What we're learning about college sports at NCAA trial

[UNT90]

Wow, wonder if we will see the player's names removed from the backs of jerseys?

Must have been why it took so long to get a TMitch jersey. As always, RV two steps ahead of everyone else.

Lol.

[TIgreen01]

Trying to read through all the fluff and overly grand prosthelytizing is difficult. Is this case not really about the players having the right to negotiate payment for use of their likeness (jersey sales, memorabilia, video games, etc)....and not much about paying them a salary and making them employees of the university.

I suppose in order to have those rights, you must first remove their amateur status; but who defines what an amateur is? Does this judge have the authority to declare that college athletes are not amateur athletes? Exactly what kind of ruling can we really expect?

[Harry]

Trying to read through all the fluff and overly grand prosthelytizing is difficult. Is this case not really about the players having the right to negotiate payment for use of their likeness (jersey sales, memorabilia, video games, etc)....and not much about paying them a salary and making them employees of the university.

I suppose in order to have those rights, you must first remove their amateur status; but who defines what an amateur is? Does this judge have the authority to declare that college athletes are not amateur athletes? Exactly what kind of ruling can we really expect?

Wish I could answer this. Honestly, it appears that the judge is siding with the O'Bannon side if you read the tea leaves. What this ultimately means to us -- who knows. My sense is the NCAA likes wielding the power of controlling the advertising revenue and money and fears that if the players are able to be compensated it will deteriorate their monopoly. The NCAA claims that if this happens, it will ruin the "amateur" status of the sport and there will be just a few schools that dominate the game turning it into a semi-pro league which will affect fan support of the sport in general. My thought is for goodness sakes, we are already there aren't we (North Texas vs. Texas et al). I think the ultimate outcome of this is the players will get more of the money (rightfully so) and the Texas, OU's etc will remain at the top of the food chain. I think the ones who could be impacted the most are the Vanderbilts, the Oregon States the lower tier schools who are so dependent on the p5 revenue streams to "build" their respective programs.

[Harry]

I again think that the outcome of this issue is O'Bannon will win, and the NCAA knew this from the start. Their battle is to limit the scope of what O'Bannon will change from the status quo. For us this really won't change too much initially. The issue for us and schools like us *g5's is more in regards to the AAC and to a lesser extent the Mountain West... We don't battle UT or OU for recruits -- we battle them for guys that they may try to grayshirt not scholarship guys. We DO battle SMU for recruits. So, what the AAC does in terms of mimicking the p5 response to O'Bannon and Jenkins et al is the key. This is EXACTLY why the AAC was looking for the schools with the biggest budgets during their expansion. If the AAC decides to pay all expenses tied to enrollment, offer 4-year guaranteed scholarships essentially to match exactly what the UT and OU's of the world do we will have the choice as a conference to decide if we will as well. That my friends is where the risk is for the UNT's of the world. If we are able to match most if not all of what the AAC offers their signees then we shall still be able to battle them for players because the bowl playoff access issue still is still fairly even. If we are unable to match them then that provides them with a key advantage and we will not compete with them for recruits.

The other piece of this that I haven't been able to get my arms around is how to differentiate between the costs of going to a private school as opposed to a public one. For instance, it is a lot more expensive to go to Vanderbilt than it is to Texas A&M -- so how does the SEC manage this in a way that is equal? I don't know that you can.