Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) Could Damage College Athletics

 For a long time now, there has been a debate on whether college athletes should be permitted to be compensated for the contributions they make to their respective schools through their athletic talents.  Furthermore, if they are paid, how should it be carried out?  Should they be paid a stipend for living expenses, or a certain percentage of Athletic Department profits.  Ultimately, states and universities decided to collaborate on laws and policies to allow athletes to profit off of their own name, image, and likeness.  In other words, athletes can be paid for their autographs, endorsement of products, public appearances, and even on endorsing political candidates.  For the professional athlete, this practice is perfectly acceptable of course, but operating college athletics in this manner would seem to damage its integrity. At the very least, these practices could lead to unethical behavior on a student and university level.

In theory, athletes play college sports for the love of the game, and to receive a quality education at minimal to no expense.  If NIL policies take full effect, the incentives to play collegiate athletics could radically change.  Instead of participating for the pride of the school and an education, students could be choosing a particular institution based solely on the amount of financial benefits they stand to gain.  Unfortunately, this could lead to watered down competition, where very few teams are able to compete at the highest levels due to their plethora of financial resources.  Thus, smaller schools’ ability to recruit top tier talent would be further hampered due to their financial restraints.  Though this is already an issue, further expansion of NIL policies would exasperate this problem.  Moreover, players would be more inclined to transfer schools based on financial benefit rather than athletic opportunity.  Without a doubt, this minimizes the purity that once existed behind the idea of playing college sports, and poisons it with the idea of heightened financial opportunity.

It is important to note that as of now, colleges and universities do not have anything to do with setting up NIL deals, however, if it is not regulated, I could see a scenario where universities develop mega deals with various companies to attract top talent, which would inevitably result in teams that dominate the college ranks, simply because of the financial resources available to top players.  At the same time, players themselves could be lured to various institutions because of the financial opportunities around it.  It is quite obvious that scenarios such as these would obliterate any sense of competitive balance that remains in college sports.

It is understandable that many feel that college athletes should be paid for their contribution to a college or university’s financial stability.  However, how they are compensated is up for debate.  For my part, there should be a flat fee based on cost of living and other expenses.  In addition, each player should get a profit sharing check based on the income of the university they play for.  Yes, players should be compensated, but in no way do I feel players should be getting rich off playing college sports.  I think Name, Image, and Likeness policies are detracting from the wholeness of college sports competition the way they are set up now., I think a few minor adjustments to those policies would eliminate those problems.