Governor Charlie Baker helps Quincy Mayor Tom Koch open the "Generals Bridge" in Quincy Center on Thursday January 13, 2022 011322 Gd Qui Bridgel01 Jpg
He’ll assume responsibility for this mess in March, decades of mismanagement thrown at his feet as he walks through the doors in suburban Indianapolis.
He better be working on it now.
You may not know Charlie Baker, but the former and wildly popular Massachusetts governor will enter his new job as president of the NCAA and face this nonsense:
— Jalen Hurts, in his 3rd season in the NFL, makes $1.3 million a year. He is the favorite to win MVP of the league.
— Jaden Rashada, a high school quarterback who has yet to step on any university campus, allegedly was offered $13 million over 4 years ($3.2 million per) in NIL money to play quarterback at Florida.
Welcome to your new gig, Gov. The fate of amateur sports hangs on your every decision.
“Every president in the past took the job and tried to be everything for everyone,” an SEC AD told me. “Well, there are winners and there are losers. Someone has to bleed. If you don’t govern like that, you end up with what we have.”
What they have is an unwieldy concoction of more than 350 member institutions in various divisions, each trying to syphon as as much as they can out of the firehose. More dangerous: the elite 65 or so universities — those with the most power — pulling in 30 or so different directions, with different philosophies, ideas and plans of execution.
When there’s no leadership at the top, no galvanizing force who can pull sides together, the results are 1 of 2 things: slow and plodding change, or — significantly more dangerous to the health of the organization — immediate reaction to big-picture problems.
Always a patch, never a fix.
It is here where we return to Baker, who in 8 years as a Republican governor in a blue state, was lauded for his ability to reach across the aisle and get things done. The fact that he was re-elected should underscore that rare quality.
This job, this unique position of standing on the edge of the abyss and staring at the end of the NCAA as we know it, will be a heavier policy lift than anything he dealt with in 8 years as the leader of the Commonwealth.
When he was named last month to replace outgoing president Mark Emmert, Baker said his goal was to “modernize college sports to suit today’s world, while preserving its essential value.”
That ship passed a long time ago, under the watchful eye of Emmert, who was equal parts punching bag, big idea/mistake man and — by the end of his 13-year run — an indifferent, gutted soul who cashed a $3 million-a-year paycheck to allow everyone to point the finger his way.
That left amateur sports — and specifically, its bell-cow sport, football — in a precarious situation of boosters controlling the future. If you don’t think that’s where we are, you’ve obviously ignored the Jalen Hurts/Jaden Rashada anecdote.
The question facing Baker isn’t how you fix it; it’s can it be fixed? Is it too late after incredibly short-sighted and simultaneous moves of instituting name, image and likeness without rules — again, there are no rules — and free player movement?
NIL is a good thing. So is free player movement.
But they need tangible, precise rules and unwavering enforcement to make it work. They need an NCAA president who can get both sides together — players and universities — to iron out these rules and proceed down a clear, unambiguous path.
It’s either that, or every wannabe hero with millions (or in some cases, billions) in his pocket controlling how college rosters are built.
Emmert isn’t the reason for the ills of amateur sports; he was simply the facilitator for those who make the rules: NCAA presidents.
Emmert’s job was to build a coalition among member institutions and develop the best practices for an ever-changing NCAA. The problem is, they all continued to ignore the 1 thing that made it all work — and the 1 thing that could bring it all down.
Players.
They can no longer be ignored, and can no longer be placed in this archaic ideal of “student-athlete.” Because that name, like it or not, implies debt.
You play for us, we give you an education and prepare you for a professional career, if you’re so fortunate to be the less than 1 percent — the NCAA proclaim this fact on its own commercials! — to get paid to play professionally.
Think about this: When the new Playoff is complete for the 2024 season, it could generate as much as $1.6 billion annually in media rights. That deal, and the estimated $4 billion annually from the combined media rights deals of the Power 5 conferences (for all televised sports), leaves nearly $6 billion annually in the Power 5 coffers.
Players — beyond education expenses and professional development, and a $5,500 stipend — get none of that ever-expanding media rights money.
The NCAA agreed to NIL legislation because it was forced to the table by the states of California and Florida (and eventually, a majority of the 50 states), who passed state laws allowing amateur athletes to earn money off their name image and likeness.
Now, here’s the key: While the legislation was passed in California and Florida, it wasn’t law for nearly 16 months. In other words, the NCAA had significant time to figure out a smart and beneficial way forward for both sides.
It instead chose to beg Congress for help with national legislation, and kicked the can down the road until it no longer could. Until the Supreme Court of the United States eventually said — and I’m paraphrasing — this is much greater than NIL; you’re potentially on the hook for much more. And we’re watching.
So now here we are, with Rashada and his camp (do I really need to explain who’s part of that “camp?”), trying to get millions from a collective (see: boosters) that makes deals with high school players (allegedly, without input from coaching staffs) — and will eventually have control of who plays and who doesn’t, and if a coach is fired or extended.
Whoo, buddy.
Don’t blame Rashada, blame the system that evolved from an indifferent NCAA, which believed the amateur model would hold weight in the courts — when it hasn’t, over and over and over.
Rashada is simply doing what you or I or any Joe Six-pack does when negotiating for a new job. In fact, the art of negotiation is the only rule, or standard, that is a typical practice in this entire NIL mess.
And just for giggles, the NCAA decided to throw in free player movement in conjunction with the birth of NIL. Another big idea/big mistake from Emmert and the presidents — at least, in it’s timing and roll out — that has led to de facto free agency with no salary cap.
Welcome, Charlie, to your new world.
So how does Charlie Baker make sense of it all, and more important, make it work and fit?
It begins with involving the players in every step, every decision, along the way. You’ve gone 150-plus years without getting input from players.
Maybe it’s time to roll with player input over the next 150.
If Baker can succeed in getting 2 diametrically different political parties to work together, he certainly can get the NCAA and players to make nice. Because at the end of the day, the common theme in politics and amateur sports is money — who gets it, and who benefits most.
In a perfect world, everyone gets most of what they need — not necessarily what they want. That’s the key moving forward for Baker and the NCAA.
Players must get what they need, including but not limited to free education (no matter how long it takes to earn the degree), annual salaries that far exceed the current $5,500, and long-term medical insurance for debilitating injuries.
In return, players agree to specific guidelines for NIL deals as a way to keep booster influence from infecting and ruining college football/sports. Because a healthy college football is the engine that drives college sports.
The easiest way to make that happen: NIL deals are only allowed after 1 year of service.
If a player is found to have made a deal prior to completing 1 year of college football, he’s ineligible for a year and loses all benefits for that same time period. He also forfeits his right to have NIL deals for the remainder of his college career — but will continue to receive salary and benefits after the initial year of probation.
For example: If Johnny Utah is a player at a Power 5 school, he makes $50,000 a year in salary, his education is paid and he receives full health benefits.
If he is found to have secured an NIL deal before completing 1 season, he sits out of competition for 1 full year, and loses his salary, education and medical benefits for 1 year — and loses his right to secure NIL deals for the remainder of his college career.
The devil in the details is giving players enough on the front end (salary) that they won’t need to search for an NIL deal until after they’ve completed 1 season.
In a matter of a week, Lane Kiffin made it clear that the quarterback room at Ole Miss must get better.
Adding a former 5-star recruit (LSU’s Walker Howard), and a 4-year starter (Oklahoma State’s Spencer Sanders) from the transfer portal made that very clear.
Don’t think that doesn’t mean returning starter Jaxson Dart isn’t on notice.
Dart’s first full season as a starter was solid. He made plays in the passing game, and was a willing and dangerous runner. He accounted for more than 3,500 yards (614 rushing) and 21 TDs (1 rush).
But Ole Miss also lost 4 of 5 games to finish the season, and Dart’s efficiency decreased over those 5 games (he threw 5 INTs in those games). Understand this: Sanders could’ve gone wherever he wanted as the starter, including a couple of SEC schools with standing offers (Auburn, Florida).
He chose Ole Miss, despite Dart returning as the stater. Howard also could’ve transferred just about anywhere in the SEC, and he chose Ole Miss.
He didn’t leave LSU — where he couldn’t get on the field in 2023 with Jayden Daniels and Garrett Nussmeier ahead of him — to arrive and sit at Ole Miss. He’ll compete for the job, too.
This spring practice at Ole Miss will be the most competitive at the quarterback spot in years. The Rebels weren’t that far away from 10 wins (or more) in 2022 with a higher level of play from the quarterback.
That doesn’t mean Dart can’t get there in 2023. It just means he’ll now how more competition.
The top 5 national championships odds for SEC teams in 2023, brought you by our friends at FanDuel:
An NFL scout analyzes a draft-eligible SEC player. This week: Auburn RB Tank Bigsby.
“I really like him as a football player. Like the way he carries himself, I like how it’s important to him. He’s a strong, decisive runner with deceptive speed when he gets to the second level. He’s a big guy now, and he has that ability to plant and hit a crease and go. He’s not a game-breaker, but I can easily see him as a significant contributor. He wasn’t a guy they threw to, but that just as easily could’ve been scheme thing as a player thing. ”
This week’s Power Poll, and 1 big thing: most important portal loss and gain (so far):
1. Georgia: Loss: WR AD Mitchell (Texas); Gain: WR Dominic Lovett (Missouri).
2. Alabama: Loss: OL Javion Cohen (Miami); Gain: TE CJ Dippre (Maryland).
3. Tennessee: Loss: WR Jimmy Calloway (Louisville); Gain: LB Keenan Pili (BYU).
4. LSU: Loss: TE Jack Bech (TCU); Gain: LB Omar Speights (Oregon State).
5. Mississippi State: Loss: WR Rara Thomas (Georgia); Gain: K Nicholas Barr-Mira (UCLA).
6. Ole Miss: Loss: LB Austin Keys (Auburn); Gain: QB Spencer Sanders (Oklahoma State).
7. South Carolina: DE Jordan Burch (Oregon); Gain: TE Trey Knox (Arkansas).
8. Kentucky: Loss: DT Justin Rogers (Auburn); Gain: QB Devin Leary (NC State).
9. Arkansas: Loss: S Jalen Catalon (Texas); Gain: DE John Morgan (Pittsburgh).
10. Florida: OL Michael Tarquin (USC); Gain: OL Damieon George (Alabama).
11. Missouri: Loss: WR Dominic Lovett (Georgia); Gain: WR Theo Wease (Oklahoma).
12. Auburn: Loss: OL Keiondre Jones (Florida State); Gain: DT Justin Rogers (Kentucky).
13. Texas A&M: Loss: CB Denver Harris (LSU); Gain: CB Tony Grimes (North Carolina).
14. Vanderbilt: Loss: RB Ray Davis (Kentucky); Gain: Edge Aeneas DiCosmo (Stanford).
Matt: Do you see LSU losing more players to the transfer portal? I feel like this team could contend for the SEC right now. — Joshua Dickson, Los Angeles.
Joshua:
There might be 1 big move still remaining, depending on how spring practice plays out. I can’t imagine QB Garrett Nussmeier, if he doesn’t clearly make a move on incumbent starter Jayden Daniels, staying at LSU.
He’s too talented (see: SEC Championship Game) to stay and sit, especially when he could be a starter for numerous Power 5 schools. I wouldn’t expect LSU coach Brian Kelly to make any definitive statement about starter and backup during spring ball, making Nussmeier’s decision more difficult.
Does he stay and bet on himself and try to win the job in fall camp? Or does he leave and get a full summer of work with another team?
This position isn’t unique to LSU. There are numerous Power 5 programs that could lose quarterbacks after spring practice.
2. Georgia landed 2 critical additions to the roster early in the transfer portal process: WRs Rara Thomas (Mississippi State) and Dominic Lovett (Missouri).
The duo combined for 100 caches, 1,472 yards and 10 TD last season. By comparison, Georgia’s top 5 receivers in 2022 combined for 143 catches, 1,826 yards and 13 TDs.
Mississippi State coach Zach Arnett on new offensive coordinator Kevin Barbay: “He’s an outside the box thinker with a brilliant Xs and Os mind. His attacking offensive philosophy will be an excellent fit for our program.”
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“If among you, one of your brothers should become poor, in any of your towns within your land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother.” Deuteronomy 15:7
A LOT of talk about being upset with people on welfare/food stamps. check your privilege and realize that je$$us will not welcome you without doing as he preaches. REPENT
Before you go quoting out of context
2 THESSALONIANS 3:10
KJ21
For even when we were with you, this we commanded you: that if any would not work, neither should he eat.
1 Timothy 5:8
8 Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
Genesis 2:15
15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.
Proverbs 10:4
4 Lazy hands make for poverty, but diligent hands bring wealth.
“The generous will themselves be blessed, for they share their food with the poor.” Proverbs 22:9
Nothing is out of context. This is an exact b!ble verse word for word. You do not like the message, so you bend and twist reality to confirm your narrative. It's sick...you need to get help please. Maybe try reading a book, interacting/making friends with people that aren't like you. maybe vacation outside of panama city
@gagatorlakelife exactly
Matthew 23: 27-28
27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean.
28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.
What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. James 2:14-17
“If among you, one of your brothers should become poor, in any of your towns within your land that the LORD your G0d is giving you, YOU SHALL NOT HARDEN YOUR HEART OR SHUT YOUR HAND AGAINST YOUR POOR BROTHER.” Deuteronomy 15:7
NONE OF YOU follow the word of je$$$$$us. For shame, as Mark 10:25
It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of G0d." REPENT. YOU LIE TO THE LORD je$$$$us and will not spend eternity by his side.
gross
Matthew 7:1-5
1 “Do not judge, or you too will be judged.
2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
3 “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?
4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye?
5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
Not sure about this but I'm pretty certain that Johnny Utah played QB at Ohio State and is now an undercover agent working for the FBI.
BTW - What happened to Greg Sankey's NCAA restructuring committee?
Ole Miss bringing in Howard and Sanders reminds me of UGA in 2020 bringing in Jamie Newman and JT Daniels in the same off-season. Obviously neither guy panned out but lucky for Ole miss this means that a former walk-on will come back into the program to win back-to-back national championships and get invited to the Heisman ceremony.
"I wouldn’t expect LSU coach Brian Kelly to make any definitive statement about starter and backup during spring ball, making Nussmeier’s decision more difficult."
Actually, Kelly has made a preemptive strike by announcing that Daniels is QB1. Whatever he has said to Nussmeier in private, in public he is shooting down any talk of a QB controversy. But it will be interesting to see how this develops. It's a good problem to have. Personally, I'd like to see Nussmeier win the job this spring, even if it means Daniels transfers out. Nussmeier is a long-term option. Daniels will have no eligibility after 2023.
I don’t see Nussmeier leaving. He knows he’s the #2 and only one unfortunate play away from being the #1 which is very possible with a run first starter. I also see Kelly giving him substantial playing time throughout the season. It won’t be a tandem QB system, but I believe we’ll see Nuss getting field time in just about every game. He also knows this is for just 1 season. He’ll be the favorite for #1 the 2 following seasons.
I hope you're right.
Just a note of caution TexasTig75. Posting something that makes sense on this site will incur consequences.
He may be QB1 and hold that title, until he doesn't. Just because he has it now doesn't mean that he will still have it when the season begins.
I don’t see Nussmeier winning the starting job at LSU before the 12th game of next season, regardless of how poorly Daniels plays in practice or in games, or how many losses that leads to, unless… Daniels gets injured, as he did in the SECC Game.
Gator fans can only hope, you know.
I disagree with the Power Up rankings with LSU at #4. The Tigers, depending on which rating service you look at, had a recruiting class ranked as high as #5. It’s transfer class came in at #1. Also consider that of the 14 transfers it lost, only 3 had any experience as starters, and those starts were sporadic. For example, it lists Jack Bech (WR) as the team’s biggest portal loss. Bech, at best was only in the middle of the pack in the receiver room…not a huge loss. Losing Howard (QB) might hurt in a couple years, but he was #3 in the QB room, possibly dropping in the future with strong freshman QB’s coming in. Add to that an offense that is returning 5 starters and a defense that filled every need via recruiting/transfers, I see LSU no lower than #2. I see a Georgia/LSU SEC Championship rematch this coming season. And don’t be surprised when the outcome of the game is different.
Correction….LSU has 9 returning offensive starters.
SDS really needs an edit function so we can correct our keyboarding mistakes!
PLEASE LISTEN SDS!
"And don’t be surprised when the outcome of the game is different."
Hope springs eternal.
I see LSU beating an IMO overrated FSU team to start the season and with a very legit chance to win the SEC in 2023.
"Players — beyond education expenses and professional development, and a $5,500 stipend — get none of that ever-expanding media rights money."
Not true. For a few years now, athletic scholarships have been for "full cost of attendance," which includes thousands of dollars over and above tuition and books.
Lol you say that as if that's a decent amount of money over the course of a year. Cute
It's a heck of a lot more than I had.
There are not many places where you can get paid north of $50,000 a year, depending on the cost of tuition for a particular school, as a 17-18 year old entry level employee with no experience at that level of employment. Especially when the majority never contribute on the field. They may or may not deserve more, but don't act like what they get now has no value, or that it is normal for kids of this age and experience level to be able to make that right out of high school.
I don't know when you went to school Tide8x5 but if it was 1980 $50k would have been equivalent to $180K today. If 1990 it'd be like having $113K today. If 2000, then $86K. If 2010, $68K today. If 2015, $62K today. The point is that $50K is not what it sounds like. And the fact that most people can't make that much ($50K) as adults in the wealthiest country in recorded history is flat out embarrassing for our country and society.
"If Baker can succeed in getting 2 diametrically different political parties to work together..."
It's Massachusetts. The parties are not that diametrically different from one another.
I wonder who represents the players in all these negotiations? And who thinks the basketball players, the baseball players, and all the other players are just going to sit back and say nothing. It will break all but the most profitable Athletic Depts. Or end sports that are not profitable, which is most all of them, at Universities.
Unions. That's the next thing coming.
I suppose. But that will just create different issues.
Wait until the Title IX sports start crying for their piece of the pie. All of the NIL money is coming from private sector. Not sure if they are going to like the answer
Don't forget Title IX. Unless they dump it because there are too many guys playing with the women.
In articles like this one talking about putting players on salary, etc., the one thing that routinely gets ignored is Title IX. From a logical standpoint, it makes perfect sense to say that the players in revenue sports get paid, and the ones in non-revenue sports don't. But that means that all the money will go to male athletes, which will never pass muster with campus wokies, the courts, or the DoJ. But if athletic departments are forced to put every female swimmer, tennis player, and equestrian team member on salary for "equity" purposes, some lower-tier athletic departments will be seriously strained. For this reason, I think there is a good chance the NCAA will lean toward allowing NIL collectives to handle the payouts. As long as the collectives are "independent" of the schools, there are no legal ramifications for only paying the athletes that are bringing in revenue.
Title IX goes away with salaried employees. But, as I said above, it presents problems for the football program to have bennies the others don't. It's a mess.
This is true, but it reverts to a Title IX issue if you're conspicuously salarying only the men's football and basketball teams and no one else. And if you salary a small subset of all male players and none of the female players it's not a Title IX issue - it's an EEOC issue (which, as you said, is a whole other mess).
Yes. Thanks.
Title 9. Football schollies never should have been used in the T9 calculus as there is no women's sport that generates money that P5 football teams generate.
How about payment based on a sharing of Net Revenue? By definition sports that did not finish with a bottom line in the black would not have to pay for play.
I don't see how this format could be seen to be prejudicial?
@dixieduck
Are you familiar with the USWNT? The women who sued because they were paid less than the men solely because women's soccer generates less money worldwide.
Right. So now they take money from the men's team/earnings and split it out so the teams make the same.
Seeing that they put a politician in charge I feel like he will go with whichever option guarantees that the government gets their slice of the pie. I have ZERO faith that this goes well. Having a player at 18 years old making more than a lot of the coaching staff will lead to significant problems at some schools.
The new NCAA president was hired because of his political background. The NCAA's priority isn't education or athletics right now, its legislation. The NCAA's future is dependent on Congress granting them antitrust exemption. This is about NIL oversight and whether student-athletes will ultimately be treated like employees by their schools. They wanted someone politically connected, someone who can deal with state and national governments and not school presidents, and that's exactly who they went out and hired.