I said it this week on PFT Live. And I’ll say it again now.
Anyone who supports the Protect College Sports Act opposes player rights.
Those who are speaking out in support of the bill won’t admit it. We’ll do it for them. Under the guise of ending chaos tracing to decades of antitrust violations that denied the players the ability to earn anything for their skills, sacrifices, and fame, the proponents of the bill want to limit the amount of money that goes to players, diverting it to the programs.
That’s the fundamental problem none of them will ever acknowledge. There are only so many dollars that can be siphoned from the piggybanks of the boosters. Every dollar that goes to an NIL fund is one less dollar that can go to the program. They want to reduce what can go to the players, maximizing what can go to the programs.
Unwilling to embrace a nationwide union that would allow the creation of a salary cap, transfer limits, and other rules aimed at creating order, the powers-that-be crave an exemption from the laws that prevent the universities from coming together and crafting anticompetitive — and anticapitalist — restrictions on the players’ earning power and freedom to transfer. And ESPN has been leading the conga line, with influential voices like Nick Saban and Pat McAfee openly pushing the Protect College Sports Act.
On Saturday, ESPN gave Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), one of the sponsors of the bill, an extended interview during College GameDay to press the case for passage of the proposed law. Cruz, not surprisingly, opened by pointing to the LSU and Brendan Sorsby situations as evidence of the current chaos. The loud reaction to those specific situations was always about mustering political momentum to get the bill passed.
Cruz also claimed that there currently is a “[s]piral of costs that is bankrupting almost every college program in the country. . . . They’re losing tens of millions of dollars.” That contention, to use a technical term, is horseshit.
There was no opposing viewpoint offered in response, other than the organic and incessant booing of Cruz (which included a one point a “Ted you suck!” chant). No time was provided for those who have concerns about the bill.
At one point, host Rece Davis posed a perfunctory question to Cruz regarding the absence of limits on compensation and mobility for coaches and administrators. Cruz offered an evasive word salad in response, and he received no pushback.
Contrary to what ESPN is leading its viewers to believe, the bill has real opposition. On Monday, Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) will conduct a press conference at noon ET with “college athletes, professional athlete unions, families and advocates” to address the problems with the bill.
From the email announcing the event, “participants will detail how the bill denies college athletes the rights and protections they are owed as workers and cuts off any path these athletes have to advocate for themselves — all so the NCAA, college athletic conferences and schools can consolidate money and power over athletes’ lives.”
Why wasn’t Murphy given equal time on College GameDay? Cruz and Murphy could have debated the merits and problems with the bill. While there are no safe bets in this age of bet! bet! bet!, it would be safe to wager the farm on ESPN not preempting McAfee’s show and taking Murphy’s press conference live as it happens on Monday.