the NCAA is a private institution so in theory they could still ban the kids but the idea is that she is trying to put pressure on them.

Personally I think that finding a solution to the issue is something that Notre Dame should be leading the way on; image and likeness seems pretty reasonable to me and they could even pattern something after the way the Olympic athletes do it.

... on this, not an individual school. I am all for compensating the players for the use of their image. But, there has to be some type of collective bargaining and equitable sharing of the proceeds. Otherwise you'll see, purely by coincidence I'm sure, every 5-star athlete that signs with Oregon receiving a Nike endorsement deal.

Any system that allows deals directly with individual players, or individual schools that distribute the payments to the players, will be abused. And the things that keep some level of parity in the NFL (the draft, salary caps) can't be easily applied to schools. Oregon and Maryland immediately become the top recruiters in the country.

Maybe the union can provide for a tiered system that rewards performance. That could actually lead to parity -- it could be an enticement for players to be the freshman starter at a small school instead of the two-year back-up at a powerhouse.

I don't think there are any easy answers here.

I guess I struggle with the concept of limiting what a player can get based off of his own image/likeness.

Nobody is limiting what the University of Oregon can make off of their deal with Nike, as an example.

NIke would be paying them to attend the University of Oregon under the fiction of their likeness. That’s the abuse. Such a system would provide cover for boosters to pay for attendance at particular universities. It is functionally equivalent to providing some nfl teams with salary cap exemptions.

If Nike wants to hire Notre Dame nation posters to come post on a NIke based site should we stop them because it's a waste of money?

If Nike wants to pay people/schools money, that's their business. I'm sure other schools could terminate their relationship with Nike and Nike would be free to go into a one school agreement and only work with Oregon. I suspect that Nike wouldn't be in a big hurry to lose all those other relationships, but who knows? Maybe Oregon is just worth that much to them.

Maybe Nike shareholders would be totally fine with that arrangement; I mean, when a publicly traded company spends a lot of money on players that might not pan out, that would effect their earnings in the short term at least. Maybe in order to offset that, Phil Knight can come up with the billions and billions required to buy back all of that stock and take the company private again, all for the sole (pun not intended) purpose of making sure Oregon won more football games.

When does the boogey man scenario cease making practical sense?

... of a level playing field. I'm not worried about a company's shareholders.

The NFL attempts to provide a level playing field through drafts and salary caps. Direct payments to players for their "likeness" eliminates any NCAA limitation analogous to a salary cap. The schools with the richest alumni win. You can't institute a draft in the NCAA because you can't have schools picking where athletes go to school.

Are places like LA and New York more attractive to professional athletes because of the greater exposure and possibility of endorsements? Sure, but the salary cap limits the effect of that, as do the high NFL salaries.

I have no problem with a developmental league or minor league system where players are paid and can receive endorsements. But none of those leagues provide players with an unfettered right to contract and all of those leagues have systems that ensure a level playing field. I also have no problem with players receiving payments from schools (including some type of collective endorsement deal), so long as such a system is is equally applied to all schools. Let the athletes pick which limitations they would prefer -- endorsements while being told, at least initially, where they must play, or no endorsements (or sharing endorsements) while giving them freedom to pick their school.

I'm definitely not saying the NCAA is perfect. I am all for paying players and giving players more freedom of mobility. Unfettered endorsement deals would cause more problems than solutions, including endorsement equivalents to coaches pulling scholarships.

it's not a level playing field anyway. If people are going to waste their money on signing kids to endorsement deals, then that's just the way the world will work. You've got schools offering 300-400 kids, oversigning, non-committable offers, and all this other bullshit going on out there in recruiting and you think that adding a booster into the mix that is going to pay a kid $100 to sign an autograph is a problem? Hey, you think that they're going to offer every single one of those 400 kids with an offer that same $100?

I tend to doubt it would happen in large scale, but hey, let's keep on with the current corrupt system and see where it leads us.

the question is where does the money come from to pay these athletes? Is it paid by SONY or MICROSOFT? Or do the schools pay? This leads into the further discussion of whether student-athletes should be paid for their play? All sports? Revenue sports only? Not all schools have a profitable operating budget in their athletic departments to pay student athletes. The Notre Dames/Texas/Alabamas (big boy schools) certainly have money, but Akron, Miami(Ohio), UT San Antonio...not so much $$

when Nike has an athlete endorse their product, Nike pays the athlete directly.

The Olympic model would likely be the guiding example. In theory, this should absolve the schools from having to pay the athletes and the "compensation" that the school provides will be in the form of education/classes/room/board/etc.

... a corporate-sponsored minor league.

The Olympic model works for Olympic athletes because they are essentially individual competitors. There's no team score at professional track meets.

spectrum will things land. The overwhelming majority of players would not benefit from being able to make money off of their image. Those players should be unionizing and fighting for more rights, like guaranteed scholarships through graduation, some form of ongoing medical care for football-related injuries, etc.

At least from the post's in this thread it seems (I have not read the article).

I believe players are contractually obligated to license their name and image to a common entity (e.g. NFL Players Inc.), and then that common entity licenses the rights to Nike, Under Armour, etc. For non-merchandise, obviously the players can go out on their own. The NBA, with shoe contracts and what not, is probably different than the NFL.

Barry Bonds and Michael Jordan, for example, cut their own deals (big reason why Jordan wasn't on some popular games like NBA Jam and Bonds wasn't in Triple Play Baseball among others).

My general understanding is that on any given item that uses a specific player's image, that specific player gets a cut, but a cut also goes to the general pool for all players. Again, I'm not positive, but in the NFL, I think all teams split merchandising money (the licensing portion) equally regardless of how much an individual team sells. Generally speaking, the NFL is much more communist than other leagues. The NBA, NHL, and particularly MLB tend to be a bit more eat what you kill.

My original response was just that the partner using the likeness is paying for the privilege.