By Kalena Reynolds | Staff Writer
After a historic approval of the House v. NCAA settlement was inked on Monday, the pen continued writing history with the introduction of a new bill in the House of Representatives that has the potential to change the trajectory of college athletics forever.
Filed by Rep. Michael Baumgartner (R-WA), the Restore College Sports Act would completely wipe away the landscape of the NCAA and replace it with the American College Sports Association.
The bill also proposes that NIL funds be distributed “equally among all student-athletes of such institutions within the ACSA.” It also suggests athletes would share money from sports broadcasts equally.
Aside from the financial aspect, the ACSA would also remove the transfer policy to essentially allow athletes to transfer without restriction or penalty.
On the same note, the bill also says conferences should be transformed to include teams that fit into the same time zone, stating that “travel and academic reasoning” would be at the forefront.
Moving away from athletes and looking more at the coaching side, the bill also restricts coaching salaries, with a maximum annual salary to not exceed “10 times the full cost of attendance at such institution.”
While Baumgartner’s intentions for the bill are to reintroduce “school spirit, fair competition” and prioritize student-athletes, the problem lies within the clauses’ objectivity and the circumstances’ subjectivity.
Applying a one-size-fits-all solution to financial or athletic disparity is merely compromising the integrity of athletics and removing individual opportunities for players. If every college charged the same tuition and every sport earned the same revenue, the ACSA would be significantly more applicable, but it isn’t.
Baumgartner said in a press release his priorities were to protect academic integrity and restore security within athletics.
“Congress has a choice: step in and restore order — or let small schools fold, non-revenue sports vanish and college sports become a monopoly for the few,” Baumgartner said.
While at first glance this bill could seem to bring stability to a rapidly changing space, the truth is it brings a false illusion of control, specifically relating to athlete profitability as well as transfer policy.
If this bill were passed, the point of the recently passed House v. NCAA would essentially be put to waste, as well as all other work toward NIL and financial-related subjects. On the other side of the spectrum, eliminating transfer restrictions is confusing and negates the punch line of the bill.
Baumgartner is insinuating “integrity” will be brought back into college athletics via a form of federalization; letting athletes transfer at any point without boundaries is a complete juxtaposition from the financial clauses and will strip away athlete and college loyalty.
NIL funds are based on the individual, and this bill infringes on an athlete’s abilities to profit from their talent and hard work, ultimately moving the peg back to square one. This sort of reassessment could also significantly impact walk-ons and shift college recruitment to looking at what players will bring in the most money — already a polarizing flaw plaguing college athletics.
This could also result in a cut in lower-revenue sports and a reduction of recruiting opportunities. Under the bill, athletes would no longer be able to be compensated for improvement, passion or financial need.
This bill has completely missed the board in what seems like a drunken attempt to throw a dart at a wall. Between losing athlete loyalty by eliminating the transfer policy and restricting athletes’ ability to profit off NIL in college, it creates more problems for both players and universities.
