The Destruction of College Football

NIL Deals Have Begun To Ruin College Football

Photo by Alexander Mils on Unsplash

Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) deals have taken over the collegiate world since they’ve become permitted in 2021. These deals allow college athletes to profit from their talents with universities and businesses paying millions of dollars to athletes each year. These deals have not only changed the landscape of players’ lives but the entirety of college sports, creating NCAA to become strictly a business.

Both athletes and universities are solely focused on money. From where a player commits to donors giving millions of dollars to an athlete, NIL deals have made the focus of college money. Before these deals became prevalent, athletes committed to schools they would best fit, where they bonded with the coaches and staff. Commits chose schools that they believed would best develop their skills on and off the field. However, commits now choose the school that offers them the most NIL money, prioritizing money over development. Thus, many commit to universities where they don’t see themselves as a fit but are only in it for the money.

College sports used to develop athletes so that they could make money in professional sports. Now, college athletes are being paid almost the same as professionals, taking away the pride of achieving professional status. Also, what makes college sports so entertaining are the underdogs and upset stories that occur every year in every sport. However, now, the best athletes commit to the top schools as they offer the most money. The universities with the biggest markets can afford to pay the best players more than smaller market schools, and with the amount of NIL money increasing each year with the bigger market universities, the best teams are only becoming better, creating increasingly significant advantages over other teams.

For example, Matthew Sluka, the UNLV quarterback, like hundreds of other collegiate athletes, has decided to forgo the rest of the season and transfer to a school that will pay him more. Money is his main priority, and while UNLV was undefeated, he does not care for the team or his legacy in college but is only in it for the money.

Also, NIL deals have created major disparities between sports with 98 out of the top 100 most paid collegiate athletes coming from football or basketball and created inequities between male and female athletes. Former Iowa Hawkeyes superstar Caitlyn Clark became the all-time leading scorer in women’s basketball history and broke the all-time record for men’s and women’s points but was only ranked 38th in NIL rankings.

While NIL deals have created valuable real-world experience in marketing, branding and financial management, their only focus is on the money and not developing their athletic skills to achieve their goals. This prioritization of money has taken the fun away from collegiate sports, creating distractions and damaging players’ development and academic obligations.