Lack of detailed NIL rules makes enforcement tough
As the market for college athletes to earn money off their names, images and likenesses rapidly evolves, NCAA enforcement is faced with the tricky task of trying to police activities currently unregulated by detailed, uniform rules.
NCAA vice president of enforcement Jon Duncan said that letters of inquiry have gone to multiple schools over the past few months. He declined to identify the schools but said the letters are not indicative of a formal investigation and they are frequently used for an assortment of reasons.
“It’s just dialogue with a school to get more information about whether violations have occurred,” he said this week.
The NCAA lifted most restrictions on athletes earning money through sponsorship deals or as paid endorsers last summer after numerous states passed laws that usurped the association’s rules. The NCAA enacted an interim policy that flung open a new market, but with no consistency from state to state. Schools were told to create their own policies, following state laws where applicable.
Though the NCAA has no NIL-specific bylaws, deals still must adhere to existing rules that prohibit recruiting inducements and athletes being paid solely for playing or for performance.
“We’re not enforcing NIL deals, and we’re not enforcing the interim policy, which is largely permissive,” Duncan said. “We’re looking at rules that are still on the books and behaviors that are still violations. Or potentially” violations.
But in the absence of welldefined dos and don’ts, determining which activities cross the lines is a challenge.
“The deals are being done with third parties. And the NCAA obviously has no jurisdiction over those third parties,” aid Mit Winter, a former college basketball player and now a sports-law attorney for Kennyhertz Perry. The NCAA “can talk to and gather information from schools and the athletes, but any incriminating information is most likely going to be among people that either work for or have some involvement with third parties.”
BYU is the only school that publicly has acknowledged providing the NCAA with information about a NIL deal. BYU officials helped arrange for a Utahbased company to pay the equivalent of tuition to its walk-on football players in exchange for the athletes promoting the company’s products with socialmedia posts and appearances.
A proposed NCAA policy would have prohibited schools from being involved in facilitating NIL deals for their athletes. But there was no vote on legislation after a Supreme Court ruling in May left the NCAA vulnerable to future antitrust lawsuits.
State laws in Florida, Alabama and elsewhere restricted schools from facilitating NIL deals for athletes, but that has left schools in those states seemingly at a recruiting disadvantage against those in states that have looser or no NIL laws.
State lawmakers are looking to repeal or rewrite NIL laws. Last week, Ohio State announced it is launching a program to “create and foster” NIL opportunities for its athletes.
Around the country, boosterbacked NIL collectives have arisen from West Virginia to Washington. They are designed to connect college athletes with money-making opportunities, in which they can be paid for things such as personal appearances, signing autographs or doing a podcast.