Being a CFB Fan in the Era of NIL

We got a 4-star commitment today.

Not long ago, that news would make my day, or even my week.

Now, I can’t get that excited. The way things are going, I’m not sure how excited I can get about CFB in general.

I’m glad the player is committed. but I think “accepted” is the correct word, as in “the 4-star accepted Nebraska’s compensation offer”.

knowing that the players may have made the decision more based on the size of the check than a desire to be a Husker changes how I look at recruiting, the program and the sport.

Additionally, every recruit that becomes a good CFB player will be an unrestricted free agent every year. So the chances of this commit—that I ’m supposed to be excited about—leaving NU or requiring a salary increase are pretty high, IF he does great things. If he doesn’t do well, then he’s almost certain to leave or get “processed” out. So again, what am I supposed to get excited about?

It’s like everyone that isn’t Ohio State is now a fan of a small-market pro baseball team. But at least MLB has multi-year rookie contracts, so the organization gets some value for developing players. That’s not happening in today’s CFB.

Don’t get me wrong, the players should get paid. But the current system has stripped away much of what makes CFB interesting for some fans IMO.

Maybe I’m old fashioned, but I liked it when the players who chose to attend my favorite school defeated a team of players that chose to play for another school.

that was the draw for me. I’m still a Husker fan, but when we beat a team with a “salary” that’s 80% smaller than ours, what is there to be proud of?

I know the inequity always existed, but I could tell myself that the reason we had a bigger budget for facilities and greater tv exposure was based on a history of success. So the advantage had a connection to something inherent on the program that was more admirable than the ability to write bigger checks to better players.

And when we lose to a team with a player salary twice as big as ours, what does that mean? A loss used to mean that the program had to strive to get better. Thats a goal I can support.

But now the lesson from most CFB game results will be school “money wins.

It won’t mean anything about the inherent skills or virtues of the winning or losing schools, programs, coaches, communities or fans.

Rain is wet. The sky is blue. Money wins.

Should we devote our fall Saturdays to simply observing these truths play out?

Some drama and/or narratives a bit more compelling might be preferable.

Those elements could only return to the sport if they organize CFB into divisions based on TV revenue and enforce revenue sharing and a divisional cap on each school’s team salary.

That’s the only way to make the sport an athletic competition between players that chose to attend and represent their respective schools. It will never be amateur athletics, but it could at least be college athletics again.

I’m not holding my breath. And I’m not that excited about recruiting news either.