Deep Dive: Can College Football Be Repaired?
The chaos that is upon us as college football fans isn’t imagined. Unprecedented fluctuation of rosters, unexpected loss of key players, unrelatability to our favorite teams simply because we don’t know anyone for the first half of the season (or perhaps for an entire season)…it’s a new world. I’m not against the players in this equation who are seeking to find out what their worth is in this new, broken era of college sports…BUT, I am absolutely livid at the NCAA’s handling of this and pretty much every issue in the past decade. Their lack of clear, consistent standards and subsequent punishment has always plagued them. But in recent years, they have struggled to make any proactive decisions, and only change policy when forced to by lawsuit or overwhelming outside pressures.
The crazy part of that is every fan knew that changes to the way athletes were compensated were imminent a few years ago, and yet the NCAA had no structures, penalties nor plans in place…just bandaids for some of the biggest problems that plague college sports.
Well, if they’re not going to be proactive and put up some consistent rules/structures, I’ll give it a try…I think your pals at Boiled Sports can save college sports…specifically, college football, before it crumbles beneath its own weight. If you’ve been paying attention, you’ve heard Deion Sanders, Chip Kelly, Lane Kiffin and others sound off about their problems with the transfer portal, as it stands, as well as the structureless NIL and the Pandora’s Box that is now open. These coaches aren’t wrong about their concerns, and some of their ideas for cures would help the situation…but there are so many layers to the problems within college football, an overhaul that affects the structure of conferences, bowl games, the playoff, the off-season and roster building, is needed and overdue.
The Current State of College Sports $$$
Let’s look at some general financial facts based on composite data before we dig into some cures.
You Purdue Boilermakers’ athletic budget in 2020 was around $110million. That’s the lowest in the B1G. The highest budget in the conference is aOSU at $230million. Pretty big gap in those budgets, but Purdue’s philosophy of how to spend on the department is worlds apart from aOSU’s. Purdue doesn’t take money from the university to run the athletic budget…but almost every program in the conference does. Purdue also has fewer sports overall than any other school in the conference. Purdue currently has around 450 athletes on campus. Every scholarship athlete that qualifies academically will receive around $7000 as an academic bonus.
The average spend in the conference (without Northwestern’s data available) was a bit over $139m back in 2020; the median spend was $132.5m.
Based on some additional digging and estimation, here are some other numbers of note: B1G TV revenue in 2024-25, per year, per school, will be around $80million, ticket revenue is around $27million, Department donations will be around $20million and licensing revenue will be approximately $14million, per school. These estimates are a bit difficult and nebulous thanks to new member numbers not being quite as clear as current members of the conference. All of that said, the median spend, per school in the B1G will increase to around $141million/year next year.
For additional context, Washington State, one of the lower budgets in the P5, spent $84m last year…and was over $11million OVER budget/allocation. This is part of the reason that many schools in the Pac12 weren’t pleased with their conference’s TV deal and the rejection of a large agreement…similar to many ACC schools right now.
A bit more information, for the sake of context, as I start to zero in on football, specifically. Alabama, one of the current standard-bearers in the sport, spent between $19 and $21million on their football coaching staff this season. In comparison, Purdue spent between $14 and 16 million on their staff. Obviously, Coach Walters $4.5m is dwarfed by Saban’s $107m salary. Both have room for additional bonuses and benchmarks. Purdue’s OC Harrell made $900k and Kane, the DC, made $850k. Alabama’s coordinators made $1.9 and $1.8m this season.
The Portal
Currently, the Portal is open on December 4th and stays open for 30 days…an additional 15days is given to teams involved in the playoff. It’s also open again on May 1-15th. I believe the early date puts pressure on players to get into the portal immediately following the end of the regular season, whether their team is involved in a bowl or not.
I believe moving the winter portal back to Dec 15, and keeping it open until January 15, along with some bowl changes might stabilize some of the problems in the sport. The Spring portal dates staying from May 1-15th doesn’t need any change, in my opinion.
Season Length
The football season starting in the last week of August and ending Thanksgiving weekend works well. With the advent of a 12, or eventually 16-team playoff, the conference championships needs to be removed. All that championship currently does is create an additional chance for a team to lose within the conference, after traversing a gauntlet of a season. The TV revenue from the extended playoff will already create additional revenue.
Every team in the Paid Subdivision will play 12 regular season games- 10 must be within the paid subdivision, leaving two non-con spots open for match-ups either in the lower division or out of the conference within the paid subdivision.
Prior to the playoffs, the bowls will need to be completed by December 14th each year. This will give players a chance to play again, if they want to play, prior to making their decision on entering the portal or preparing for the draft.
NIL Bowl Incentives
Bowl games outside of the playoff have already become a shell of what they were a mere decade ago. The portal and NFL draft potential has caused players, even prospects for the 5th, 6th or 7th rounders to not see any non-playoff bowl as irrelevant.
I propose an appearance bonus for each player on the active roster for a bowl game. The bonus will range from $5k-$30k (possibly up to $50k within the playoff?), dependent upon the bowl. If the bowl cannot afford this bonus, they will not be able to continue to exist. In my opinion, that in itself is a positive.
Atop of the general appearance fees, an MVP bonus of $10k-50k can be added, and perhaps a victory bonus for the winning team?
Similar appearance bonuses should apply for playoff games with graduating rates with each of the four rounds.
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The NCAA has admitted publicly that they are proposing a paid subdivision within college sports. This along with their proposal of moving NIL bonus structuring ‘in-house’ away from the collective model shows that they see paying student athletes as an inevitability. In my opinion, they are trying to stay relevant and grasping at straws as proposals of a new governing body or commissioner over the Mega Conferences become more prevalent. With all of this in mind, we move forward to details of how to govern transfers, NIL and salaries effectively.
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Football Player Base Salaries
The main argument for paying student athletes has been that there is a ton of money being made off of their talents, so they deserve a piece of that pie. And while I personally see a tremendous value in a scholarship as well as the TV revenue being spread out so other sports can simply exist as scholarship sports, I do understand this argument. Also, as I said above, it seems that a base salary is an inevitability and the NIL, even in this poorly-governed form, is already here.
A $50,000 base salary for all paid subdivision schools seems attainable. Money that might have been spend on additional facilities or moved around the athletic department would now go directly to all 85 scholarship athletes. The cost to the university would be $4.25m/year for an 85 man roster. This salary is paid monthly to all full-ride athletes, and is broken up into 11 equal payments with June being an off-month. If the player remains under academic scholarship, he would retain his salary. Academics or disciplinary issues could force immediate termination of the agreement (in correspondence with the scholarship).
Revised NIL Structure
NIL bonuses will no longer be from a collective or non-university personnel. The collectives might continue to exist as a fund-raising arm of the Athletic Department. That, along with TV revenue allocation will define a university’s NIL budget (not limited to just football).
NIL agreements will be structured between University’s NIL office and player representatives. Contracts will be publicly-accessible 24hours after signing. Making these numbers public will lend to transparency within the process as well as aid to giving a realistic market value of a player/position. Regardless of the institution being private or public, terms will be publicly available. If an institution isn’t willing to release this data, they will not be able to complete in the Paid Subdivision.
Player can still sign outside endorsement contracts with third parties without affiliation to a university (i.e. Caleb Williams with Dr. Pepper).
One exception will be individual shoe/affiliate supplier athletic apparel endorsements will not be legal while a player is eligible.
Transfer Rules/Structure
When a player enters the portal, their salary and NIL agreement will be frozen immediately. The time in the portal will be viewed as almost limbo in which a player is not affiliated with a specific university during that period.
Travel expenses (hotel, flight, food) will be paid by host university. Giving of money or goods (the ol’ impermissible benefits trick under the current NCAA regulations) during a recruiting visit will result in the loss of signing any athlete from the portal during the next transfer window.
Agents/Representatives found to be guilty of communicating with potential suitors prior to portal periods will lose their ability to represent players for one year.
Any communication by university personnel or booster (i.e. direct tampering) will result in a $100,000 fine for that university and the loss of signing any athlete from the portal during the next transfer window. The majority of the fine will be awarded to the wronged university (10% will go to the governing body of the Paid Subdivision). The second offense will $500,000 fine with loss of signing of any athlete from the portal for a calendar year. The third offense will be loss of 10 scholarships.
Portal Transfer Fees
Lower Division Transfer:
Any Paid Subdivision athlete that transfers via the portal to the lower division can do so without cost to the new school.
Level 1:
All non-starter portal transfer athletes who transfer will cost the new university $10,000. This cost will be paid to the origination institution from the new school.
Level 2:
Any portal transfer athlete that started two or more games will cost the new university $20,000. This cost will be paid to the origination institution from the new school.
Level 3:
Any full-season portal transfer athlete that started eight or more games will cost the new university $100,000. This cost will be paid to the origination institution from the new school.
Conclusion
Before you get angry and go all keyboard warrior on me for the details (fines, terminology, etc), please don’t miss the point of this. This isn’t about the specific dollar amounts for salaries, contracts, fines, etc…it’s about the overarching theme. Big business and big transactions require structure, reward and benefit for all involved. People who are proponents of players being paid always refer to coaches being able to leave a university, but they don’t talk about the contracts in place and the buyouts of the contracts. Whether anyone wants to see it, there is an actual cost for a coach leaving…or getting fired.
Bigger than that though, look at the NFL, NBA, MLB, etc…they have rules with real teeth because real money is being exchanged. The moment we truly moved away from the amateur model, it was no longer about kids just playing a game…it officially became a business for all sides.
