How big a concern is crossover b/t school and player deals?
by rockmcd (2019-02-05 11:50:07)

In reply to: a member of the CA state senate plans to introduce a bill  posted by jt


This is just off the top of my head so feel free to poke holes in this. What's to prevent the following?

Notre Dame has an endorsement deal with Under Armour.
It stands to reason that Under Armour will want to endorse individual ND players too, and will have a vested interest in ND getting top high school players to commit to ND.
Let's say that Under Armour pays ND $10 million per year.
Now that student-athletes can collect endorsement deals, ND and Under Armour agree to reduce it to $8 million per year; Under Armour will then use that extra $2 million to negotiate endorsement deals with high school athletes, on the condition that they sign with ND.
If I'm not mistaken, this is kind of what happened in the recent college basketball scandal.

So in effect, the sports apparel companies will become recruiting agents for the schools, and the recruiting wars for the top recruits will become actual bidding wars.

Maybe that's fine? Just say "Screw it, let the free market prevail. Better to have it all out in the open." It certainly won't help parity, but we don't have parity right now anyway.


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