I bumpitty bump this to make an observation and axe a question.
The Legendary GOAT, and greatest human being of all time, Nick Saban, was on Crapitol Hill yesterday, in some round table discussion with Ted Cruz and players and officials from around college sports. The discussion was mainly over NIL and how to possibly get a handle on it.
Recently, Saban openly admitted that the final straw in making his decision to retire, was when just after the season, the majority of players he talked to only wanted to know about playing time next season, and how much they were going to be paid. Why is nobody talking about this?
NIL simply means a player can earn money on their own by securing sponsorships, doing commercials, signing autographs, selling their own merch, or just plain negotiating to receive a certain amount from these collectives. The reality is, the collectives are nothing more than the concept of the "bag man" becoming legal. It goes against the spirit of why NIL was created, but since nobody made a rule against it, we're gonna' do it until somebody stops us.
Having said that, there are rules against any of that being run or directed through the athletic departments. The collectives are not supposed to be under the control of coaches, administrators etc. In fact, go back to the start of this very thread, which points out that FSU gets nailed for an assistant coach simply driving a player to meet with someone about collective money. Did the rules change? Did I miss something? If not....
then why were players going to Nick Saban to find out what kind of cash they were going to be making? What the hell does the head coach have to do with your NIL money? Nothing, right? I'm not trying to act naive here. I understand how it works. But, jimminy crickets, the man is openly admitting they're breaking every rule in the book, and nobody gives a frick. And FSU gets popped for an Uber lift.