A new federal bill introduced Thursday would make it illegal for the NCAA or other university sports associations to place any restrictions on the type or size of approval agreements university athletes can sign in the future.
The bill, co-authored by Senator Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut) and Representative Lori Trahan (D-Massachusetts), is the latest in a series of proposed national laws aimed at helping college athletes make money and a multi-billion dollar college sports industry that, according to several members of Congress, is fundamentally unfair. This proposal is so far the only option that Congress, the NCAA or any other governing body cannot help determine which products athletes can endorse.
“Big-time sports college athletics look no different than professional leagues, and it’s time we stop denying the right of college athletes to make money from their talents,” Murphy said. . “If predominantly white coaches and NCAA executives can have unhindered underwriting agreements, why would not mainly black athletes get the same opportunity?”
The new bill also specifically prohibits the NCAA or conferences from doing anything that could prevent athletes from organizing under collective representation to sell their licensing rights as a group. These types of group licenses are usually required to bargain for media rights, jersey sales and items such as video games, such as the university football game that EA Sports announced earlier this week that it intends to revive.
The NCAA has so far been opposed to the possibility of athletes organizing for any type of group licensing activity.
NCAA President Mark Emmert and other university sports leaders have asked Congress to help create national uniform rules that determine how athletes can benefit from their names, images and parables (NIL). The leaders want the ability to create ‘backrests’ that, according to them, will prevent NIL payments from becoming thin salaries that cross the line between amateurism and professional sports.
Murphy and Trahan, who played volleyball at Georgetown, believe the NCAA has long crossed the line in professionalism.
“As a former Division I athlete, I am all too familiar with the NCAA’s business model that for decades used the guise of amateurism to justify obscene profitability while student athletes struggled to make ends meet,” Trahan said in a statement Thursday said.
Murphy told ESPN that he believes Congress is unlikely to act on university sports legislation in the first six months of the year. This makes it likely that some NIL laws will come into force before a national plan is put in place.
Florida has already passed a law that would make the current NCAA rules illegal in the state from July 1st. Four other states are also considering legislation that will come into force at the same time.
The NCAA argued that a variety of state laws, many of which have unique differences, would create a chaotic environment where schools operate under different rules and prospective athletes might choose their schools based on the state that gives them the best chance of making money in to earn. on underwriting transactions.
The association has stated its intention to amend its own rules in October 2019. However, they missed a deadline they imposed on themselves to vote on the proposed changes last month, and it is not clear when they will move forward. The most recent NCAA proposal was significantly more restrictive for athletes than most legal options in the state.
“I did not want to support what the NCAA did, and therefore I do not shed any tears over the NCAA’s decision to postpone,” Murphy told ESPN. “They would never be able to handle it. I think there is an argument for enforcing the various state laws so we can see if the air falls as the NCAA says it will.”
The bill introduced by Murphy and Trahan will be considered along with other legislation, offering a variety of options for how deeply Congress will become involved in shaping the future of university sports.
Democratic senators Cory Booker and Richard Blumenthal introduced a bill in December calling for comprehensive changes that go beyond compensation and NIL rights. Republican senators Roger Wicker and Marco Rubio have each proposed bills that provide more room for NCAA leaders to determine what restrictions are needed to preserve amateurism in college sports. Rep. Anthony Gonzalez (R-Ohio) also submitted a detailed proposal that would open the door for NIL payments while creating restrictions on what type of products athletes can endorse.
The Murphy and Trahan Bill also states that all services that a school or conference provides to athletes to help them make the most of their NIL potential should be available to all athletes. In other words, if a school hires a consultant to help build the brands of its football stars, all other athletes at the school should be given the same opportunity.
The bill also calls for an annual report, funded by the federal government, to determine how much money university athletes earn from approval transactions and to divide the data by race, gender and sport to analyze the market.