Protect or Restrict? What the College Sports Bill Means for Athletes

Amateurism apparently wore a quarter-zip, drove a courtesy vehicle, and needed $13 million a year to teach sacrifice.

Beautiful footwork.

Kirby Smart, Lane Kiffin, and Curt Cignetti are all around that annual compensation neighborhood in 2026 reporting. Personally, I support getting your bread. Negotiate until the athletic director needs a timeout and an oxygen mask. (directv.com⁠)

But let a player bring that same energy to the negotiating table and suddenly everybody becomes the assistant principal.

Young man, what about loyalty?

Sir, your agent has three schools on hold and a buyout calculator open.

THE FREE MARKET HAS A RESTRICTED AREA

College sports loves competition.

Compete for coaches. Compete for television contracts. Compete to build a locker room that looks like a spaceship with a smoothie bar.

Then the athletes compete for compensation and somebody dives across the scorer’s table to unplug the scoreboard.

We need order!
We need guardrails!
We need to protect the game!

Funny how the emergency meeting always starts when the money approaches the people sweating.

The men’s March Madness media agreements announced in 2010 and 2016 totaled $19.6 billion across their terms through 2032. That is an industrial quantity of bread for an enterprise that spent decades preaching amateurism. (ncaaorg2.sidearmsports.com⁠, ncaa.com⁠)

The money was already in the gym.

The players finally asked which locker was theirs.

THEN SOMEBODY CHECKED THE FILM

The research behind Who Profits from Amateurism? examined athletic department finances from 2006 through 2019. The NBER summary reported that football and basketball players captured less than 7% of the revenue they generated under that system. (nber.org⁠, nber.org⁠)

Less than seven percent.

You carried the offense, guarded their best player, sold out the building, and took the charge.

Everybody else split the gate.

You got a speech about how this experience would prepare you for business.

Apparently, the first lesson was: watch your pockets.

To keep the stat sheet clean, that figure describes the historical amateurism system. It is not today’s NIL or revenue-sharing percentage.

The old numbers can embarrass themselves without us padding their stats.

RACE IS RIGHT THERE IN THE SCOUTING REPORT

The NBER summary found that nearly half the football and basketball players in its sample were Black, compared with 11% of athletes in the other sports studied. (nber.org⁠)

The researchers found resources moving away from athletes more likely to be Black and from poorer neighborhoods toward athletes more likely to be white and from wealthier neighborhoods. They also documented spending on facilities and coaching salaries. (aeaweb.org⁠)

That finding deserves a serious response.

“Race baiting” is not a rebuttal. It is throwing the ball into the eighth row and blaming the rim.

Nobody needs to boo a rower or foul a golfer. Those athletes work too.

The question belongs at the administrator’s desk: Why was restricting one group’s earning power an acceptable way to finance everybody else’s opportunities?

Explain that possession.

NOW THE SENATE WANTS THE CLIPBOARD

On September 28, the Senate passed the Protect College Sports Act, 77–22, sending it to the House. It is not law yet. (commerce.senate.gov⁠)

Here is where we keep both feet in bounds: the committee’s summary describes adopting the House-settlement revenue-sharing cap while adding a retention fund and preserving NIL rights. Calling it a blanket cap on every dollar an athlete can earn would be inaccurate. (commerce.senate.gov⁠)

The bill also includes scholarship and medical protections. Those matter. An injured athlete should not have to run a GoFundMe fast break to get care. (commerce.senate.gov⁠)

But protections do not end the compensation debate.

Who negotiates the limits? Who represents the players? Who gets to challenge the rules when the deal stops working for them?

Those questions belong in the starting lineup.

EVERYBODY ON THE BASELINE

If college sports needs financial discipline, open the entire budget.

Coaching contracts. Buyouts. Administrative salaries. Facilities. Media revenue. Athlete compensation.

Put every expense through the same conditioning drill.

Do not make the players run suicides while the adults watch from a climate-controlled donor lounge.

I played professionally long enough to know that a career has a clock. Bodies wear down. Opportunities close. The people asking you to be patient may still be collecting checks long after your last game.

Athletes deserve meaningful bargaining power while their value is on the floor.

They should not have to wait until their knees are cooked to discover that everybody else understood the business.

If the adults can negotiate like professionals, the athletes should not have to bargain like children asking for lunch money.

Forward this to a coach, parent, or athlete.

When they say “protect college sports,” ask them to point to exactly who is being protected.