Ncaa President Sees Path Forward For Reform Legislation

NCAA President Charlie Baker defended Congress’ effort to regulate college athletics Sunday, saying that powerful conferences are making a mistake opposing the legislation.

The two largest groupings in college sports — the Big Ten and Southeastern conferences — have come out in opposition to the bill from Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) that aims to temper a college sports world in turmoil since student-athletes began earning cash for endorsements.

Their bill seeks to limit the ability of student-athletics to transfer, ban coaches from moving schools mid-year and cement certain “name, image and likeness” protections. The NCAA has already taken steps toward reform, adopting a rule that would give most Division I athletes five years to complete five seasons of play.

President Donald Trump has thrown his support behind the Senate legislation after the House’s attempt at drafting regulations for college sports went up in flames. And Cruz has laid out an ambitious plan for getting the bill signed before the start of the next academic year.

The Big Ten and Southeastern conferences, however, have said the Protect College Sports Act “leaves critical issues unresolved” and fails to override the existing patchwork of state laws with federal rules.

In an interview with Ed O’Keefe on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” Baker said that the conferences shouldn’t try to abandon an earnest effort to address “a number of the most significant challenges” facing college athletics.

“What we're really trying to achieve is some sort of national framework so that you can have national championships and national competitions, in which, for all intents and purposes, everybody's playing by the same set of rules,” Baker said.

Baker on Sunday also cautioned against institutions — such as the University of Georgia — considering severing themselves from the NCAA, emphasizing the value of a national standard when it comes to running competitions for national championships. However, Baker did suggest that there’s room to strategize on how the NCAA can “actually serve the membership, in some respects, in a better way than we have in the past.”

The former Massachusetts governor hinted at some disagreement over how the legislation would ensure that revenues from high-profile sports like football and men’s basketball are used to ensure that smaller sports aren’t cut.

“I think the legislation does deal with this in a variety of ways,” Baker said. “I happen to think there are better ways to deal with it, and it's an important issue, and we're going to continue to talk to folks in the Senate about that.”

He continued: “The best way to deal with it is to treat the sports that generate significant amounts of revenue appropriately, right, and make sure there is this opportunity to share revenue.”

In response to a question about whether conferences would continue to expand, Baker said that some schools have begun to consider scheduling their football programs differently than other sports that play during the week and at a greater frequency, but stopped short of suggesting that college football breaks off from other sports entirely.