nelsonmuntz
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The transfer thread was turning into a discussion of how the transfer portal and NIL were going to impact college football. I think that is a very interesting discussion. Here are a few things I think are going to happen:
1) All of these things will feed off each other. Expanded access to the CFP will lead to more NIL for second and third tier programs and make more programs viable for top players out of the transfer portal. This is already happening in basketball.
2) Talent is going to get dispersed. Players will need to get on the field to really get paid, and they will be less willing to sit out their careers on the bench at Clemson or Alabama. UConn may not get players from Alabama and Clemson, but Florida and South Carolina and Tennessee will, and probably Pitt and Virginia too, and then we will get some of the players that would have gone to Pitt and Virginia. Because who wants to sit on the bench? I think this will be less pronounced in basketball since basketball players are smarter about finding playing time in the recruiting process than football players are.
3) People need to stop conflating TV money with a local corporate and alumni base's willingness to provide NIL. There may be a correlation, but those two things are not a cause and effect. I think urban schools are going to have a big advantage in the NIL world, even if they do not have a massive TV contract at this particular moment.
4) The SEC was the best conference in college football for the last 10+ years because its schools were willing to cheat at a level that other schools were not. That era is over because paying players is not cheating anymore. Throw in the transfer portal, and expanded access to the CFP absolutely balancing the playing field among at least the P5 schools, and that will eventually filter down to TV contracts. Oklahoma and Texas to the SEC and USC and UCLA to the Big 10 will look like bad, reactive decisions, within 5 years.
5) A streaming world will reward programs for playing interesting games that fans care about, not filling their schedule with a bunch of random "conference" partners that fans will be indifferent to. I do not think USC and UCLA will be in the same conference with all of Rutgers, Iowa, Minnesota and Indiana in 10 or 15 years. Something will happen to shake that up. Texas and Oklahoma to the SEC and USC and UCLA to the Big 10 will not age well. In a streaming world, people do not even know what channel they are watching, and they are not stuck watching whatever game ESPN or CBS put on the TV. They are looking for specific games.
6) I don't know what Northwestern, Duke, Vanderbilt and Stanford will do. They have massive endowments and all the resources they need to compete with any program, but they think of their competition as Ivy League, New York University, University of Chicago and Rice, not Mississippi State, Minnesota and Arizona State. If I had to bet, I think the super-elite academic D1 programs will drop down a level or reorganize into a league with each other at some point.
7) Some winners and losers:
Losers: The era of Alabama and Clemson dominance is over, and a school like Auburn is probably never returning to being a perennial Top 10 program and will be lucky to occasionally pop into the Top 20. I think the Mississippis, LSU, Oklahoma State and Arkansas will have problems. Rural state schools in poor states are not going to be great destinations in a world where every school can pay players, get on TV, and compete for a national championship.
On the other hand, Texas will become a dominant program in the new environment unless its athletic program is run by idiots. It is in a wealthy city, the school has a huge alumni base and lots of corporate support, and it is Texas. Florida could be one too. Georgia, Michigan and Ohio State should do very well in both major sports.
Pitt, TCU, Minnesota, BYU, Cincinnati, UCF, Arizona State, Washington, Virginia and North Carolina are all positioned to do very well. They are all in or near big or mid-sized cities with lots of wealthy people and corporations. In several cases there is not a full complement of pro teams in those cities so the college program will become the de facto pro team. I think all the Big East schools will do well in the NIL world, as will UConn.
1) All of these things will feed off each other. Expanded access to the CFP will lead to more NIL for second and third tier programs and make more programs viable for top players out of the transfer portal. This is already happening in basketball.
2) Talent is going to get dispersed. Players will need to get on the field to really get paid, and they will be less willing to sit out their careers on the bench at Clemson or Alabama. UConn may not get players from Alabama and Clemson, but Florida and South Carolina and Tennessee will, and probably Pitt and Virginia too, and then we will get some of the players that would have gone to Pitt and Virginia. Because who wants to sit on the bench? I think this will be less pronounced in basketball since basketball players are smarter about finding playing time in the recruiting process than football players are.
3) People need to stop conflating TV money with a local corporate and alumni base's willingness to provide NIL. There may be a correlation, but those two things are not a cause and effect. I think urban schools are going to have a big advantage in the NIL world, even if they do not have a massive TV contract at this particular moment.
4) The SEC was the best conference in college football for the last 10+ years because its schools were willing to cheat at a level that other schools were not. That era is over because paying players is not cheating anymore. Throw in the transfer portal, and expanded access to the CFP absolutely balancing the playing field among at least the P5 schools, and that will eventually filter down to TV contracts. Oklahoma and Texas to the SEC and USC and UCLA to the Big 10 will look like bad, reactive decisions, within 5 years.
5) A streaming world will reward programs for playing interesting games that fans care about, not filling their schedule with a bunch of random "conference" partners that fans will be indifferent to. I do not think USC and UCLA will be in the same conference with all of Rutgers, Iowa, Minnesota and Indiana in 10 or 15 years. Something will happen to shake that up. Texas and Oklahoma to the SEC and USC and UCLA to the Big 10 will not age well. In a streaming world, people do not even know what channel they are watching, and they are not stuck watching whatever game ESPN or CBS put on the TV. They are looking for specific games.
6) I don't know what Northwestern, Duke, Vanderbilt and Stanford will do. They have massive endowments and all the resources they need to compete with any program, but they think of their competition as Ivy League, New York University, University of Chicago and Rice, not Mississippi State, Minnesota and Arizona State. If I had to bet, I think the super-elite academic D1 programs will drop down a level or reorganize into a league with each other at some point.
7) Some winners and losers:
Losers: The era of Alabama and Clemson dominance is over, and a school like Auburn is probably never returning to being a perennial Top 10 program and will be lucky to occasionally pop into the Top 20. I think the Mississippis, LSU, Oklahoma State and Arkansas will have problems. Rural state schools in poor states are not going to be great destinations in a world where every school can pay players, get on TV, and compete for a national championship.
On the other hand, Texas will become a dominant program in the new environment unless its athletic program is run by idiots. It is in a wealthy city, the school has a huge alumni base and lots of corporate support, and it is Texas. Florida could be one too. Georgia, Michigan and Ohio State should do very well in both major sports.
Pitt, TCU, Minnesota, BYU, Cincinnati, UCF, Arizona State, Washington, Virginia and North Carolina are all positioned to do very well. They are all in or near big or mid-sized cities with lots of wealthy people and corporations. In several cases there is not a full complement of pro teams in those cities so the college program will become the de facto pro team. I think all the Big East schools will do well in the NIL world, as will UConn.
