If you thought the NCAA has become a paper tiger as of late, just wait. Once we introduce the ability for athletes to be compensated for their name, image, and/or likeness, there’s going to be a ton of loopholes to sort out.
There’s a lot of smart people trying to run this thing down that will eventually break the code to some degree, but everyone will be dragged through the mud to get there first. There will be some sort of structure of it all, but even as we find out the end game, I’m not sure how you begin to regulate and oversee a pay for play type of model.
The NCAA even admitted it’s still working out the intricate details.
“It’s also really important that in all of this conversation to recognize that what the Board of Governors approve and what the working group put forward is the clear framework within which a lot of detail is still to be developed,” NCAA president Mark Emmert said Wednesday morning. “That’s what the three divisions are working on now. So some of these answers will be ambiguous until all of the details are fleshed down in the coming nine months.”
The NCAA will try its best to come along with where this is going, but it’s going to be a wild ride. Frankly, it’s probably long overdue, but that doesn’t mean it’ll be easy.