College sports are about to change in a big way.
As part of a settlement of three antitrust lawsuits last week, the NCAA committed to allowing schools to share revenue with their athletes beginning in 2025, ending the NCAA’s longstanding ban on schools paying athletes.
We spend this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays discussing why it was time for the NCAA to embrace revenue sharing, how the change could impact Ohio State, the lingering questions that remain unanswered and why the model created by the settlement is more likely to be a temporary fix than a permanent solution.
The full rundown for this week’s conversation:
- 1:57: We didn’t necessarily expect it to come this quickly, but revenue sharing was inevitable
- 5:45: It’s both a huge change for the NCAA and a natural evolution of what was happening with NIL
- 9:43: Players’ “salaries” should be coming from school revenues, not fan donations
- 12:26: Bringing collectives in-house could give the NCAA another chance to regulate NIL
- 15:58: Like it or not, college sports are gradually becoming more and more like professional sports
- 19:10: Ohio State will have to share a far smaller piece of its pie than most other schools
- 21:37: From a roster-building standpoint, Ohio State would benefit if there was no sharing cap
- 23:29: Revenue cap could increase gap between OSU basketball and basketball-first schools
- 30:28: Should OSU keep all 36 sports if it can’t fund all 36 at a championship-contending level?
- 33:37: OSU will need donors to fund smaller sports, but football can’t subsidize 34 sports anymore
- 35:43: Should Title IX apply when football and men’s basketball generate most of the revenue?
- 40:12: Ohio State should look for ways to generate more revenue from other sports
- 42:12: Will the NCAA’s efforts to regulate revenue sharing be more successful than it’s been with NIL?
- 45:10: The new revenue-sharing model isn’t likely to be a permanent solution
- 46:14: Collective bargaining is necessary to create a long-term system that works for everyone
You can watch this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays in the video at the top of the page, listen to it in the audio player below or stream it on your podcast-listening platform of choice (Spotify, Apple Podcasts).
