The ongoing push for a federal law that restores the NCAA’s roar conveniently overlooks a solution that college football (and other revenue sports) should be pursuing on their own.
Collective bargaining.
It’s a fine line for the powers-that-be to walk. Yes, they need rules. No, Congress isn’t the only way to get those rules. College football (and other revenue sports) would have those rules if the players create a multi-employer bargaining unit and negotiate those rules with the NCAA and its members.
Clemson coach Dabo Swinney is the latest college-football figure to indirectly invoke the wisdom of a CBA. In a lengthy interview with Chris Low of On3.com, Swinney complained about the current chaos that borders on anarchy by pointing to the order that exists in the NFL.
“The only thing worse than having no rules is having rules you can’t enforce or don’t enforce,” Swinney said.
“I don’t think any of us thought we’d be in a world where there’s no order. It’s a much bigger conversation now. Even in the NFL, there are rules. You can’t sign with the Browns and go practice for two weeks and the Dolphins call you up and say, ‘Hey man, what are they paying you? Hey, we’ll pay you a million more. Come on down here to the Dolphins.’ And then you go in there and say, ‘Hey boys, I’m out.’
“That’s really what we’ve got now in college football.”
The NFL doesn’t have that because the NFL has a union that represents all players in collective negotiations with the 32 teams. It has allowed the league to have a draft, a salary cap, free-agency rules, and other provisions that keep players from hopscotching around the league.
That’s the right answer for college football, and the other sports that generate revenue that previously was withheld from the players. The student-athlete model is a myth. It previously was supported by widespread antitrust violations that extended to strict restrictions on the players making a penny from their names, images, and likenesses.
Earlier this year, Swinney acknowledged the potential wisdom of collective bargaining. And for good reason. The players are employees. Everyone knows it. Few are willing to admit it.
The sooner that Congress stops searching for a solution to a problem that college sports creates through decades of disregarding the antitrust laws and tells the university system to clean up its own mess, the sooner the NCAA and its members will have no choice but to grab a mop and a bucket.
