NIL and the future
I've been loosely following this NIL rollout, and assuming it catastrophic. But perhaps it presents a very slim chance for a major opportunity.
My eyes were opened by a news report of Gary Patterson's recent speech/plea to monied TCU alumni and donors. Sorry I don't have a link to it, but the short version is this: "Set up a system to funnel cash directly to our players now or we'll be irrelevant within a couple of years." At least within the P5, ALL recruits now are asking up front what they'll get, and schools are actively poaching players away with $$ offers. Patterson claimed (in this context) that they could lose "25-30 players" to other schools if TCU didn't also step up with payment planning (paying for exclusive interviews, etc.).
I originally thought NIL would mean that a few superstars could get rich while in college (Nike ad contract). Now I realize that it's just going to provide cover for old-fashioned, SMU-style buying of players.
Rice will not and should not participate in this. The big question that we need to be actively pursuing right now is just how many like-minded Div. 1 programs are there still left?
When Div. 1 college football quickly now moves entirely to unabashed, mercenary professionalism, will there be any P5 programs that might beg off? Perhaps not, but we should be leading and advertising this idea at least --- of an "NCAA renewal league" or "western/midwestern Ivy League", or of course the fabled "Magnolia League" etc.
Some universities that might not be ready to act, but that would possibly at least listen to this now might include: Cal, Stanford, UW, Colo, much of the MWC, Mich, Purdue, NW, Illinois, KU, Wake, Duke, UNC, Virginia, Ga Tech, BC, ND, Pitt, Syracuse, Temple, UConn, Tulane, Tulsa, Vandy...
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