The college football landscape is definitely changing. If we, as fans have been paying attention over the last couple of years, we're starting to notice that it's a different landscape than it was 10 years ago...
There has been a lot of talk out there about all of the changes that are here in college football and the ones that are coming pro and against and the prevalent feeling is mixed in my view...
There is 3 basic aspects of this change that I want to screw down on and try to answer the question... Is the game that we've come to love, gonna be okay...
The first aspect comes in 2 parts, and that's the advent of the Transfer Portal & Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) and the impact that brings...
The "portal", as we all know now at this point, allows the player to transfer schools and still be eligible to play without sitting out a year. That player can immediately play for his or her new school without penalty.
The Name, Image, and Likeness or the NIL, allows the player to profit off his own image and Likeness, and allows the player to make endorsement deals and profit off his name. The impact this these two bring is the ability to be "sold" to the highest bidder. Although, schools are now setting aside money for the NIL, it's always been the boosters and alumni that drives the money...
With no clear regulations, the major schools will get all of the talent, and the sport will become nothing more than the "minor league" of pro football...
With those two aspects now being a part of college football's reality today, that just makes room for the next part of this thought, and that is..
Conference Realignment...
With the movement of not only players, but coaches too going to different schools and going to the schools that are going to pay out more and/or give them the best opportunity to build their platform grow, it only stands to reason that the more lucrative schools ("Blue Bloods") will get the lion's share of all the coaching & player talent. Those schools are getting all kinds of funds, mainly from the massive television deals that not only go to the schools, but also the conferences.
So the major schools are naturally going to want to go where the money is at so college president's and athletic directors are going to make the decision to leave a conference that they been in for decades, if not their whole entire existence and go to a conference that they can get a bigger payday for the school and a chance to compete at a higher level....
Especially if the team has the talent.....
Which all comes down to this third aspect....
The College Football Playoff System...
Or... the 12 team playoff, which by the way will expand to 16 teams in the next year or so. There's some gripe about this as well and we'll cover that on another day. I personally like the idea of a playoff like tournament for major college football and if it wasn't for the first two aspects of the change in college football, I don't think we would even be in this space right now talking about a playoff tournament for the National Championship, but with players moving within teams and conferences, profiting off their name, image, and likeness and the overall talent in the coaching community as well as players at are coming up with television deals that spans the tens of millions, the expansion of the National Championship just makes sense at this point, because as stated before, this is a BILLION dollar sport..
So... to answer the stated question : Is College Football going to be okay? I'm going to say...... Yes, it's going to be okay. I feel that it's even going to thrive. Right now, it feels like it's getting away from us and it's like a runaway train, but there are too many fans that simply loves this sport too much to just let it come crashing down.
I see regulations coming for the NIL along with sensible limits on how and when schools and conferences administer the transactions in the Transfer Portal....
And we'll all enjoy the new College Football Playoff format as the years go by and even get used to the expansion of it too...
It's all going to be okay..
