The NCAA just picked a fight with the University of Tennessee over NIL. And Tennessee has volunteered for the rest of the country to fight back.
The Vols' response?
The school president wrote a scathing rebuttal on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the attorney generals of the states of Tennessee and Virginia joined together to sue the NCAA over its NIL policy.
The funny thing here is, those attorney generals weren't defending the institutions. No, they were defending the rights of the individuals - the young players - in those states to be able to capitalize on NIL in any way they see fit.
So the state of Tennessee didn't argue NIL for the University of Tennessee. They argued on behalf of the players/recruits.
That may be an end around the NCAA just didn't see coming.
Right now, the NCAA is embroiled in so much litigation. A tweet below details many of them.
My take is this: The NCAA can't get out of its own way fast enough. While well meaning, the current governance was set up for a different era of college sports. Not a bad era, just not the multi-billion dollar one we have today.
Today, the labor should be compensated more equitably. Therein lies the crux of the problem. The NCAA and many of its member institutions don't want to call athletes "labor" because that might jeopardize the schools' tax exempt status.
I don't know the right answer. I don't even know if there is a right answer. The questions and problems are multifaceted.
Someone needs to take the reins soon, or college sports is going to be a muddled mess of epic proportion in two years time.
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