3 Big Ten players speak to Emmert, asking for NIL rights for the 21-22 school year. Isaiah Livers among them.
After checking the board history I was surprised to see this wasn't posted. Isaiah Livers, Geo Baker, and Jordan Bohannon reached out to NCAA President Mark Emmert to publicly endorse a temporary waiver for players to have NIL rights for the 21-22 school year. They also asked that all schools be forced to adhere to Title IX rules, providing more support to their female athletes such that they are on par with the support provided to males.
Long story short, the players spoke directly to Emmert and he said he would get back with them regarding the NIL endorsement. Also he stated that the NCAA is not required to meet Title IX standards. All 3 of them took that as "this isn't going to happen, we wasted our time." Not an actual quote from the article, that was me paraphrasing.
Between this and Emmert saying that he wants the leaders of women's college basketball to be more vocal and to be in charge of pushing for changes in how women's athletics are handled, what does this guy do? He also didn't even negotiate with CBS when it came time to renew their TV contract for March Madness. He just let it renew and now it's lauded as one of the worst TV deals in sports history. I'm serious, WHAT DOES HE DO??? Any time he's asked to do something he passes the buck!
Reading between the lines....does this mean that Livers is pondering a return next year?
I don't know, but that would be amazing. I wouldn't put my money on it, but Jordan Bohannon has already said that if NIL happens next year he'll return.
someoe's got to break Hummel's record. Or was it Settles.
Aaron Kraft
I'm probably a shallow person for immediately wondering the same.
You're not alone. It was the first thought I had.
This NIL rights debate is a double edged sword. Letting college athletes be paid for their likenesses is one thing, but when all the minor NCAA sports have limits on the number of scholarships allowed, this tarnishes the image they are trying to project for equality in college athletics.
A prime example is the UM baseball team that made it to the NCAA finals in 2019. They were allowed 11 ½ scholarships. Some players qualified for academic scholarships, the rest split the remaining sum into equal parts, meaning they all paid partial tuition.
Also the Covid crisis last year saw many institutions dropping several of their unprofitable minor sports.
Not to mention that the profits generated by the major sports provide the necessary infrastructure for these "lesser" sports.
So I'm not sure that giving the money to some star athletes in the major sports, while other athletes see their sport disappear or must pay partial tuition, is in the best interest of amateur athletics.
This is one angle that wasn't even mentioned in the Supreme Court debate and is nowhere to be found in Emmert's time zone !
Your takes ?
Maybe I'm missing your point, but how would NIL rights take anything away from schools, scholarship players, non-scholarship players, or anyone else?
It just means the players can profit off of their own name, image, and likeness. The school aren't paying them; they're just allowed to make money off of themselves.
I don't see how that hurts any minor sports, etc. If anything, it means that half of the Michigan baseball team that you mentioned could have tried to pay for some of their tuition by profiting off of their own popularity.
Exactly. NIL rights have nothing to do with direct payments to players by the NCAA or the colleges they represent. Doesn't touch their money at all. Maybe they'll get a little less ad money because the companies can bypass the institutions and talk directly to the players? That's the only way NIL harms the institutions. Very little harm in that.
NIL would help the top end athletes in the small sports. Like Katie Ledecky could swim for Stanford (or Phelps for M back in the day) without costing herself millions. She quit college athletics for explicitly this reason.
Heck, we saw that of all the basketball players in the Elite Eights, Paige Bueckers had the most followers, not any of the big stars on the men's side.
There is also the question of bagmen now being able to go through corporate sponsors and now be legal.
Back in 2013 between his freshman and sophomore years, Johnny Manziel was signing hundreds of autographs for a couple of sports memorabilia companies, but the NCAA investigation couldn't find tangible proof that there was money involved.
Also there were articles about the star Bama FB players that were given free use of new cars from local auto dealers, with photos of the athletes' parking lot.
Just to say that that this will be a whole new can of worms and it's best to look at all angles, before rather than after.
Well, to be blunt, if these guys actually thought wearing a couple tee shirts and setting up this meeting was going change the NCAA's stance then they're morons.
I’d guess by this one post that you’re a fucking Moron
Change is pressure applied over time. Kudos for Livers and others for increasing the public pressure on the NCAA. Probably won't work this time, but speaking out will encourage others and the NCAA will have to respond, which will weaken their position further. Isaiah has many things to be proud of over the course of his UM career, but maybe getting the student athletes engaged will be the best legacy he can leave behind.
Emmert is a habitual buck passer.
Obligatory
This is probably my all time favorite episode of south park