College sports are uniquely American. They’re a source of excitement and pride not only for myself, but for millions of athletes, students, alumni, and fans across the nation. I know firsthand the impact sports can have as a fan and former student athlete. Today, the landscape of college sports is evolving at an increasingly chaotic pace with no clear guidelines or guardrails—creating an unfair and unsustainable environment for coaches, players, and fans.
We must preserve the future of college sports–while protecting our student-athletes and the fan-driven atmosphere that makes college sports special. Congress has a clear opportunity to step in now to restore order to a system that has grown increasingly unbalanced. If we don’t act now, the problems facing our athletes and institutions will only get worse—doing nothing is no longer an option.
Through Chairman Cruz’s leadership and ongoing work on this issue, along with some thoughtful approaches of Ranking Member Cantwell, a bipartisan framework can emerge from the Commerce Committee to serve as the foundation for legislation that fixes this issue once and for all. I’m presenting my blueprint of commonsense ideas that can fix college sports and shape the conversation as Congress works on meaningful legislation to address these issues.
PILLAR 1: Ending Rulemaking By Lawsuit
The current environment of “policymaking by courtroom default” has created chaos and instability that is unsustainable.
- Antitrust Safe Harbor: Create a narrow, conditional safe harbor to allow schools and conferences to adopt uniform, athlete-protective rules without the threat of immediate, freezing litigation.
- National Standards: Replace the current patchwork of conflicting state NIL laws with one federal standard to ensure competitive balance.
- Governance Flexibility: Allow conferences to choose their own governing bodies under federal oversight, recognizing that, in a new era of college athletics, this may warrant a shifting governance model.
PILLAR 2: Putting Players First, A Commonsense Approach
College sports must remain a “time-limited educational opportunity” rather than a short-term professional career.
- One-Time Transfer Baseline: Restore roster stability with a national one-time transfer rule, aligning athlete mobility with academic calendars. Governing bodies can grant waivers for coach movement and unforeseen circumstances.
- Eligibility Guardrails: Reaffirm eligibility standards to prevent older, professionalized rosters from displacing high school recruits and undermining development pathways.
- Coaching Accountability: Align coaching transitions with transfer windows to minimize disruption to athletes’ academic and competitive lives.
Pillar 3: Saving Olympic and Women’s Sports
Safeguard non-revenue sports by ensuring a certain number of varsity sports are maintained by schools.
- Revenue Sharing and Caps: Authorize direct compensation from schools to student-athletes and permit a governing body to adopt salary caps to ensure long-term financial sustainability.
- Restoring NIL, Not Pay-for-Play: The goal is to return NIL to its original purpose, marketable endorsements, while institutionalizing direct revenue sharing.
- Bona Fide NIL: Require verification that NIL compensation is for services rendered at fair market value, prohibiting “sham contracts” as an end-around salary cap.
- Transparency in Contracts and Player Representation: Protect student athletes from fraudulent deals and greedy agents by establishing a public registry and national standards.
Pillar 4: Ensuring College Sports Endure
Beyond the challenges around NIL, Congress should take a hard look at the growing financial strain facing college sports. We need to have a true debate on this issue. It won’t be easy; there are strong and sensible positions on each side of this debate, but policymakers should ask a basic question: are college sports getting fair value for what they produce, and what is the best way to ensure they are strong for the long-term to support a wide array of college athletics and student athletes who participate?
- Maximizing Value in Media Rights: College football consistently attracts large national audiences, yet overall media revenues don’t match those of other professional sports leagues. This gap suggests there are real opportunities to modernize and optimize media rights deals in ways that grow total revenue.
- Restoring Stability: Ongoing conference realignment shows schools are seeking greater financial predictability and competitive stability. Recent realignment decisions highlight the importance of examining what underlying financial incentives are driving these shifts.
- Long-Term Success: Discussions around any potential proposals that open up or amend the Sports Broadcasting Act should focus on keeping college athletics healthy for the long haul. Can a review of how media rights are secured provide more schools opportunities to be more competitive, protect women’s and Olympic sports, and ensure long-term sustainability?
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