Judge approves House settlement - Schools to pay

[Flabio]

Does this ok the SEC schools to continue the payments to high school commitments while they are still in high school? That one is unbelievably stupid but yah know the south.

 

[betsch]

So if students were in a non-revenue generating sport, do they have to pay the school back? 😁

 

[Carm]

Congress could soon introduce a very NCAA-friendly bill​

The Post obtained copies of draft legislation from two House committees that addresses the priorities the NCAA has spent years lobbying for.

June 9, 2025 at 12:28 p.m. EDTToday at 12:28 p.m. EDT

By Jesse Dougherty

Now that a judge has approved the settlement of three major antitrust cases against the NCAA and power conferences, the political jostling over college sports legislation is expected to heat up on Capitol Hill.

The Washington Post obtained copies of draft legislation from two House committees, which would amount to a bill that checks off every item the NCAA has spent years — and millions of dollars — lobbying for: a preemption of state laws that conflict with rules set by the NCAA and/or its conferences; a prohibition on college athletes being classified as employees; and broad antitrust protection that lines up with the House v. NCAA settlement approved Friday, which could insulate the NCAA and its members from legal challenges of a new salary cap for schools’ direct payments to athletes and attempts to regulate booster spending in the name, image and likeness (NIL) market.

Republican lawmakers first sent the drafts around last week, meaning there could be changes, subtle or substantial, before they are publicized. The main draft has been circulated by Republicans from the House’s Energy and Commerce committee (in conjunction with its subcommittee on commerce, manufacturing and trade). The subcommittee is holding a legislative hearing on college sports Thursday, which was announced as a session for the “SCORE Act to Standardize NIL for Student-Athletes.”

The main draft, which is expected to be introduced at that hearing, leaves a key spot for the House Judiciary committee to provide language on antitrust protection and a preemption of state laws. The Post obtained the Judiciary committee’s language, too.

As of Monday morning, it was unclear which lawmakers will put their names on the legislation draft (those spots were left blank in the obtained copies). The House’s Energy and Commerce committee is chaired by Brett Guthrie (R-Kentucky). The subcommittee for commerce, manufacturing and trade is chaired by Gus Bilirakis (R-Florida), who introduced a draft of a college sports bill in January 2024. The Judiciary committee is chaired by Jim Jordan (R-Ohio). But no matter who it is, it’s notable that Republicans from multiple House committees are working together on this. A half-dozen congressional staffers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private negotiations, say they believe that’s the only way a college sports bill has a chance to move through the House. According to multiple people familiar with the discussions for this legislation, some House Republicans are also seeking involvement from the Education and the Workforce committee, particularly to ensure college athletes cannot become employees.
The draft language includes antitrust protection for:

• Preventing an associated entity or individual from providing a student-athlete compensation greater than fair market value for name, image and likeness agreements. (The House settlement establishes a clearinghouse — run with the help of Deloitte by the College Sports Commission, the entity formed by the power conferences to implement the settlement and enforce its rules — that will review any NIL deal that exceeds $600.)
• A school, conference or interstate association setting the maximum amount of money that can be distributed to athletes in a given year. (The House settlement establishes an initial spending cap of $20.5 million for money paid from schools to athletes in 2025-26. That cap is expected to rise throughout the decade-long legal agreement.)
• Limiting the eligibility of athletes based on the number of seasons played or years exhausted. (This is not part of the House settlement but would provide the NCAA with protection from a slew of antitrust lawsuits challenging eligibility rules.)

The draft goes on to outline additional antitrust protection for enforcing transfer rules and an agent registration process. Multiple athlete advocates say they believe the latter could create conflicts of interests if agents must be certified by the same people they are ultimately negotiating with on behalf of the athletes they represent. The NCAA currently has a voluntary registry for NIL agents.
Since the summer of 2021, there have been more than a dozen college sports hearings in Washington. To date, only one bill has reached a committee vote. There has otherwise been little traction toward legislation, though a small handful of senators have held many discussions about a bipartisan solution. Those conversations have mainly included Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Jerry Moran (R-Kansas), Cory Booker (D-New Jersey), Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut) and Chris Coons (D-Delaware).
Schools will start sharing revenue with athletes July 1 under the terms of the House settlement, increasing the NCAA and power conferences’ urgency for legislation.

On Saturday, NCAA President Charlie Baker sent a letter to members of Congress, reiterating his organization’s main asks and hammering the need for action. The letter, obtained by The Post, outlined why the NCAA wants Congress to pass a bill “affirming student-athletes are not employees,” “providing limited liability protections” and “resolving conflicting state laws.”
All along, the NCAA’s plan has been to settle the House, Carter and Hubbard lawsuits, then leverage that development on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers have historically been very skeptical of the NCAA’s push for antitrust protection and other measures. Baker, a former Republican governor of Massachusetts, was hired, at least in part, for his track record of working with politicians on both sides of the aisle.
“With a new system in place for schools to greatly expand direct financial benefits to student-athletes, they are more modern and more future-ready than ever,” Baker wrote in his letter. “The progress we’ve made, especially with the House settlement, represents a significant step forward. And, in the narrow areas where we lack the authority needed to address outstanding issues, we look forward to working with you and your staff to advance solutions that will ensure that college sports continue to provide fair opportunities to all student-athletes, for generations to come.”

Rep. Lori Trahan (D-Massachusetts), a former Georgetown volleyball player, has been very involved in college sports discussions in Washington. On Saturday, Trahan released a statement commending the athletes who pushed for the progress resulting in schools paying athletes directly for the first time. But Trahan, a minority member of the House Energy and Commerce committee — and the subcommittee on commerce, manufacturing and trade — is not in favor of the congressional action the NCAA seeks.
“With this momentum, athletes can, and must, keep pushing. There’s much more work ahead to strengthen Title IX, ensure NIL rights extend to all college athletes, and center the health and safety of athletes in every conversation about reform,” Trahan said in her statement. “The greatest threat to that progress is misguided intervention by Congress that chokes off the hard-won gains athletes have fought to achieve. If Congress acts, it must focus on the actual challenges facing college athletics — not the balance sheets of powerful conferences.”
Once Republicans took control of the Senate, House and White House after November’s elections, it seemed the NCAA had an easier path to its desired bill. President Donald Trump’s overhaul of the National Labor Relations Board led multiple groups to pause efforts to have athletes recognized as employees. On Sunday, Trump golfed with SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey and Notre Dame Athletic Director Peter Bevacqua. The plan was to discuss the future of college sports, according to people familiar with the outing. The White House has kicked around forming a commission to explore that topic. On Monday morning, in a virtual news conference to discuss approval of the House v. NCAA settlement, Sankey called for Congress to act on college sports. Expect those calls to come at an even faster pace.
And now on Thursday, the latest draft for a House bill would begin the post-settlement discussions on a very friendly note for the NCAA. But as the past few years have shown, the path to actual legislation will always be winding and complicated.

 

[betsch]

And Tennessee raised ticket prices to get ready for this. Even the very rich will have to look at the budget closely. Most likely will hurt the least revenue generating sports the most nation wide. At many schools they will have to get some donations to make the budget work. I'm just not seeing a lot of extra money for the NIL bag men that some folks think will emerge. All schools are going to have to take a hard look at their budgets to make everything work out.

It makes you wonder if prices for players are going to be real high to start and then bottom out as time goes on due to budget cuts.

 

[Carm]

It makes you wonder if prices for players are going to be real high to start and then bottom out as time goes on due to budget cuts.

I read an article that said economists contend the people that will suffer the biggest loss from House are coaches; they contend that the money that wasn't paid to players largely ended up as higher salaries paid to coaches.

 

[Stan Raymond]

I read an article that said economists contend the people that will suffer the biggest loss from House are coaches; they contend that the money that wasn't paid to players largely ended up as higher salaries paid to coaches.

Makes sense, coaching salaries need to come back down. Especially Women's Basketball salaries, nobody makes more to lose money than Women's Basketball coaches, often make Women's Basketball the biggest money loser in athletic departments.

 

[Stan Raymond]

Doing some research on this and I think Carm is right:

New Roster Limits Set by House v. NCAA​

New Scholarships Can Be Created​

It’s not all bad news. Schools do have the option to increase scholarships in sports where the previous scholarship limits were lower than the new roster limits. It was initially anticipated that not many would do this, as the value of new scholarships up to $2.5 million will count against the amount a school can distribute for revenue sharing.

However, some schools have announced they will be fully funding scholarships for all of their rosters up to the new limits, including Clemson, Tennessee and Texas A&M.

(Linky)

Rechanged my mind. To many schools have announced that they will be using all 20.5 million of revenue sharing and are increasing scholarships. Maybe at one point 2.5 million would count against the revenue share cap, but I don't believe that is the case at this time, to many schools have announced increased scholarships and using all 20.5 for revenue share, so I think something has changed. Just read an article on Michigan, their AD said they were increasing some scholarships and budgeting all 20.5 for revenue share.

 

[Carm]

 

[2010sarenevercomingback]

The how exactly they're going to "analyze" the deals is kind of a giant missing detail. There are something like a half a million student athletes eligible for NIL payments. If just 10% of them sign deals, that's 200 cases to process each business day. Probably going to be some AI-driven algorithm that bulk-approves the majority based on whether they fall safely into a set of mystery criteria, and red flags the potential outliers for further research.

 

[Stan Raymond]

Doing some research on this and I think Carm is right:

New Roster Limits Set by House v. NCAA​

New Scholarships Can Be Created​

It’s not all bad news. Schools do have the option to increase scholarships in sports where the previous scholarship limits were lower than the new roster limits. It was initially anticipated that not many would do this, as the value of new scholarships up to $2.5 million will count against the amount a school can distribute for revenue sharing.

However, some schools have announced they will be fully funding scholarships for all of their rosters up to the new limits, including Clemson, Tennessee and Texas A&M.

(Linky)

Changed my mind yet again. Does look correct. Just read an article that Clemson was going to do just that. Add a whole bunch of scholarships and then have 18 million left for direct payments. Odd way to do it, but Carm does look to be correct.

 

[Pepe Silvia]

Rechanged my mind. To many schools have announced that they will be using all 20.5 million of revenue sharing and are increasing scholarships. Maybe at one point 2.5 million would count against the revenue share cap, but I don't believe that is the case at this time, to many schools have announced increased scholarships and using all 20.5 for revenue share, so I think something has changed. Just read an article on Michigan, their AD said they were increasing some scholarships and budgeting all 20.5 for revenue share.

I'm betting in 3-4 years some schools will be having trouble maintaining that. It's a big commitment for schools who aren't getting nearly as much media revenue as the SEC and Big 10

 

[Stan Raymond]

I'm betting in 3-4 years some schools will be having trouble maintaining that. It's a big commitment for schools who aren't getting nearly as much media revenue as the SEC and Big 10

It's a huge line item in the budget for almost all programs. When you toss in the cost of some additional scholarships and less revenue coming from the conference and NCAA for the backpay, there are a lot of hard choices being made at a lot of schools.

 

[nja13]

Changed my mind yet again. Does look correct. Just read an article that Clemson was going to do just that. Add a whole bunch of scholarships and then have 18 million left for direct payments. Odd way to do it, but Carm does look to be correct.

At least you’re keeping an open mind!

I wonder if that also applies to other sports. If we increase baseball scholarships above 11.7, does that come out of rev sharing also?
I know it says it was capped at 2.5, and I am not sure how many schollies it would take to reach that point.

 

[Stan Raymond]

At least you’re keeping an open mind!

I wonder if that also applies to other sports. If we increase baseball scholarships above 11.7, does that come out of rev sharing also?
I know it says it was capped at 2.5, and I am not sure how many schollies it would take to reach that point.

LOL, just a lot of conflicting information out there. Partially because I think there is real confusion on what all this settlement means and some with just how news is reported now.

The way I currently read it, subject to change, is yes if Nebraska gives baseball more than 11.7 scholarships next year then that comes out of the 20.5 pool of revenue share, until 2.5 million is used on new scholarships. I'm assuming that is just the first year new scholarships are added? But that's just a guess, just can't imagine that being true for every year.

I don't know why the two are mixed up like that as it doesn't make much sense to me, but that does seem to be the way it is written.

 

[PonyBoy]

Alston scholarship was $5,980 per player (per academic year). That's now gone, and quite a few teams used that money to make up for scholarship and/or NIL deficiencies, sometimes both.

So, when the athletic department doesn't increase the scholarship allotment for a sport - and the revenue sharing doesn't make up for the total Alston amount lost - that specific sport is now working with less after the house settlement.

This. Is. Nebraska. Athletics. (Can, or will, this change? It has twice this week alone. We'll find out more in the near future) Piss poor leadership.

 

[nja13]

Alston scholarship was $5,980 per player (per academic year). That's now gone, and quite a few teams used that money to make up for scholarship and/or NIL deficiencies, sometimes both.

So, when the athletic department doesn't increase the scholarship allotment for a sport - and the revenue sharing doesn't make up for the total Alston amount lost - that specific sport is now working with less after the house settlement.

This. Is. Nebraska. Athletics. (Can, or will, this change? It has twice this week alone. We'll find out more in the near future) Piss poor leadership.

Excuse my ignroance. What is an Alston scholarship?

 

[Carm]

Excuse my ignroance. What is an Alston scholarship?

Alston is the Sup Ct case that said so-called amateur status violated anti-trust law.

The $5980 is the living expense stipend schools paid after the decision.

 

[herbsinator]

Alston scholarship was $5,980 per player (per academic year). That's now gone, and quite a few teams used that money to make up for scholarship and/or NIL deficiencies, sometimes both.

So, when the athletic department doesn't increase the scholarship allotment for a sport - and the revenue sharing doesn't make up for the total Alston amount lost - that specific sport is now working with less after the house settlement.

This. Is. Nebraska. Athletics. (Can, or will, this change? It has twice this week alone. We'll find out more in the near future) Piss poor leadership.

This seems like more of a non-football problem. I’ll be real with you, I’d rather see us disband the baseball and wrestling teams if it gave us a better chance at being competitive in football and basketball.

 

[PonyBoy]

This seems like more of a non-football problem. I’ll be real with you, I’d rather see us disband the baseball and wrestling teams if it gave us a better chance at being competitive in football and basketball.

I'll be real with you, you're not a serious person.

 

[ZJSARENOTFREE]

This seems like more of a non-football problem. I’ll be real with you, I’d rather see us disband the baseball and wrestling teams if it gave us a better chance at being competitive in football and basketball.

Agree with this. Stay with the programs that can make money and give your school some clout. As much as I love all Husker sports, winning a baseball or wrestling title doesn't move the needle much nationally. Football and basketball are prominent, the others are a few steps down. Football, Basketball and Volleyball to me should continue to be the focus.