I fundamentally agree with principles behind the ideas that you propose. Why must a semi pro league be associated with any university or institution of education? Makes no sense to call the athletes students and then treat them and make rules as if they are employees of a corporation. They are not employees, they are students.
Yes students play the game, but college football more than nfl derives its immense popularity and loyalty from the educational institution to which ut is tied, not the individual players. Let all the five and four star recruits form a minor league of their own: I’ve asked this before, would anyone watch the south bend Irish comprised of unproven HS athletes?
The athletes are students first then football players. We as a society, especially the educational institutions, must not forget this. These students deserve something, not because they bring in so many dollars but because they dedicate incredible amount of time outside of their studies. I would be in favor of a stipend commensurate with a what a student would make ina work study program. If they weren’t playing, they would be working perhaps as a tutor, in the dining hall, etc. and let’s not forget a full scholarship.
But no wonder the student athletes feel like they are being robbed. All around them are only greedy theives and hustlers known as university administrators. Just look at the move that USC and UCLA is making and tell me that what they are doing benefits the student athletes in any way! It’s in your face I don’t give a shit about the student, STFU we are following the Dollars move. No wonder the students feel like they deserve a piece of the pie.
The Universities must return the profits to where it belongs, education and other non profit sports. Why? Because that is the mission of the university: to foster and develop ALL of its students into productive citizens, which includes majority of the student athletes who will not play professional sports but become nurses, teachers, bankers, entrepreneurs, engineers.
There must be a hard reduction on coaching salary, and by, like, ALOT. And there must be a cap. All sports injury incurred during their school years must be covered, for the rest of their lives. There must be reprimand and penalty for not graduating players.
If we must insist on paying ridiculous amounts to players and coaches then we must separate them from the universities. As another poster mentioned, the universities exist to educate, not run football teams. We must allow HS graduates to opt for a developmental league rather than attend a university and call themselves students. College football will exist as sports played by student athletes and the ‘minor league’ will exist as a professional place of employment. Which one will you watch and invest yourselves?
How can we achieve this? Sadly, I have very little faith that it will ever become again ‘college’ football. Universities crave the dollar like a diver craves oxygen, which leaves only congressional action to right the ship. Only, the characters that comprise the congress may just be worse than leaders of our universities.