Fighting Roster Limits in House v NCAA settlement

I absolutely agree with grandfathering but not in the manner described. There are XC teams with 40 members. Tour logic would allow teams who have 15 today to go up to 35 next year. Grandfathering should merely mean keeping all scholarship athletes.

These are great points, and support claim that House settlement may not get approved.

I am actually surprised ADs are taking such urgent action on things that very well may not happen???

A whole other issue on payments is House plans to allow teams to pay athletes up to roughly $20 million, and restrict NIL from boosters to only legitimate market value NIL, and not just bags of cash covered with a fake marketing deal.

Problems with this is the $20 million sets a salary cap, when ncaa now has no anti-trust protection. Duke QB just set market value at $4 million annually! If $20 million has to be split 50/50 with women, that's already 40% of the budget.

Also who is to determine what market value for an NIL is? Who rules that a $500,000 payment to an AL linemen is not at fair market value? When and how fast does this ruling and appeal take place?

All sorts of fun.

I am surprised that they aren't taking more urgent action. There are going to be tens of thousands of student athletes getting cut this summer. Imagine being a student with an apartment and maybe a year to go.

That's a good point, and I was just spit balling a phased approach. Looking at a specific teams roster composition over the last X years would produce a better formula, and reduce from there. Max or average roster over the last 5 years, reduce 20% each year, or something of that sort. Team that were already under the new roster limit wouldn't need to change a thing.

The problem with specifying scholarship athletes is that most XCTF (and swimming/diving, and baseball and basically any sport besides football and basketball) is that most are not on a full or maybe even partial scholarship, so I would adjust that language from "scholarship" to "rostered".

They are taking urgent action based on an agreement unlikely to be approved?

Many students being cut lose their roster spot-awful, but can keep their place in school and financial award-not so awful.

I wouldn't. Walk-ons could always be let go on a moment's notice. So I would not agree to permit a team with 40 to have an advantage over a team with 15. Grandfathering should merely protect scholarship athletes. For example, a XC team may currently have 30 women on scholarship totalling 5 scholarships. I propose that they should be permitted to remain until eligibility expires. Otherwise, I predict that a class action lawsuit will be generated.

As the poster in question let me clarify a couple of things.

-The House settlement sucks

-The day they decided to start allowing athletes to get paid was the beginning of the end

-I do not think that the roster limits are good for the sport but I do think that this settlement keeps the sport alive at the D1 level

Worst case scenario if the NCAA collapses and even D2 and D3 get caught in the storm, the NAIA is at the very least going to keep the traditional college sports model alive. Track and XC won't disappear but the opportunities will be vastly different. Imagaine a return to the 80's where programs are all bare bones budgets, regional vs national competition, and less opportunities due to the trickle down of talent away from the lost D1 opportunities. Is this "the sky is falling!", sure, but our sport does not have a seat at the table. Our governing bodies, USATF and USTCCCA, need to worry less about making the sport marketable and worry more about lobbying washington and making powerful friends with the ability to legislate or continued survival at the college level. I love the idea of grandfathering, but there is no time. This is moving at lightspeed. The NCAA might be gone in two years. Our sport does not have time to grandfather these kids in. Your analysis of the problems with the settlement and the potential lawsuits are valid and it absolutely could collapse the NCAA without congressional involvment, but I think the NCAA collapses sooner without the settlement. This buys us time. The bottom line is do you go with the devil you know or the one you dont know.

Just saw this article. Ivy league schools are probably opting out. This is the most well known conference to opt out at this point. Not sure how this affects the them as institutions but it definitely adds another wrinkle to this issue.

thedp.com

Ivy League set to opt out of House v. NCAA antitrust settlement

Valeri Guevarra, Sean McKeown

An email from Ivy League Executive Director Robin Harris stated that the Ivy League student-athletes will continue to not receive shared revenue or direct N.I.L. payments from their universities

Open link

100% accurate analysis of what I said. Let me add a number 5

5- Roster spots were never gauranteed. Only scholarships.

The roster limits basically limits coaches ability to roster kids that they know they might cut anyways. The downside is that it kills opportunity and development, but the truth is that without factoring education, the kids getting cut are kids that should not have went D1 to begin with. That being said I hate that the kids are caught in the middle and I hate that they are losing opportunities.

That is where you are wrong. There are many elite runners who are at risk at their schools. Some athletes stagnate for a year or two. Some get injured. Some programs are just elite and the have 20 or more great runners.

which post were you referencing?

Your post stating that kids who will get cut should not have gone D1.

You are correct that there are elite kids that will be affected. They are however in the minority and they will be able to move to another good program. The exception for now is the SEC kids which have unreasonable roster limits and will affect them even worse. That does not change the fact that the vast majority of the back of the pack kids affected probably should not be there. That does not mean that those kids should not have the opportunity. I wish they did. Our sport is reaping the results of years of outrageous spending with no ROI, which makes them an easy target for saving money. The irony is that this settlement was brought by a bunch of non-revenue kids that overestimated their importance and have likely killed their own sports along with the rest of the Olympic sports.

Curious about that last point. Who has guaranteed athletic scholarships? I know at my kid’s school it is cancelable every year.

Sort of. Let's assume there is a boy who was a state champ in XC and ran 4:14 in track. He goes to a program like Michigan that has 30 guys at his level or much faster because theyvsre upper classmen. He redshirts a year and then gets sick and gets injured. He runs a few races indoor this year in 4:20, then 4:22, then 4:18. He gets cut this summer. This kid could have been a top 7 XC guy and a sub 4 minute miler had he not gotten sidetracked and he still could do it in his 5th year but he gets cut this year due to the roster limits. Saying he can transfer is silly. Where can he go as a 21 year old with a college best of 4:18 when there sre thousands of guys getting cut? He instead just decides to graduate next year rather than training hard amd doing 5 years as was his and his coach's plan.

They will keep the scholarship because the cause was the roster limits.

Unless I am wrong, the TN and CU kids cut were losing roster spots, but not any money they were getting. At CU, cuts were mostly walkons. At TN many were getting NIL and scholarship.

Sounds like a like guys I can think of. Reaching potential is a wandering road for a lot of runners and what will probably be the new college environment will rarely allow for that.

This is not correct. As a college coach we have been told we can cut whoever and plan on having that money available immediately unless the athlete has signed a mult-year agreement.