It’s striking how few coaches talk about college athletics being on the right path these days.
They’ll acknowledge robust financial health, for sure. They’ll confirm the ever-expanding conferences are getting more and more competitive, laud that players who have never been able to profit off their own work and image now can. Those players boast abilities to seek funds and playing time they were never before afforded.
The cost of all that might finally be weighing on the minds of those who seemed to benefit most by it, though.
Penn State head coach James Franklin joined a growing chorus of college football coaches early this week, wondering if the advantages of major changes that have swept through college football over the last five years are creating an untenable situation over the long haul.
When the Big Ten outmaneuvered zero suitors last week to add Oregon and Washington to its already bloated roster starting in 2024, it essentially did two things: It bolstered the mega-conference’s already overflowing coffers; it disintegrated the Pac-12, which for generations acted as the cornerstone of football culture on the Pacific Coast.
That’s good capitalism. But it’s not leading to a brand of college football like the one fans knew and loved it. Nor is it making academic success more attainable for student-athletes. Securing both should have been a goal for college sports.
“It’s not shocking that these things are kind of happening,” Franklin, ever the diplomat, said with a shrug Sunday during his program’s annual Media Day at Beaver Stadium. “It’s somewhat sad in some ways — not that people are being added to our conference, because I think obviously there’s a lot of strategy that goes into that. But, I do think there are some challenges that come along with it.”
There’s an old saying common among athletic directors: Financially, football drives the bus.
Most athletics departments are funded by football profits. That includes Penn State, where most of its 30 other varsity teams exist on what football is able to put in the bank. A lot of it comes from the Big Ten’s media rights deals, and those only get more valuable when major media markets like Los Angeles and Seattle are added to the mix.
No stranger to the pursuit of more money, Franklin wondered Sunday if those who run college sports are prepared for an onset problems more sophisticated than any of them currently realize.
Missouri’s Eli Drinkwitz wondered what the new Big Ten schedule will do for programs outside of football. How many cross-country trips will the Rutgers softball team or the Washington tennis team will have to make every year to play out their conference schedules? Can young student-athletes not used to cross-country competition on a regular basis actually handle that along with their academic responsibilities?
“Do we know what the number one symptom or cause of mental health (crises) is? It’s lack of rest and sleep,” Drinkwitz vented. “I don’t worry at all about the game; Football is going to be fine. But did we consider the people that we are entrusted with?”
No. As always, they considered money. The best ways to make a lot of it. And, the ramifications of losing it.
As Franklin enters his 10th season leading the Nittany Lions, the job he has now barely resembles the one he inherited.
He juggles the ever-changing transfer portal and a more cutthroat approach to recruiting high school talent. He balances playing time like a plate spinner at the circus, always walking the line between keeping a player invested and preventing his eyes from seeking greener pastures. He’s constantly on the prowl for donations from big-spending boosters to take care of a Name, Image, Likeness budget that is never high enough and somehow doesn’t come from that TV money.
Don’t bet against what’s sure to become a twice-annual West-coast road trip in the heart of conference play evolving into another hurdle for his program to navigate.
The NCAA made it a more difficult job by failing, for decades, to make the necessary compromises with players that would have kept college football ultra profitable without sacrificing its most important traditions.
“Do I think the players should have options and choices? Yes. Do I think the coaches should have been able to restrict student athletes from transferring anywhere that the coach didn’t want them to transfer to? No,” Franklin said. “But I also think we could have gotten to more of a middle ground rather than from one extreme to where we are now.”
What’s good for business isn’t necessarily what’s good for college athletics, nor is it exactly the best thing for college football. As Washington State coach Jake Dickert said, lamenting the ultimate demise of the Pac-12, “At the end of the day, we’ll look back at college football in 20 years and think, ‘What are we doing?’”
For some, it won’t take near as long.
