The Win Column: Is college sports chaos … nearing an end?
It’s my birthday this weekend, and my primary sports wish (did you know you get one of those?) is for dear, sweet Drake Baldwin to get well soon.
Barring that … how about some calmer collegiate seas?
HEY, A MAN CAN DREAM
Stop me if you’ve heard this before.
Actually, don’t, because you’ve definitely heard it before — but a momentous few weeks could be afoot for college sports.
- The SCORE Act is out, with a new, bipartisan attempt to install governmental guardrails around compensation for athletes purportedly en route soon. (SCORE stands for Student-Athlete Compensation, Oversight and Revenue Equity Act.)
- The College Sports Commission — charged with watchdogging NIL deals, salary caps and such — won a big arbitration battle. The extent of its authority will be reexamined in court next week.
- And on Friday, the NCAA’s Division I cabinet could vote on its proposed “give players five post-high school years to compete, the end” rule.
“I think we’re moving inexorably toward something,” Bruce B. Siegal told me. “But I’m not 100% sure what that is.”
Relatable!
Siegal, by the way, is a longtime local sports attorney at Atlanta’s Greenspoon Marder LLP. After decades focused on licensing and trademarks, he’s expanded to work with collectives and companies in the NIL space. He’s also an adjunct professor at Georgia Tech.
I reached out to him this week because Atlanta is the college football capital of the world (not an argument). And, well … it’s all very confusing.
🔎 Here’s an attempt to elucidate
The long-debated SCORE Act would, among other things, make the NCAA immune to antitrust lawsuits over compensation and transfer rules; supersede state NIL laws; and declare that college athletes are not employees of their school or conference.
It was pulled from the U.S. House’s agenda Tuesday.
The thought is that a new piece of legislation led by Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) will move into the starting lineup … once it’s introduced.
- That could happen this week. And although we don’t know specifics, Siegal said Cantwell has previously favored a “more athlete friendly” approach.
That could — theoretically, possibly, maybe — lend itself to more universal support.
The SCORE Act never got enough votes to advance. Groups like the Congressional Black Caucus and athletes.org, a sort of independent college players association, panned it, with the latter deeming it “codifying the same power imbalance that created this chaos in the first place.”
🔎 Translation: Earning power is cool … but not so much if the NCAA can still set whatever caps and limits it wants without any substantive negotiation.
- “The key,” Siegal said, “is that (athletes) be empowered to protect their interests, and are protected against unscrupulous agents and bad deals.”
- College athletes now have the metaphorical car keys, he said — “but nobody out there is really showing them how to drive.”
It would help, of course, to have rules of the road that aren’t constantly changing.
Or just one set of rules.
Or someone who can enforce the rules without getting sued into nonexistence.
🔎 Also an option: College and university leaders putting on their big person pants, admitting that at least some athletes are employees and figuring things out via collective bargaining without begging America’s most inept organization (Congress) to save its second-most inept organization (the NCAA).
But I digress.
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MARK YOUR CALENDARS
👑 Big college baseball days ahead, with your ACC champion Yellow Jackets and SEC champion Bulldogs opening their respective conference tournament quests Thursday.
From there? The NCAA tournament bracket gets announced at noon Monday on ESPN2, with both local teams hoping to host a regional.
⚾ The Braves wrap up their series in Miami on Thursday before returning to Truist Park for a brief weekend home stand against the Nationals.
- There’s a “straw cowboy hat” giveaway Friday, if you’re into that kind of thing.
🏈 The Falcons resume organized team activities Thursday, then get a break until Tuesday. Quarterback Michael Penix Jr. says he’s “running his own race.”
🏀 The Dream will try to bounce back from their first loss of the young season by hosting Dallas and Phoenix on Friday and Sunday, respectively, in College Park. Friday’s tipoff = 7:30 p.m. on Ion.
⚽ Atlanta United follows last night’s abhorrent U.S. Open Cup performance with a Sunday evening trip to Columbus (5 p.m., Apple TV).
🏎️ Caitlin Clark will serve as grand marshal for Sunday’s Indianapolis 500. More importantly: The Wienie 500, a now-annual race of Oscar Mayer Wienermobiles, returns at 2 p.m. Friday on Fox.
MEET OUR NEW FALCONS BEAT WRITER
His name is Daniel Flick, he most recently covered Indiana football and he’s already all-in in Flowery Branch, learning things from OTAs and everything.
- “One prevailing thought from today: Zachariah Branch looked excellent,” he wrote Tuesday on X, where you should definitely follow him.
- “Had an explosive catch-and-run during an offense vs. defense period, and he’s so fast & sudden. Days like these — shorts, no pads, no contact — generally favor smaller, quicker players, but Branch stood out."
Ch”ck out this week’s Dirty Birds Dispatch for more about Mr. Flick, plus a definitive ranking of those “This is Falcons football” schedule release videos.
In the meantime: How about a bonus infographic?
Official Win Column data man Rahul Deshpande was curious what the Falcons’ collective odometer would look like come season’s end. Turns out they’d compare pretty favorably in the NFC South … if it weren’t for that pesky November journey to Madrid.
OOPS, WRONG FRENCHMAN
Picture it. Atlanta, 2023. The Hawks hit the lottery a year early, get the No. 1 pick and select … Victor freaking Wembanyama.
Now it’s three years later. There is no Zaccharie Risacher (the 2024 No. 1 pick) getting garbage time minutes while the Knicks pummel the Hawks out of the playoffs.
Instead, a 7-foot-4 alien — the ATLien? — is bullying Karl-Anthony Towns. Slapping every Jalen Brunson floater into Spike Lee’s lap. Putting up 41 POINTS AND 24 REBOUNDS and drilling game-tying 30-foot daggers in the conference finals.
Mon dieu!
What a world that would be.
OTHER INTERESTING STUFF TO KNOW
🐝 Georgia Tech brass says Bobby Dodd Stadium will have an upgraded video board in time for the 2027 football season.
💯 Wholeheartedly endorse columnist Ken Sugiura’s idea to somehow set aside a small portion of tickets to Atlanta sporting events for folks who wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford it. We paid taxes for this stuff, after all.
😬 Judging by the results, y’all enjoyed last week’s Bobby Cox Ejection Trivia Challenge … even if that “winning percentage in games where Cox got tossed” question ate everyone alive.
🏨 Atlanta’s World Cup hotel bookings situation appears to be less dismal than elsewhere. Yay?
🍻 Can two new women’s sports bars coexist in the same Atlanta neighborhood? Absolutely, lifestyles columnist Nedra Rhone writes.
PHOTO OF THE WEEK
Celebratory tomahawk bats, you say?
Thanks for reading to the very bottom of the Win Column. Questions, comments, ideas? Contact me at tyler.estep@ajc.com.
Until next time.
About the Author
Tyler Estep hosts the AJC Win Column, Atlanta's new weekly destination for all things sports. He also shepherds the Sports Daily and Braves Report newsletters to your inbox.
