What is the NCAA really investigating with Tennessee and Florida State
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00:00 Do you agree? That creates an aspect of NIL that I think many people fall on one side or the other.
00:06 Is NIL pay-for-play? Is it straight up for sponsorships like our man Julian San and Panini America?
00:12 Or is it a mixture of both? Or what is NIL, Mason?
00:17 Well, I mean, I think at the current rate and with the way it has been, it's essentially been a glorified scheme of pay-for-play.
00:24 I don't think that's insane to say given what we have seen players who have not even stepped on the field signing deals and things of that nature.
00:33 But I don't have an issue with that.
00:37 I think it's nothing short of naive to think that college football has been anything but a professional sport in any sense for the last 20 years probably.
00:48 I think the moment you saw 18 to 23 year old kids laying their bodies on the line on ESPN on Saturday, we had gotten well past amateurism.
00:57 So I think this is something that has been in the works for a long time.
01:01 I think this seems like the next logical step.
01:05 This is the NFL light. This is not college football anymore.
01:09 It's not college football. It hasn't been my entire lifetime really.
01:14 I have never seen college football.
01:16 Right, right. You want college athletics, go watch track and field. Go watch swimming and diving.
01:24 I mean, and those athletes are working very, very hard, but those are the more amateur athletes.
01:30 But I think the NCAA is wrong here because I think the NCAA is wrong going after these programs.
01:37 Even though Florida State and Tennessee, Alabama's rival or whatever, I think you're wrong because people want to say,
01:45 "It's pay for play," and you want to say, "Oh, we're giving X recruit X thousands of dollars to sign."
01:52 But you've got to ask yourself, if these players, if these high schoolers weren't valuable, why is anybody going after them?
01:59 Why do they have five stars next to their name? Why do they have four stars next to their name?
02:03 Why do we say, "Oh, I want Billy over Johnny because Billy looks a lot more talented than Johnny does."
02:10 That's already name, image, and likeness that Billy has earned for himself.
02:15 The reason that Nikko Ayamalewa is so valuable as a high school senior is because he has been identified as a special high school prospect.
02:24 And while he didn't earn that name, image, and likeness wearing the Tennessee T, he is a valuable commodity.
02:32 So, while people say, "Oh, that's not true name, image, and likeness. That's not real."
02:37 If I were to be recruited by the University of Alabama, that obviously gives me some sort of cachet, some sort of notoriety.
02:45 And thus, if I say, "Okay, you're recruiting me. I'm a four-star recruit. I might end up with a couple thousand yards receiving or whatever.
02:54 You're going to need to pay me some money."
02:56 I've already built that name, image, and likeness for myself.
02:59 It may not be at the stage where you're at, but you've already built that name, image, and likeness.
03:04 And so, for the NCAA, I just feel like they're chasing their tail here.
03:08 And I just feel like it's a whole big scheme of, "Oh, crap. We let the wild, wild west happen.
03:15 And now we're trying to go after a couple of the bad guys. Bad guys."
03:19 When really, this is how everyone's operating.
03:22 Do.
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