You can tell when people don’t actually care about the players at all when they take a reductionist approach and describe athletes as “ones that can jump high.”
Worked their asses off? They’re teenagers. I played varsity basketball (all 8th region) and also ran for a scholarship in college. They didn’t “work” any harder than you or I.
Ahh my bad. You totally understand these players and their experiences because you ran in college. My mistake. Carry on.
I hear what you are saying, but does that mean you don't have any concerns about the ability of the NCAA to regulate NIL so schools don't use it as a means to pay players to come to their school. I think college athletics are already dirty enough without adding something like this on top of it. Schools, UK in particular, have gone to great measures to prevent boosters from buying players. What prevents a school from now contacting boosters and establishing NIL funds that they can pay out to get recruits to come to their schools? The whole point of these rules is to try and establish a level playing field for schools to compete against each other. We know cheating goes on, but the idea behind the rules is to limit cheating as best as they can. I'm concerned this change will open the flood gates to rampant cheating that will be next to impossible to prove. If fans don't feel like the sport has a level playing field, then they will lose interest. It's why professional leagues put a lot of effort into making sure wealthy teams don't just buy championships. And even with those efforts, large market teams still out perform small market teams. I just have concerns about the direction college sports are heading. It surprises me that more people aren't concerned about it.
I don't think you are really all that concerned about a level playing field. We are Kentucky, we want the field tipped in our favor all the time. And the field has never been level in recruiting. Eastern Kentucky doesn't have a chance to land Jalen Duren, but Kentucky does.
All these "concerns" about regulation and limiting income somehow only apply to the athletes. I can't figure out why.
I guess we’re kinda like the ABA now. Well maybe more like the G league except more corruption. At least KY will have finished college basketball as the best team ever. Looks like soon we begin as a semi-pro team, clean slate.
You should never assume you know someone's motives, and in this case you would be wrong. I don't base what I think on how it affects UK. I base my opinions on what I think makes sense for the sport. The Eastern Kentucky analogy is a poor one. EKU could have put resources toward developing a top basketball program just like UK did, but they didn't. Any school that is willing to put resources toward being competitive can be competitive. Look at UK football or Gonzaga basketball. I want a level playing field where schools can't buy players. I would prefer the NCAA make it harder to cheat then easier. As a UK fan, if all we are doing is buying a championship, is the championship really worth much?
That's different in my mind. A school can put resources toward building better facilities and hiring the best coaches in order to compete. I don't see how that is comparable to paying players to come to your school.
Schools aren't paying players. The NIL is going to allow those players to do endorsement deals etc. There will likely be someone on staff that will help facilitate it and the endorsements will be under great scrutiny. This executive order is exactly like the schools putting resources toward things that allow UK to compete. Do you honestly think UK would have been able to compete against schools in states allowing NIL laws without this executive order? You are foolish if you say yes.
So in your opinion how are we supposed to develop this level playing field? It doesn't exist now. May never have truly existed. As long as there is money involved someone is going to manage to use it to sway a kid one way or another. Wouldn't the most level thing to do be put the money above board? You truly don't think that what happened at UL, KU, LSU, Auburn and so on isn't the rule but rather the exception and they are the few bad seeds and that it's not a rampant problem? Duke isn't buying houses, UNC isn't giving out fake degrees! Oregon and Washington are just so attractive that they beat us out for several top recruits. NIL maybe the most level playing field we have ever seen.
If you read my other post in this thread, I said I am concerned schools can simply go to boosters and set up NIL funds they can use to basically guarantee a certain payment to a player if he comes to a school. That is no different than directly paying them. How could that be regulated to prevent it from happening? If it can be, I don't have a problem with NIL. My concern is it leads to schools cheating more than they do now. My comments are about NIL in general, not whether the state of Kentucky is at a disadvantage because of not having passed a NIL law. There are no laws prohibiting players from making money from their likeness so I'm not sold on creating law having any significant advantage over places who don't have a law. If the NCAA doesn't enforce their rules for all members, then I don't think they could single out UK for allowing NIL even if the state doesn't have a law.
I think college sports is definitely dirty. It's probably dirtier than you or I believe it is. That being said, I don't think this helps. I think it moves us closer to schools who are willing and able to pay large amounts of money to players to be able to get them to come to their schools. That's not going to make for leagues that are fun to watch. I have no problem with NIL as long as it can regulated so it doesn't devolve to simply paying players to come to your school. I'm not convinced it can regulated to that degree, but I hope they can.
Too bad. I will assume I know your motives, and will continue doing so. You can't stop me.
UK eats no matter the rules, decade or the coach
Wow, why be a douche when I was merely trying to have a discussion? If you can't intelligently discuss a topic why involve yourself in the discussion to begin with?
I don't know. I'm just feeling feisty today. I should probably stop that though.
Billions of dollars are tied to college football and basketball tv viewership. As long as that is the case and you and I both know it will always be the case. Then they are gonna want to have the best talent they have coming out of hs participate to help keep sinking ratings from sinking more. With the ever developing financial options for potential recruits becoming more and more available we will start to see the talent level decrease. You maybe a purest of the sport and be ok with that. I don't know but the casual fan are not they will be turned off by it. As tv revenue goes down more rapidly as attendance in arenas continue to decrease the potential death of the sport we all love becomes even more certain than it already is. I wish the solution was as black and white as enforce the rules better. Hell it took the FBi being involved to bust the lid off of how bad it really is. I just think trying to have financial options that are above board may help to clean it a little. The IRS will be involved with NIl meaning their will be paper trails at least to help with what your concern is about the boosters. I know there will be grey areas. Just don't see it being any worse than it already is. Just want to say my brother I do respect you. You debate intellectualy don't get personal and I grasp you love UK. Let's just both hope that what's best for the sport wins out and we have many more years of fandom ahead
Have no idea how people think there is a bottomless pot of gold somewhere in Central KY. Some of these players might get offered 5-10k in a year. If Mintz returns he won’t be the featured player on the team.
College basketball will morph into some abomination like the G league or backwater semipro league. Every entitlement program in the land will want a cut. The biggest markets will dominate..
Kentucky lands players like Duren because of program qualities. Using EKU in that comparison is inappropriate. You want a form of unregulated capitalism which usually doesn't work out well. At any rate, money will now be the deciding factor for most top players, not program quality. It is a paradigm shift in college sports that will most likely lead to an absolute lack of parity and could even shift current top programs like UK or any traditional power to a secondary position. I still expect this wonderful development for players to be the ultimate demise of fan passion. For whatever reason, you seem to think that is all a good idea.
I'll try to give you my honest answer. Sports are unlike any other occupation. We created leagues with games to entertain us. No other occupation is dependent on competitive leagues for their survival. For a league to function, fans/customers have to have some belief that their team can compete, that rules allow for each team to win if it has competent leadership. As life long Bengals and Reds fan, if we didn't think the rules allowed us to compete, why would we watch? We blame it on Mike Brown's leadership, not that the rules don't allow small market teams to compete. Leagues, by definition aren't free markets. They have rules in place that limit competition to try and create situations where any team can theoretically win. If they were governed by free market principles, many teams would fold because fan interest would die because of the realization that their team cannot compete. I don't think anti trust laws should apply to sports leagues because they rely on restricting competition between teams to keep and create fan/customer interest. If we are going to say sports leagues violate anti trust and must be run consistent with free market principles, then I would suggest they won't remain popular for very long.
Will Wade is asking: where have you all been? I've been doing this for 4 years!
Ok why is the money available only localized? We have one of the largest fan bases in the nation. We are on national tv constantly so you think national sponsors like Nike, Coca cola, PepsiCo, Gatorade, so on and so on won't come a knocking on our players door? Nevermind the fact that such a high percentage of our guys go pro. Meaning that national advertisors can get in on the ground floor with them.
One autograph signing locally with a very low turnout of a 1000 people at a very low market price of 10 dollars an autograph will max out your 10k just one when a 2nd tier player could easily do 5 or 6. That's not including any business sponsorships. 10,000 followers on social media can generate 1000s more
