quarterfinals yesterday against world No. 1 Jannik Sinner, which gives Shelton an unfortunate streak: The only two players to defeat him in Grand Slams this year are Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz, who have combined to win the past six slams in all. Awaiting Sinner in the semifinal: Novak Djokovic, who outlasted the upstart Flavio Cobolli yesterday. Their rivalry is … eerie.

More news

Paris Saint-Germain thrashed Real Madrid 4-0 in the Kylian Mbappe derby. It was surgical.
Former NCAA wrestler and MMA fighter Ben Askren said he “died four times” before receiving a lung transplant.
The Yankees designated DJ LeMahieu for assignment one day after benching him. They still owe LeMahieu a lot of money.
A new report says the 2026 World Cup will be the “most climate polluting in history.” Gulp. More details here.
Lionel Messi is back dominating MLS … all while a Saudi club makes a strong push for the legend. DealSheet has the scoop.
The “NBA2K26” cover athletes are here: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Angel Reese and Carmelo Anthony. See the full cover here.

Love The Pulse? Check out our other newsletters.

Oddities: How did these cards get made?

Scores of trading cards are printed every year and shipped around the world. Some have value. Most don’t. The cards that earn status do so mostly through the feats of whatever player graces the front.

Others are valuable for their mistakes.

I could not stop cackling through this roundup of unflattering cards yesterday, inspired by a recent sale of a Bronny James card that accidentally has “LEAVE” printed across the front. Thus, Brooks Peck went and found the 17 “worst” cards to ever exist.

I’d like to share the two that earned guffaws from yours truly:

Blake Griffin was past his prime at this point, but that didn’t mean Mosaic had to make him look like a disproportionate cartoon character. Why is head so big? Why did they pick this facial expression to blow up? Sorry, Blake, but this is hilarious.

And then there’s Bill Pecota:

Fleer Baseball should be prosecuted for this. Hey Bill, here’s your card! It looks like you’re striking out!

The card does, however, add to Pecota’s unique place in baseball lore, as the nine-year journeyman finished with a .249 career average and inspired the name of the projection model PECOTA, which projects player output every year.

See all the cards here. I would like someone to print an unflattering card of me one day. OK, almost done:

What to Watch

Wimbledon: Sabalenka vs. Anisimova
8:30 a.m. ET on ESPN
The No. 1 seed takes on the last remaining American in this semifinal matchup. The other semi, Iga Świątek against Belinda Bencic, follows directly after. Another good morning of tennis.

MLB: Mariners at Yankees
7:05 p.m. ET on MLB Network
Aaron Judge vs. The Big Dumper. Two good teams. Just watch it.

Get tickets to games like these here.

Pulse Picks

I was floored by this feature on Jojo and Jacob Parker, the identical twins who could be first-round picks in next week’s MLB Draft. They couldn’t play catch with their dad, but Jop Parker got his sons here anyway. Make time for this.

Sam Amick wrote a fascinating notebook about the scene in Los Angeles, where both the Lakers and Clippers have prioritized flexibility this offseason with the future in mind. The question is: Who ends up with the star at the end?

To hear the Astros talk about rookie star Cam Smith is to get secondhand goosebumps. He was special from his introduction to the team.

Most-clicked in the newsletter yesterday: Tim Graham’s story on the Bills’ uneasy political dance with Canada. Read it here.

Most-read on the website yesterday: The story on Christian Horner’s shock firing yesterday, which had all of F1 talking.

(Top photo: Cover courtesy of EA Sports)

Link

NIL

How NIL has changed college basketball: Numbers deep dive reveals surprising trends, recipe for success

Many of the same teams and coaches who consistently won in college basketball before the Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) era — which began July 1, 2021 — have unsurprisingly continued to thrive in the NIL era. Think Mark Few at Gonzaga or Bill Self at Kansas. A handful of coaches have shown their ability […]

Published

22 minutes ago

July 10, 2025

Your Sports Nation

But not all of them.

The contrast in success between eras has been starker for some than for others. The NIL era has blunted some programs’ success or, in some cases, significantly diminished it. On the flip side, other coaches and programs have surged thanks to improved access to resources and a more level playing field.

Take the following data as an example. Gonzaga, Kansas and Duke — each of which posted a winning percentage of 80% or higher from the 2000-01 season through 2020-21 — stood apart from the rest of the sport during that stretch.

The chart below, sorted by winning percentage, shows that over a 20-year span, only four teams won 75% or more of their games. (Data courtesy of Stathead.)

1	Gonzaga	720	604	116	83.9
2	Kansas	748	611	137	81.7
3	Duke	741	599	142	80.8
4	Kentucky	736	556	180	75.5
5	North Carolina	744	538	206	72.3
6	Memphis	722	522	200	72.3
7	Arizona	713	512	201	71.8
8	Michigan State	729	523	206	71.7
9	Villanova	710	508	202	71.5
10	Louisville	711	507	204	71.3
11	Florida	724	512	212	70.7
12	Syracuse	727	512	215	70.4
13	Wisconsin	712	501	211	70.4
14	BYU	697	487	210	69.9
15	VCU	696	486	210	69.8
16	Ohio State	716	499	217	69.7
17	Xavier	697	485	212	69.6
18	Utah State	690	480	210	69.6
19	Murray State	663	456	207	68.8
20	San Diego State, Belmont	694, 670	477, 460	217, 210	68.7

That tide has turned in the NIL era. While we only have four seasons worth of data, 11 teams — nearly triple the rate of the pre-NIL era for the preceding two decades — have won 75% or more of their games during that time. Of those 11, four — Gonzaga, Drake, Saint Mary’s and Grand Canyon — hail from outside the major conference structure.

Teams like Vermont, North Texas, VCU Charleston and UAB have all posted winning percentages above 70%.

1	Houston	152	132	20	86.8
2	Duke	150	121	29	80.7
3	Gonzaga	139	112	27	80.6
4	Purdue	147	116	31	78.9
5	Drake	141	111	30	78.7
6	Saint Mary’s	138	108	30	78.3
7	UConn	147	115	32	78.2
8	Arizona	145	112	33	77.2
9	Auburn	141	108	33	76.6
10	Grand Canyon	136	103	33	75.7
11	Tennessee	145	109	36	75.2
12	Kansas	144	106	38	73.6
13	Vermont	136	100	36	73.5
14	San Diego State	139	102	37	73.4
15	North Texas	140	102	38	72.9
16	VCU	140	101	39	72.1
17	Alabama	144	103	41	71.5
18	Memphis, Charleston	139	99	36	71.2
19	UAB	146	103	43	70.5
20	North Carolina	146	101	45	69.2

The sample is small and the landscape is continuously shifting, so it’s hard to draw sweeping conclusions about the NIL era and its impact on the sport. But it’s not so hard to at least glean a few things from the data above, and speculate about what it means in the present and what it portends for the future of college basketball.

Here are my takeaways.

1. Cinderella is not dead

Everyone was ready to sound the alarm bells in March when — for the first time since the NCAA Tournament expanded to 32 teams in 1975 — every team in the Sweet 16 field was represented by a major conference. But reports of the death of Cinderella are far too premature.

From 2000-21, 20 of of the 50 winningest Division I teams hailed from non-major conferences. (That includes Gonzaga and BYU, neither of which I would have nor do count as mid-majors.) Since then, that number is up to 29.

2. Disparity arising at mid-major level

At one point, there was notable parity between mid-major and high-major programs — and perhaps there still is to a degree — but the gap in winning percentages between the two groups has narrowed considerably. Increasingly, however, the disparity among mid-majors lies between programs with resources and those without.

Drake, for instance, owns the fifth-highest winning percentage in the NIL era among all Division I teams. That success has been anchored by strong coaching hires — first Darian DeVries, and more recently Ben McCollum — and marks a sharp upward trend for a program that, before the NIL era, ranked in the bottom third of the Missouri Valley Conference in winning percentage. (Creighton left the MVC after the 2012-13 season, and Wichita State departed following 2016-17.)

Drake’s winning percentage since 2021 is more than 10 percentage points higher than the third-most successful program in the conference and nearly 50 percentage points better than Evansville — which has the most losses in the league over that span. Compared to the pre-NIL era, the gap between the top and bottom of the MVC has only grown.

Highest win % among MVC teams pre-NIL/post-NIL

1	Creighton	70.6%	Drake	78.7%
2	Wichita State	68.4%	Loyola Chicago	75.8%
3	Loyola Chicago	61.9%	Bradley	67.4%
4	Northern Iowa	59.1%	Belmont	64.3%
5	Southern Illinois	56.8%	Indiana State	58.0%
6	Missouri State	54.0%	Northern Iowa	56.2%
7	Illinois State	53.5%	Southern Illinois	55.8%
8	Drake	48.5%	Missouri State	50.4%
9	Bradley	47.1%	Murray State	46.4%
10	Indiana State	46.8%	Illinois State	45.9%
11	Valparaiso	46.1%	Illinois-Chicago	42.7%
12	Evansville	44.2%	Valparaiso	36.2%
13	—		Evansville	30.2%

This is not just a cherry-picked sample from one league. Here’s the Mountain West below. (Note: Boise State joined in 2011-12; Fresno State and Nevada joined in 2012-13; San Jose State and Utah State joined in 2013-14. Utah and BYU left after 2010-11 and TCU left after 2011-12.)

SDSU, Boise State and Utah State have won more than 71% of their games during the NIL era. Not even the most winningest MWC team in the preceding two decades met that mark. That has come at the expense of rapidly declining success among teams like Air Force and Fresno State, both of which dropped off by at least 15%.

Highest win % among Mountain West teams pre-NIL/post-NIL

Rank	Pre-NIL (2000-2020 seasons)	Win %	Post-NIL	Win %
1	BYU	70.8%	San Diego State	73.4%
2	San Diego State	68.7%	Boise State	71.2%
3	UNLV	61.9%	Utah State	71.0%
4	Nevada	61.4%	Colorado State	66.9%
5	Boise State	61.1%	New Mexico	64.2%
6	Utah State	61.1%	Nevada	59.5%
7	New Mexico	60.8%	UNLV	58.0%
8	Utah State	60.6%	Wyoming	47.3%
9	Fresno State	55.4%	San Jose State	39.8%
10	Colorado State	52.5%	Fresno State	39.4%
11	Wyoming	51.5%	Air Force	30.6%
12	Air Force	46.3%	—
13	TCU	40.5%	—
14	San Jose State	22.1%	—

And just for giggles here’s the CAA. Pre-NIL, only two teams from 2000-01 through 2020-21 had winning percentages below 40%. Since 2021-22, that number has more than tripled — with Stony Brook, Northeastern, Monmouth, Elon, Hampton, William & Mary and North Carolina A&T all below win percentages of 40%. This league is a particularly interesting case study in the impact of NIL because of how big a leap Towson, James Madison, Delaware and UNC-Wilmington have made in the league’s hierarchy.

Highest win % among CAA teams pre-NIL/post-NIL

Rank	Pre-NIL (2000-2020 seasons)	Win %	Post-NIL	Win %
1	Richmond	75.9%	Charleston	73.3%
2	VCU	69.9%	UNC-Wilmington	72.8%
3	George Mason	64.6%	Towson	65.7%
4	Old Dominion	60.4%	Hofstra	60.9%
5	Charleston	56.9%	Drexel	55.6%
6	Hofstra	54.7%	Delaware	54.0%
7	Northeastern	53.7%	James Madison	51.7%
8	Drexel	50.0%	Campbell	45.3%
9	UNC-Wilmington	49.3%	Stony Brook	39.0%
10	William & Mary	45.7%	Northeastern	38.4%
11	Elon	45.3%	Monmouth	38.4%
12	Delaware	44.2%	Elon	37.2%
13	James Madison	42.1%	Hampton	34.7%
14	Georgia State	40.0%	William & Mary	34.6%
15	Towson	39.4%	North Carolina A&T	28.1%
16	American	25.9%	—

3. The recipe to success in NIL era

Great college coaches can transcend situation and find ways to win — and win big — and that seems to be the throughline for many programs regardless of era. Of the 10 winningest teams from the 2000-21 seasons, six had coaches who raked in top-10 salaries per USA Today data collected in 2020.

A seventh, Gonzaga-led Mark Few, is among the most successful coaches in college basketball history. An eighth school, Memphis, was led previously by one of those coaches who landed elsewhere (John Calipari). A ninth school, Arizona, was led by one of the highest-paid coaches (Sean Miller) before scandal late in his tenure. A tenth school, Louisville, was also led by one of the highest-paid coaches who was also wrought with scandal before his ouster in 2021.

Compare that to the current NIL landscape and the ratio of high level success and high level coaching is nearly 1:1. Of the twelve winningest schools in the NIL era, at least five are coached by those with salaries in the top 10 in the sport.

One gigantic takeaway here: Kelvin Sampson is far and away the most underpaid and underappreciated coach in all of college athletics and it is not all that close.

Wins since 2021

School	Win %	Coach salary rank
Houston	86.8	16
Duke	80.7	Private school
Gonzaga	80.6	Private school
Purdue	78.9	13
Drake	78.7	Private school
Saint Mary’s	78.3	70
UConn	78.2	3
Arizona	77.2	9
Auburn	76.6	6
Grand Canyon	75.7	68
Tennessee	75.2	7
Kansas	73.6	1

Link

NIL

The Only Question That Matters For The Future Of College Sports

College athletics currently lives in the same world as a middle aged man with fantastic genetics and horrible habits. The naive optimist in him is quick to remind himself that no doctor has ever seen a problem with him, and that was true for his father and his father before him. Meanwhile, in addition to […]

Published

3 hours ago

July 10, 2025

Your Sports Nation

The strong as steel relationship between fans and their alma mater, local school or childhood favorite team has never wavered for well over 99% of fans in the lifetime of college sports. It’s a bond that in many parts of the country is stronger than the connection to a professional team, religion, or even a spouse. And even for the most pessimistic of fans, they will still come crawling back after walking away a few times before they can truly cut out the addictive connection. Try as you will, there are legendary, joyful, and painful moments that will always stay with you. From the Kick Six to Kemba Walker’s ankle-breaker, Kris Jenkins’ shot to Ezequiel Elliot’s run.

As the current landscape stands in 2025, it remains a relatively favorable situation. The twelve-team playoff in college football revived my rapidly dissolving passion, thanks to 2024 being the most compelling season in well over a decade. The game-to-game tension of the thirty-one-game college basketball regular season has easily surpassed the NBA’s eighty-two-game snoozer in this century. The talent may be better, but the clearly lessened effort and player absences can’t compete with the life or death feeling swirling around every game in the conferences capable of getting at-large bids, but not just by waltzing to a .500ish record (ACC, Big East, A-10, Mountain West and PAC-12 again soon).

Traditionally smaller sports are growing in fan engagement as well, especially volleyball, baseball and softball.

Meanwhile, problems that threaten to destroy the very essence of college athletics are creeping in with a Dementor’s darkness and speed. Fans have made it clear that much more than a super majority does not want athletes playing for four schools in four years, or a college football playoff with a certain number of auto bids for certain conferences, or seeing more teams with losing records in conference play in the NCAA Tournament.

The old world of paying players under the table at the biggest schools was the secret cigarette of athletics. Everyone knows it’s going on, but the need to hide kept it under reasonable control. All of the boundaries are gone now and while that short term rush is hitting everyone, something awful is silently building up beneath the surface.

Blotting out of those issues is the constant whisper of a threat that twenty to forty of the biggest schools could always form their own league with the unlimited ability to pay players who likely wouldn’t even enroll in the school. While the massive fanbases of these teams would support them in any format, the big schools seem to underestimate that becoming an independent minor league would quickly place them a lot closer to the UFL than the NFL.

There is nothing in America that social media loudmouths are more united on than a desire for college athletics to refrain from continuing down a path of completely unregulated and unlimited payments to players, all the while those players have absolutely nothing preventing them from leaving their current team just a few minutes after arriving. Yet, everyone is resigned that this is how it will be. A giant wall of water is bearing down, and their foot is stuck right in its path.

That powerless feeling stems from the one unanswerable question in college sports that encompasses all of the other problems. You can better regulate NIL, begin to restrict transfer rules again and maybe even get conferences realigned closer to geographic reasonability. None of that will matter without a fundamental shift in responsibility.

Is there a future in which the major stakeholders in college athletics begin to care about the medium-to-long term again?

One great year is all that is needed now to get a promotion. Players get bigger paychecks to transfer. Coaches get hired for higher-profile jobs. Athletic directors and school presidents get promoted to bigger and richer institutions. Even conference commissioners can step up to higher-regarded leagues, or find a high-paying private sector job.

All of this constant movement has created a singular pressure for success in each year. Plans for future development, whether it’s a player growing his skills or a coach building a program, are now moot. Take new Iowa basketball coach Ben McCollum, for example. He was a four time National Champion at Division II who couldn’t generate any interest from Division I programs until Drake took a chance on him. One singular 31-4 season at the top level was enough for him to land a power conference gig. That would have been preposterous just a few years ago.**

Athletic directors are basically running legal Ponzi schemes now. If they can bring in a lot of money in one to three years at the helm, they get to carry a big bag of cash with them on the way out. Who cares if that short-term gain is a long-term detriment? The person who’s signature is on the document will long gone by the time that ramifications come.

It runs entirely counter to what happens in professional leagues, where owners desire to continue building up their franchise values, rather than just maximizing their single-year income. The NFL and NBA make decisions with the next ten years in mind. Many in college couldn’t care less about the end of the next twelve months.

Some of the lack of foresight in college athletics comes with greed, some comes from teenagers not having their priorities straight, but it all has the same damaging effect. How to fix it is a multi-billion-dollar question, one that I will pose without much of an idea of the right answer. How do we bring the importance of long-term building back into the minds of the major stakeholders of college athletics?

**Do not put it on the record that I slandered Ben McCollum. It was an extremely aggressive hire by Iowa, but I’d bet that he is a good enough coach that they will get away with it.

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NIL

College Baseball Coaches Support Changes To MLB Draft, Transfer Portal

Image credit: (Photo by Jay Biggerstaff/Getty Images) In May 2020, with the world paused during a global pandemic and college baseball frozen in uncertainty, a group of coaches led by then-Michigan head coach and current Clemson skipper Erik Bakich saw opportunity in the stillness. They called it the New Baseball Model—a sweeping, data-backed plan to […]

Published

4 hours ago

July 10, 2025

Your Sports Nation

College Baseball Coaches Support Changes To MLB Draft, Transfer Portal

Image credit:
(Photo by Jay Biggerstaff/Getty Images)

In May 2020, with the world paused during a global pandemic and college baseball frozen in uncertainty, a group of coaches led by then-Michigan head coach and current Clemson skipper Erik Bakich saw opportunity in the stillness.

They called it the New Baseball Model—a sweeping, data-backed plan to overhaul the sport’s calendar. They believed it would not only bolster the sport’s financial viability but also enhance player safety, academic balance and long-term sustainability.

At its core, the proposal—which has been reviewed by Baseball America—sought a four-week shift in the college season’s start date, moving Opening Day from early February to early March. That change, the proposal argued, would do more than just warm the weather. It would give cold-climate teams a chance to schedule regional games instead of shelling out thousands of dollars on southern travel they’d never recoup. It would also increase fan engagement by avoiding direct overlap with the college basketball postseason and extend the preseason ramp-up period, thereby reducing early-season pitching injuries, which had become a growing concern across the sport.

The plan drew wide interest, particularly from the Big Ten, Big 12 and ACC. The SEC’s reaction was more divided, and the Pac-12 approached with caution.

Ultimately, any perceived momentum never materialized. Shortly after the proposal began circulating, the NCAA froze all legislative activity due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The New Baseball Model was shelved. It was never formally revisited.

Now, more than five years later and in an unrecognizable college athletics landscape, those same core ideas are quietly resurfacing.

As frustrations mount around the sport’s chaotic and compressed calendar, a growing number of Division I leaders are again calling for change. Baseball America spoke with 20 current head coaches across the country who, granted anonymity, outlined the changes they believe college baseball needs most. Some responses were lightly edited for clarity.

The Draft

No single event has had a bigger ripple effect on the college baseball calendar than the MLB Draft. And in the transfer portal era—where roster construction is equal parts evaluation and survival—its current placement has become a pain point for coaches across all levels.

Seventeen of the 20 Division I head coaches surveyed by Baseball America advocated for a shift in the draft’s timing, which since 2021 has landed in mid July, roughly two weeks after the transfer portal closes. That gap, coaches say, is a logistical choke point. It freezes roster planning at a time when scholarship decisions, fall practice rosters and financial aid agreements are due.

“The MLB Draft currently takes place in mid July, but roster and scholarship decisions for fall need to happen much earlier,” one prominent mid-major coach said. “Move the MLB Draft back to June, closer to the end of the College World Series, as it was pre-2021. Coaches would know by early summer which players are signing professionally and could plan fall rosters better and more confidently.”

Another Power 4 coach offered a more coordinated timeline: “I would like the draft to happen the weekend after Omaha with the portal closing two days after the draft. Doesn’t solve everything but would work together a little better.”

While coaches voiced their frustrations, most acknowledged the reality: The draft isn’t moving.

Multiple MLB sources told Baseball America that the league has no plans to return to a June draft, and recent changes—shrinking to 20 rounds in 2021 and switching to a two-day event starting in 2025—suggest even more streamlining could come in future years. In short, MLB has modernized its developmental pipeline and is unlikely to reorient it around college baseball’s convenience.

Which is why, for many coaches, the more realistic solution isn’t changing the draft—it’s adjusting their own calendar to better fit around it.

“Moving the season back two weeks gets us closer to the draft, which is not changing anymore,” one high-major coach said. “MLB has overhauled the draft and MiLB, already contracting rounds, eliminating short-season leagues and affiliate teams, which makes sense on their part. College baseball is a great MLB farm system with over 50% of MLB rosters made up of former college players.”

Some coaches also floated a more symbolic fix: Align amateur baseball’s biggest event with the sport’s biggest professional milestone.

“Do the draft in Omaha during the CWS,” one coach suggested. “The College World Series would be a couple weeks later than it is now anyway with a March 1 start.”

Still, symbolic or structural, every solution shared by coaches points back to the same underlying frustration: College baseball’s postseason and its most consequential roster decisions are fundamentally out of sync.

In the transfer portal era, when roster construction requires clarity more than ever, the current system feels like it was built for a different time. And increasingly, coaches are saying that time has passed.

The Portal

If there was consensus among coaches that the current transfer portal window doesn’t work, there was far less agreement about what should replace it.

This year, the portal opened for non-graduate transfers on June 2 and closed on July 1. Graduate transfers can enter at any time, and players whose programs experience a coaching change receive their own 30-day window regardless of the season. For everyone else, the parameters are fixed—and increasingly seen as flawed.

Two major issues surfaced in conversations with the 20 Division I head coaches who spoke with Baseball America. The first is timing. The portal opens during the postseason, creating a dynamic in which coaches must simultaneously prepare for elimination games and construct their next roster.

“You’re trying to scout your super regional opponent while hosting transfers on campus and figuring out NIL packages,” one coach said. “It’s not sustainable.”

The second issue is its disconnect from the draft. Because the draft occurs after the portal closes, teams often lose players to pro ball after they’ve already finalized transfer decisions—an unpredictable and often destabilizing sequence.

“It would give us a couple weeks after the draft for rosters to start to settle,” one coach said of a potential fix.

Another was less diplomatic: “The portal ending before the draft is stupid.”

That idea—shifting the portal to open after the final out of the College World Series and extending it beyond the draft—was one of the most popular suggestions. Coaches argued that it would create a more logical progression by allowing programs to finish the season, navigate the draft and then fill roster holes.

Others pushed in the opposite direction. A group of high- and mid-major coaches advocated for a shorter window overall, believing that extending it post-draft only encourages reactive poaching.

“Shorten the portal window by two weeks,” one Power 4 coach said. “Have to find a school or sign a pro contract by July 15.”

Echoed a mid-major coach: “Extending the portal period beyond the draft brings zero benefit. It just allows people who do a bad job forecasting to steal other peoples’ players.”

The sentiment that a longer window rewards the opportunistic and penalizes the under-resourced was shared by several coaches from smaller programs. One admitted the system is flawed no matter how it’s drawn up.

“I think we’re exposed either way,” he said. “I guess the current model does protect the mid-major a little, but I’d leave the window open for a week or so after the draft so we could all know exactly what our needs are.”

The good news for coaches? Change might be on the way. Speaking at the State of College Baseball press conference in Omaha on June 12, NCAA senior vice president of championships Anthony Holman acknowledged that transfer window reform is under active discussion.

“There’s oversight committees for each sport, and they may establish their own [windows],” Holman said. “That probably makes the most sense.”

For now, though, the portal remains both a lifeline and a landmine—an indispensable tool built on an increasingly incoherent timeline.

“It’s not right in my opinion for players to flood the portal when the NCAA tournament is starting,” a mid-major coach said. “We all go through this mess in the summer to build/rebuild the rosters for what? Get to the postseason and have players leaving and coaches distracted with the portal?

“I don’t want to carry a tone of complaining, but it’s a mess.”

Postseason Format

Though only four coaches raised the topic unprompted, all were aligned in their support for expanding the NCAA Tournament field.

Their proposed fixes varied, but the vision was clear. One idea suggested shortening the regular season from 56 to 52 games in order to trade a week of regular season play for a longer, more inclusive postseason. In that model, the tournament would expand from 64 to 72 teams, with teams seeded 65–72 playing into the main field against seeds 57–64. Winners of those best-of-three series would then face the top eight national seeds in a newly-structured regional round. From there, 32 teams would remain and play a second best-of-three weekend at 16 sites, followed by the traditional super regionals and a trip to Omaha.

Beyond access, coaches argued that the structure makes financial sense. Hosting more early-round series at more campuses—especially in place of low-attendance midweek games late in the season—could generate more revenue and energy while reducing travel strain.

Still, enthusiasm hasn’t translated into momentum.

“You are asking if we should expand the field,” said Southland Conference commissioner and former Southeastern Louisiana head coach Jay Artigues on June 12 in Omaha, “there’s always discussion about that.”

Artigues, who spent years in the mid-major ranks, didn’t hesitate to voice his support.

“I love expanding it coming from a mid-major school,” he said. “If you see the success of the Murray States and some other mid-majors, it shows they can play with the big boys.”

But while the heart may say yes, the wallet—and the calendar—say no.

“I don’t know what the value proposition is to that,” Holman said. “We lose money on regionals. The proposition of not garnering additional revenue and just adding expenses, in this day’s economic landscape, doesn’t make a whole lot of business sense.”

By The Numbers

Below are breakdowns of how the coaches who spoke with Baseball America aligned on each topic.

Draft

Suggested Change	Total Supporters
Return To Early June Draft	17
Keep Draft As Is	1
Lack of Belief That Change is Possible	2

Portal

Suggested Change	Total Supporters
Extend Window Beyond Draft, Maintain 30-Day Length	12
Extend Window Beyond Draft, Shorten Length	5
No Comment	2
No Change To Portal Window	1

Fall Portal Window

Suggested Change	Total Supporters
Create Fall Window	1
Do Not Create Fall Window	14
No Comment/Unsure	5

NIL

Colorado football’s Deion Sanders blasts NCAAF’s current NIL situation

The post Colorado football’s Deion Sanders blasts NCAAF’s current NIL situation appeared first on ClutchPoints. With Deion Sanders and the Colorado football team working the recruiting trail, a wide-ranging topic in the grander scope of college football has been around name, image, and likeness (NIL). Though there have been some major wins on the recruiting […]

Published

5 hours ago

July 10, 2025

Your Sports Nation

The post Colorado football’s Deion Sanders blasts NCAAF’s current NIL situation appeared first on ClutchPoints.

With Deion Sanders and the Colorado football team working the recruiting trail, a wide-ranging topic in the grander scope of college football has been around name, image, and likeness (NIL). Though there have been some major wins on the recruiting trail for Sanders and the Colorado football team, he would speak on Wednesday about the issue with NIL and the transfer portal.

Sanders would be present at Big 12 media days with other head coaches in the conference and would be asked about his thoughts on NIL and how it should be regulated. The former NFL great would say there should be a “cap” with NIL and the amount of money given to players, mostly from the vantage point of some teams not being able to match the bigger programs.

“I wish it was a cap, you know, like the top-of-the-line player makes this, and if you’re not that type of guy, you know, you’re not gonna make that,” Sanders said. “That’s what the NFL does. So the problem is, you got a guy that’s not that darn good, but he could go to another school, and it gave them a half a million dollars. You can’t compete with that. It don’t make sense. And you’re talking about equality, and all you have to do is look at the playoffs and see what those teams spent.”

Colorado football’s Deion Sanders on NIL

Even with the criticisms around the topic, the Colorado football team and Sanders have utilized the transfer portal and NIL, but only because they have to to get the players they desire. It still doesn’t take away from the fact that Sanders has many issues with the system, saying that it is “hard to compete” with teams that can shell out an immense amount of money for top players.

“And you understand why they made the playoffs, it’s kind of hard to compete with somebody who’s given 25, 30 million dollars to a darn freshman class. It’s crazy,” Sanders said. “We’re not complaining, because all these coaches up here could coach their butts off and given the right opportunity with the right players and play here and there, you’ll be there, but it’s what’s going on right now, don’t make sense. And we want to say stuff, but we’re trying to be professional, but you’re going to see the same teams during the end, and with somebody who sneaks up in there, but if the team that pays them more, that pays the most, will be in.”

The Buffaloes open next season against Georgia Tech on August 29.

Related: Volunteers land 2026 DB recruit over SEC foes Georgia, South Carolina

Related: Why coaching is ‘easier’ for Deion Sanders without Shedeur, Shilo

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