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Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Why Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti sees 'a lot uncertainty' in collegiate athletics
BORDEN — Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti is eager for some clarity from the governing bodies of college athletics. He anticipates the House v. NCAA settlement to move forward in the coming weeks, but told reporters during an appearance at the athletic department's annual booster dinner at Huber's Orchard & Winery that the coming revenue-sharing framework and NIL clearinghouse won't solve all the issues plaguing collegiate athletics. Advertisement "We need regulation, we need rules, so that we all can plan and do what we are hired to do cause right now there's just a lot of uncertainty," Cignetti said. "How many portal windows are there going to be? When are they going to be? And I could go on and on. We got to get the industry fixed, the game is great. We got to get the industry fixed." The final approval of the settlement won't do much to impact IU football's day-to-day operations. Much of the Power Four was already operating under the proposed revenue-sharing framework back when the portal opened in December. "There was a lot of front-loading of NIL deals, people trying to make transactions before the rev-share did pass because of the NIL Go will go into effect immediately," Cignetti said. "That created a bit of a different world and some anxiety, a little more anxiety than normal." Cignetti is more concerned about the lack of clarity on the other major topics impacting collegiate athletics including the transfer portal and eligibility rules. Advertisement He circled back to the topic when he talked about IU's 2026 signing class. The class currently features nine verbal commitments — Cignetti hinted that there's more to come — but he's still not sure how many players the Hoosiers will take thanks to the lack of overall clarity with the portal windows. "If I just knew when the portal date would be, and what the portal pool would look like, I could figure out whether we are taking 20 or 17 high school guys relative to what our team needs look like next year," Cignetti said. "Right now it's hard to plan cause we can't get any answers." More: Ranking Indiana football's top 5 position groups after spring practice Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti isn't interested in wading into College Football Playoff debate Twelve teams? Sixteen teams? How many automatic bids should each conference get? Should their be automatic bids at all? Advertisement The discussion about the format for the College Football Playoff in coming years has taken center stage at the SEC Meetings this week in Destin, Fla., with commissioner Greg Sankey along with the conference's athletic directors and coaches all weighing in. Cignetti wasn't interested in adding his voice to the growing chorus of opinions on how things should be structured. "I've been part of all the different formats, D2 and FCS, at the end of the day there's one team standing whether you start with 64 or eight — there's going to be one standing at the end, no matter what the number is, somebody is going to feel bad that they got left out," Cignetti said with a smirk. "That's just the way it works, you can't make everyone happy." The closest Cignetti got to weighing in was admitting he likes the tweaks the committee made for next year that include removing the automatic byes for conference champions and goes to a straight seeding format. Advertisement "The straight seeding is a good thing, would have been nice to have that last year and had a home game, 12 and a half point favorite," Cignetti said. "We were still in control of our own destiny and didn't get the job done. If you pinned me down, I'd probably have an opinion, but it's not worth stating." Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek and read all his coverage by clicking here. This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti: Collegiate athletics in desperate need of better regulation
San Francisco Chronicle
29-05-2025
- Business
- San Francisco Chronicle
College sports lurches forward, hoping to find a level playing field with fewer lawsuits
MIRAMAR BEACH, Fla. (AP) — On the one hand, what this new version of cash-infused college sports needs are rules that everybody follows. On the other, they need to be able to enforce those rules without getting sued into oblivion. Enter the College Sports Commission, a newly created operation that will be in charge of counting the money, deciding what a 'fair market' deal for players looks like and, if things go well, helping everyone in the system avoid trips to court whenever a decision comes down that someone doesn't like. With name, image, likeness payments taking over in college, this group will essentially become what the NCAA committee on infractions used to be – the college sports police, only with the promise of being faster, maybe fairer and maybe more transparent. In a signal of what the CSC's most serious mission might be, the schools from the four biggest conferences are being asked to sign a document pledging not to rely on state laws – some of which are more permissive of payments to players -- to work around the rules the commission is making. 'We need to get out of this situation where something happens, and we run to our attorney general and file suit,' said Trev Alberts of Texas A&M, one of 10 athletic directors who are part of another group, the Settlement Implementation Committee, that is helping oversee the transition. 'That chaos isn't sustainable. You're looking for a durable system that actually has some stability and ultimate fairness.' Number crunching to figure out what's fair The first, and presumably more straightforward, is data being compiled by LBi Software, which will track how much schools are spending on every athlete, up to the $20.5 million cap each is allowed to distribute in the first year of the new arrangement expected to begin July 1. This sounds easy but comes with the assumption that universities – which, for decades, have sought to eke out every edge they can, rulebook or no – will provide accurate data. 'Over history, boosters have looked for ways to give their schools an advantage,' said Gabe Feldman, a sports law professor at Tulane. 'I think that will continue even with the settlement. It's anyone's guess as to how that manifests, and what the new competitive landscape looks like.' Adding some level of transparency to the process, along with the CSC's ability to deliver sanctions if it identifies cheaters, will be key to the new venture's success. 'There's legal risk that prohibits you from doing that,' Alberts said. 'But we want to start as transparent as we can be, because we think it engenders trust.' Good intentions aside, Alberts concedes, 'I don't think it's illogical to think that, at first, it's probably going to be a little wonky.' How much should an endorsement deal be worth? Some of the wonkiest bookkeeping figures to come from the second category of number crunching, and that involves third-party NIL deals. The CSC hired Deloitte to run a so-called clearinghouse called 'NIL Go," which will be in charge of evaluating third-party deals worth $600 or more. Because these deals aren't allowed to pay players simply for playing – that's still technically forbidden in college sports -- but instead for some service they provide (an endorsement, a social media shoutout and so forth), every deal needs to be evaluated to show it is worth a fair price for what the player is doing. In a sobering revelation, Deloitte shared with sports leaders earlier this month that around 70% of third-party deals given to players since NIL became allowable in 2021 would have been denied by the new clearinghouse. All these valuations, of course, are subject to interpretation. It's much easier to set the price of a stock, or a bicycle, than the value of an athlete's endorsement deal. This is where things figure to get dicey. Though the committee has an appeals process, then an arbitration process, ultimately, some of these cases are destined to be challenged in court. 'You're just waiting to see, what is a 'valid business purpose' (for an NIL deal), and what are the guidelines around that?" said Rob Lang, a business litigation partner at Thompson Coburn who deals with sports cases. 'You can see all the lawyer fights coming out of that.' Avoiding court, coordinating state laws are new priorities In fact, elements of all this are ripe to be challenged in court, which might explain why the power conferences drafted the document pledging fealty to the new rules in the first place. For instance, Feldman called a law recently enacted in Tennessee viewed by many as the most athlete-friendly statute in the country 'the next step in the evolution" of state efforts to bar the NCAA from limiting NIL compensation for athletes with an eye on winning battles for recruits and retaining roster talent. 'What we've seen over the last few years is states trying to one-up each other to make their institutions more attractive places for people to go," he said. 'This is the next iteration of that. It may set up a showdown between the schools, the NCAA and the states.' Greg Sankey, the commissioner of the Southeastern Conference, said a league spanning 12 states cannot operate well if all those states have different rules about how and when it is legal to pay players. The SEC has been drafting legislation for states to pass to unify the rules across the conference. Ultimately, Sankey and a lot of other people would love to see a national law passed by Congress that does that for all states and all conferences. That will take months, if not years, which is why the new committee drafted the document for the schools to sign. 'We are all defendant schools and conferences and you inherently agree to this,' Alberts said of the document. 'I sat in the room with all of our football coaches, 'Do you want to be governed?' The answer is 'yes.''
Indianapolis Star
29-05-2025
- Business
- Indianapolis Star
'Get the industry fixed': Why Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti wants 'regulation, rules'
BORDEN — Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti is eager for some clarity from the governing bodies of college athletics. He anticipates the House v. NCAA settlement to move forward in the coming weeks, but told reporters Wednesday during an appearance at the athletic department's annual booster dinner at Huber's Orchard that the coming revenue-sharing framework and NIL clearinghouse won't solve all the issues plaguing collegiate athletics. "We need regulation, we need rules, so that we all can plan and do what we are hired to do cause right now there's just a lot of uncertainty," Cignetti said. "How many (transfer) portal windows are there going to be? When are they going to be? And I could go on and on. We got to get the industry fixed, the game is great. We got to get the industry fixed." The final approval of the settlement won't do much to impact IU football's day-to-day operations. Much of the Power Four was already operating under the proposed revenue-sharing framework back when the portal opened in December. "There was a lot of front-loading of NIL deals, people trying to make transactions before the rev-share did pass because of the NIL Go will go into effect immediately," Cignetti said. "That created a bit of a different world and some anxiety, a little more anxiety than normal." Cignetti is more concerned about the lack of clarity on the other major topics impacting collegiate athletics, including the transfer portal and eligibility rules. He circled back to the topic when he talked about IU's 2026 signing class. The class currently features nine verbal commitments — Cignetti hinted that there's more to come — but he's still not sure how many players the Hoosiers will take thanks to the lack of overall clarity with the portal windows. "If I just knew when the portal date would be, and what the portal pool would look like, I could figure out whether we are taking 20 or 17 high school guys relative to what our team needs look like next year," Cignetti said. "Right now it's hard to plan cause we can't get any answers." Insider: How 'Operation Bigfoot' brought Hoosier the bison back to life. Why IU finds value in mascot Twelve teams? Sixteen teams? How many automatic bids should each conference get? Should their be automatic bids at all? The discussion about the format for the College Football Playoff in coming years has taken center stage at the SEC Meetings this week in Destin, Florida, with commissioner Greg Sankey along with the conference's athletic directors and coaches all weighing in. Cignetti wasn't interested in adding his voice to the growing chorus of opinions on how things should be structured. "I've been part of all the different formats, DII and FCS, at the end of the day there's one team standing whether you start with 64 or eight — there's going to be one standing at the end, no matter what the number is, somebody is going to feel bad that they got left out," Cignetti said with a smirk. "That's just the way it works, you can't make everyone happy." Also in Borden: Will Luke Goode, Anthony Leal play for IU basketball next season? Where eligibility stands The closest Cignetti got to weighing in was admitting he likes the tweaks the committee made for next year that include removing the automatic byes for conference champions and goes to a straight seeding format. "The straight seeding is a good thing, would have been nice to have that last year and had a home game, 12 and a half point favorite," Cignetti said. "We were still in control of our own destiny and didn't get the job done. If you pinned me down, I'd probably have an opinion, but it's not worth stating."
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Will NIL deals be better regulated in the future? 'At the end of the day, we're all looking for a competitive advantage'
MIRAMAR BEACH, Fla. — Along a carpeted hallway within the Sandestin Hilton, Brian Kelly is mid-conversation when a man interjects. 'Hey,' the man said toward the LSU football coach, 'you asked great questions today during our presentation!' The man continued onward, leading a team of about a half-dozen people through the lobby of this place. They are members of the Deloitte leadership and implementation team operating college sports' new NIL clearinghouse dubbed 'NIL Go.' Presenting in front of SEC coaches here on Tuesday — a question-and-answer session too — Deloitte representatives walked them through the intricacies and concepts of the much-ballyhooed clearinghouse, the industry's new, somewhat controversial method to prohibit booster payments to athletes. While the presentation garnered rave reviews, uncertainty and doubt still lingers from coaches and others on the clearinghouse's legal sustainability and enforcement method. There's so much uncertainty, says Georgia coach Kirby Smart, that some schools are promising high school recruits and transferring players third-party NIL deals as part of their compensation package despite an important fact: None of those deals can be approved by a clearinghouse that hasn't fully launched. But more concerning, says Smart, is that some school-affiliated, booster collectives are currently compensating high school players — upwards of $20,000 a month — to remain committed and eventually sign with their school. 'Teams that are unusually good at recruiting right now are doing it. Kids are getting money, but if you decommit, you owe that money back,' Smart said. 'These are high school kids getting money from an entity not affiliated with the university but is a collective of the university.' Pressed to identify the schools, Smart said none of them are in the SEC, but the schools 'are signing kids [to contracts] right now and paying upfront through an outside collective.' It is the latest maneuver from athletic departments to take advantage of this murky, unregulated space as college sports transitions the way in which it compensates athletes — from booster-backed collectives to direct school revenue sharing, a move scheduled to be finalized July 1 if the House settlement is approved. In the meantime, it is a free-for-all. But not for long, says Kelly. Three days after the settlement is approved — if it is approved — the 'NIL Go' clearinghouse is expected to begin processing athlete NIL contracts. Athletes must submit to the clearinghouse all deals valued at more than $600. Deloitte is using a fair market value algorithm to create a 'compensation range' for NIL deals to assure they are not the fabricated contracts that boosters have struck with athletes for years. Smart expects a 'mass run' on submissions to the clearinghouse from schools attempting to test the entity to determine just 'how much can I get outside the cap,' he said. 'Every team is going to put pressure on Deloitte to say, 'I need to know! I'm promising this money outside of the cap!'' Smart told Yahoo Sports. It could get tricky. The officials from the Deloitte-run clearinghouse 'NIL Go' — the centerpiece of the new enforcement entity, dubbed the 'College Sports Commission' — is sharing data with coaches and athletic directors, including that 70% of past deals from booster collectives would have been denied. Deloitte also shared that about 80% of NIL deals with public companies were valued at less than $10,000 and 99% of those deals were valued at less than $100,000 — figures that suggest the clearinghouse threatens to significantly curtail the millions of dollars that collectives are distributing to athletes. 'If you got some mucky deals going on right now, you'd better be careful,' warned Kelly. 'These deals have got to be for a valid business purpose. A lot of [previous] deals would have never gotten through.' Even some of those currently being promised to recruits are at risk of rejection by the clearinghouse, coaches and administrators tell Yahoo Sports. For example, schools are guaranteeing to recruits that a portion of their compensation will be derived from third-party deals. An example of this might be a school guaranteeing a player an entire compensation package of $500,000: $300,000 from the school in revenue share plus $200,000 more in third-party endorsement deals that would, presumably, not count against a school's revenue-share cap. What if these third-party deals don't get approved? 'That's a risk,' Smart told Yahoo Sports. 'Schools are going to either default on a contract, or have lied, or have been right and they gain a player for it.' Such a contract is actually prohibited by new rules. Administrators learned of that during a call with House implementation committee members earlier this spring. No third-party NIL deals — including those from multi-media rights companies, apparel brands and corporate sponsors — can be guaranteed to athletes as part of their revenue-sharing contracts from schools. However, uncertainty still lingers about all of this. Many legal experts believe that the clearinghouse concept will trigger a bevy of legal challenges, but Texas A&M athletic director Trev Alberts believes in the new entity. He is one of 10 administrators from the Big Ten, Big 12, ACC, SEC and Pac-12 on the implementation committee. 'The reality is not a lot of people understand it or know about it, which leaves them to [say], 'It won't work!' 'It won't be fair!' 'They don't know what they're doing!'' Alberts said from meetings on Tuesday. 'The system has to be given a chance.' For now, the system cannot formally launch until a decision from a California judge is made over the House settlement. A decision to approve or deny the settlement has, for nearly two weeks, been in the hands of Judge Claudia Wilken. She's on her own timeline. Meanwhile, Alberts acknowledges the jockeying from schools in an attempt to exceed the cap with third-party contracts. 'Everybody is trying to figure out fair market value NIL,' he said. 'At the end of the day, we're all looking for a competitive advantage. What is real is you have rev-share amount and scholarship amount, but what is undefined is how much fair market value deals can you get through NIL Go. 'The institutions most successful in getting that done, if you can organically grow your cap by $3-5 million per institution, you have more resources as others.' An affiliation agreement being circulated throughout the power conferences requires schools to abide by the new enforcement rules, even if their state law contradicts them, and waives their right to sue over enforcement decisions. The agreement aims to, above all, protect the clearinghouse's decisions, exempting it from lawsuits from schools and preventing those schools from circumventing the settlement's compensation cap through affiliated entities such as collectives. Alberts calls the agreement 'critically important.' 'We are all defendant schools and conferences and you inherently agree to this,' he said. 'I sat in the room with all of our football coaches, 'Do you want to be governed?' The answer is yes.'
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Will NIL deals be better regulated in the future? 'At the end of the day, we're all looking for a competitive advantage'
MIRAMAR BEACH, Fla. — Along a carpeted hallway within the Sandestin Hilton, Brian Kelly is mid-conversation when a man interjects. 'Hey,' the man said toward the LSU football coach, 'you asked great questions today during our presentation!' The man continued onward, leading a team of about a half-dozen people through the lobby of this place. They are members of the Deloitte leadership and implementation team operating college sports' new NIL clearinghouse dubbed 'NIL Go.' Advertisement Presenting in front of SEC coaches here on Tuesday — a question-and-answer session too — Deloitte representatives walked them through the intricacies and concepts of the much-ballyhooed clearinghouse, the industry's new, somewhat controversial method to prohibit booster payments to athletes. While the presentation garnered rave reviews, uncertainty and doubt still lingers from coaches and others on the clearinghouse's legal sustainability and enforcement method. There's so much uncertainty, says Georgia coach Kirby Smart, that some schools are promising high school recruits and transferring players third-party NIL deals as part of their compensation package despite an important fact: None of those deals can be approved by a clearinghouse that hasn't fully launched. But more concerning, says Smart, is that some school-affiliated, booster collectives are currently compensating high school players — upwards of $20,000 a month — to remain committed and eventually sign with their school. Advertisement 'Teams that are unusually good at recruiting right now are doing it. Kids are getting money, but if you decommit, you owe that money back,' Smart said. 'These are high school kids getting money from an entity not affiliated with the university but is a collective of the university.' Pressed to identify the schools, Smart said none of them are in the SEC, but the schools 'are signing kids (to contracts) right now and paying upfront through an outside collective.' It is the latest maneuver from athletic departments to take advantage of this murky, unregulated space as college sports transitions the way in which it compensates athletes — from booster-backed collectives to direct school revenue sharing, a move scheduled to be finalized July 1 if the House settlement is approved. In the meantime, it is a free-for-all. But not for long, says Kelly. College sports' new NIL clearinghouse will be charged with ensuring deals involving players are legit. (Getty creative image) (zimmytws via Getty Images) Three days after the settlement is approved — if it is approved — the 'NIL Go' clearinghouse is expected to begin processing athlete NIL contracts. Athletes must submit to the clearinghouse all deals valued at more than $600. Deloitte is using a fair market value algorithm to create a 'compensation range' for NIL deals to assure they are not the fabricated contracts that boosters have struck with athletes now for years. Advertisement Smart expects a 'mass run' on submissions to the clearinghouse from schools attempting to test the entity to determine just 'how much can I get outside the cap,' he said. 'Every team is going to put pressure on Deloitte to say, 'I need to know! I'm promising this money outside of the cap!'' Smart told Yahoo Sports. It could get tricky. The officials from the Deloitte-run clearinghouse 'NIL Go' — the centerpiece of the new enforcement entity, dubbed the 'College Sports Commission' — is sharing data with coaches and athletic directors, including that 70% of past deals from booster collectives would have been denied. Deloitte also shared that about 80% of NIL deals with public companies were valued at less than $10,000 and 99% of those deals were valued at less than $100,000 — figures that suggest the clearinghouse threatens to significantly curtail the millions of dollars that collectives are distributing to athletes. Advertisement 'If you got some mucky deals going on right now, you'd better be careful,' warned Kelly. 'These deals have got to be for a valid business purpose. A lot of (previous) deals would have never gotten through.' Even some of those currently being promised to recruits are at risk of rejection by the clearinghouse, coaches and administrators tell Yahoo Sports. For example, schools are guaranteeing to recruits that a portion of their compensation will be derived from third-party deals. An example of this might be a school guaranteeing a player an entire compensation package of $500,000: $300,000 from the school in revenue share plus $200,000 more in third-party endorsement deals that would, presumably, not count against a school's revenue-share cap. What if these third-party deals don't get approved? 'That's a risk,' Smart told Yahoo Sports. 'Schools are going to either default on a contract, or have lied, or have been right and they gain a player for it.' Advertisement Such a contract is actually prohibited by new rules. Administrators learned of that during a call with House implementation committee members earlier this spring. No third-party NIL deals — including those from multi-media rights companies, apparel brands and corporate sponsors — can be guaranteed to athletes as part of their revenue-sharing contracts from schools. However, uncertainty still lingers about all of this. Many legal experts believe that the clearinghouse concept will trigger a bevy of legal challenges, but Texas A&M athletic director Trev Alberts believes in the new entity. He is one of 10 administrators from the Big Ten, Big 12, ACC, SEC and Pac-12 on the implementation committee. 'The reality is not a lot of people understand it or know about it, which leaves them to (say), 'It won't work!' 'It won't be fair!' 'They don't know what they're doing!'' Alberts said from meetings on Tuesday. 'The system has to be given a chance.' Advertisement For now, the system cannot formally launch until a decision from a California judge over the House settlement. A decision to approve or deny the settlement has, for nearly two weeks, been in the hands of Judge Claudia Wilken. She's on her own timeline. Meanwhile, Alberts acknowledges the jockeying from schools in an attempt to exceed the cap with third-party contracts. 'Everybody is trying to figure out fair market value NIL,' he said. 'At the end of the day, we're all looking for a competitive advantage. What is real is you have rev-share amount and scholarship amount, but what is undefined is how much fair market value deals can you get through NIL Go. Advertisement 'The institutions most successful in getting that done, if you can organically grow your cap by $3-5 million per institution, you have more resources as others.' An affiliation agreement being circulated throughout the power conferences requires schools to abide by the new enforcement rules, even if their state law contradicts them, and waives their right to sue over enforcement decisions. The agreement aims to, above all, protect the clearinghouse's decisions, exempting it from lawsuits from schools and preventing those schools from circumventing the settlement's compensation cap through affiliated entities such as collectives. Alberts calls the agreement 'critically important.' 'We are all defendant schools and conferences and you inherently agree to this,' he said. 'I sat in the room with all of our football coaches, 'Do you want to be governed?' The answer is yes.'
