AILSA CHANG, HOST:
2024 was the year that rocked college sports. Two years ago, the NCAA agreed to pay $2.8 billion to settle antitrust claims with student athletes. And that launched the era of student athletes personally making money for their name, image and likeness. Now the NCAA is looking for help on Capitol Hill to make college sports financially solvent in the aftermath of that settlement.
Schools argued that the settlement money wasn't enough to attract the best athletes. So Congress came through with a bipartisan bill called the Protect College Sports Act. If this bill passes, it will allow the larger, wealthier schools to spend more money to attract the best athletes to their teams. Ross Dellenger is a senior reporter with Yahoo Sports and joins us now to explain the details. Welcome to ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.
ROSS DELLENGER: Great to be on.
CHANG: Back in 2024, the NCAA and Power 5 athletic conferences agreed to pay this $2.8 billion to settle a bunch of antitrust claims. And as part of that settlement, conferences and schools would start sharing revenue - right? - with student athletes directly. And that sharing allowed these direct payments. So can you explain, what problems did that settlement create? And what is the Protect College Sports Act trying to fix?
DELLENGER: No. 1, by bringing revenue to the athletes directly from the schools. Previously, the athletes were paid basically by boosters, for the most part, and businesses.
CHANG: Right.
DELLENGER: And it was a little unruly and all that. So the settlement sort of shifted the money from boosters to the school to directly pay. And they set a cap. It's around $20 million. Has a $20 million cap, each school, to pay all of their athletes.
CHANG: Right.
DELLENGER: So not just football but all of their athletes. Well, what happened was, in no surprise, the schools that are always looking for a competitive advantage have gone over the cap because the name, image and likeness endorsement commercial deals that athletes can get, they don't count against the cap. So basically, what happened is schools arrange their boosters and booster collectives, which are groups of boosters, to go in other entities, corporate sponsors, other contractually affiliated businesses with a school. The school got those entities to pay athletes to go above the cap with sort of compensation disguised as endorsement and commercial opportunities. So the schools are going above the cap.
CHANG: Got it. So it just returned everybody to this unruly situation again, this free-for-all.
DELLENGER: Yes.
CHANG: OK. So then how does this bill, the Protect College Sports Act, try to fix some of those problems that you're describing?
DELLENGER: The NCAA, seven years ago, began lobbying Congress to fix some of these issues. And finally, we have a bill that is sort of on the brink of a vote on the Senate floor. And basically, the bill would limit transfer movement. So athletes would have one time to transfer. And then they'd have to sit out as a penalty if they transfer any subsequent times.
CHANG: OK.
DELLENGER: So it would limit the transfer movement. It would limit eligibility to five years. And it would also ban professional players from returning to college, which has happened as well.
CHANG: (Laughter).
DELLENGER: And then the cap, the compensation cap, it would handle that, too. It raises the cap. I mentioned earlier that each school has $20 million to spend on their athletes.
CHANG: Yeah.
DELLENGER: It raises the cap to closer to $50 million, which is the market. So now they're saying, OK, all of these entities that you're using to go above the cap now count against the cap. So in theory, the smaller programs will have a little bit more of a shot, maybe, to compete, according to the bill. So if that's closed, there's a harder cap. Yes, the cap is higher. But there's a stricter cap, more like the NFL as opposed to the MLB.
CHANG: Got it. Got it. Well, you mention the NFL. I mean, I feel like we're having this conversation in the first place because college sports is becoming more and more professional - right? - instead of just part of some educational experience for these athletes. And I'm wondering if college sports continues to (laughter) move towards professional sports, what is lost?
DELLENGER: Just 10 years ago, maybe even five years ago, college sports administrators talked often about academic progress and graduation rates. Well, guess what? You don't hear any of that anymore. You just don't. So already, you're seeing the tether between universities and major college football programs sort of stretched, stretched. And we're getting closer and closer to it popping. By the way, the settlement in the Congressional bill is sort of just a way to avoid collective bargaining, which is what the NFL, of course, has. And that's probably at the end of the road. Eventually, collective bargaining and employment probably will be coming to major college football.
CHANG: Ross Dellenger is a senior reporter with Yahoo Sports. Thank you so much for clarifying all of this.
DELLENGER: Yeah. It's great to be on. Thank you for having me. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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