In 1972, scientist Philip Merilees asked a convention, “Does the flap of a butterly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?” The “butterfly effect” he coined refers to any seemingly insignificant change that sets off a chain of events of ever-increasing magnitude. College football—and even college athletics in general—may have experienced its own flapping wings this week, as major scholarship reforms were approved.
Usually mired in red tape, the NCAA moved swiftly and monumentally to pass numerous arms of agenda. The most significant were multiple-year scholarships (which discourage unscrupulous coaches pushing underachievers off their rosters and off their campuses to make way for younger and more promising talent) and “cost of attendance” scholarships. Abandoning single-year scholarships will help virtuous programs (like Penn State) gain a more level playing field with notorious “oversigners” (see the guilty parties). But the $2,000 yearly stipend will have more far-reaching effects on college athletics.
The cost-of-attendance push began last off-season as BCS conferences sought to fight back against the nagging grievances of the smaller schools trying to gain a greater piece of the college sports pie. By pushing through legislation that gave them the “choice” to pay athletes more, the BCS conferences were really trying to make the playing field less level.
Helping their cause in the realm of public opinion was the snowball of scandal that started with A.J. Green and Cam Newton last season and grew monstrous with school-wide epidemics at Ohio State and Miami. The public thinks athletes deserve more, and so the BCS schools magnanimously (wink, wink) agreed to share.
The Ever-Benevolent NCAA
Only, in the long run, the new rule has nothing to do with generosity. No, this move will eventually create a league of college football that includes about 70 or so teams. The smaller schools might still have football, but they’ll no longer be mentioned in the same breath as the big boys.
And if you’re a fan of the big boys—which, as a reader of this Penn State blog, you probably are—this is a good thing for you. Yes, the widening gap of the haves and the have nots is going to be a great thing for college football.
College football is a product that’s as hot as ever (even if TV numbers are down a bit), yet the casual fan only wants to see about thirty of the teams play. The other 90 (of the 120 current FBS teams) are—in business terms—dead weight, carried along by the star power of the rest.
How does $2,000 create a rift between big-time and small-potatoes college football teams?
Two thousand per athlete might not seem like a big deal. It’s surely not enough to curb the corruption at the highest levels of the sport. But to a teenager who might be financially strapped, it might be the difference between going to Penn State and Temple.
The extra two grand won’t kill off the Boise States and Temples as significant competitors immediately, but it will wear them down. Most football programs aren’t operating in the black to begin with, so adding a million dollars or two to the expenditures of the athletic department would cripple a school. As the cream rises to the top over the next few years, a natural division will occur. I proposed previously what that might look like; I now humbly admit I have no idea what the final split will look like.
The Coming Split
The “elite schools” will be paid heftily by TV networks to play each other for most of their games, cutting out more opportunities for the little guys. TV money will trump the “home game” money that major schools currently gather by scheduling cupcakes out-of-conference. The larger TV payments will then make the rift even larger between the “two-grand schools” and the “old scholarship” schools.
(The same result will occur for minor sports as well, perhaps in an even more pronounced way. If the smaller schools get less money for football overall, they might not be able to support as many sports due to Title IX. If there are less scholarships for small sports available, that will push more talent to the elite and “better paying” schools.)
Eventually, there will be a few major conferences that constitute a “major league” of college football. The others will be relegated to the minors. I doubt minor teams will be forbidden from playing the big boys, but I could see a scenario where only one game per year is allowed between, let’s say the Big Ten and a MAC-level school. All the other games will be high-quality match-ups between teams that casual fans and TV entities desire to see.
And this is a good thing. Better games. Higher quality performances. Fewer irrelevant programs. A product that is more easily digestible by casual fans.
Even if you’re a fan of a smaller program, the end result will be good for you. Why play on an unlevel playing field year after year? Why hope and pray for a measly 8-4 season where you make a bowl game? Why not aspire for a championship in a league of peers and equals?
A colossal change is slowly coming for college football. And it all started with a measly two grand.
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