Is NIL and the portal sustainable?

Yeah, it’s absolutely not sustainable because eventually the cost will be passed on to the fans and I know very few fans that will pay pro prices for a below minor league product. Loyalty goes both ways and everything is fun and games until people’s bottom lines start getting affected.

I’ll be contrarian and say yes the system is sustainable. Given that it all started with judicial intervention rather than planned policy, it will take time for changes (hopefully improvements) to catch up. I suspect there will be formalization of the NIL deals with some type of time commitments for players accepting deals.

The system will allow players to get paid and place a premium for great college players who may not become great NFL players. Guys like Quinn Ewers and Shadeur Sanders who would have made a lot more money staying in college may be more likely to stick around rather than bolt early.

The system will allow big money programs with huge fan bases to thrive- which will keep the big money and big fan bases involved.

The playoff will allow teams like Boise St, AZ St, and SMU to have a shot- which gives legitimacy to the playoff and keeps the legislators from interfering. I suspect they will expand to 16 teams so that the P2 can get more teams in.

As for whether Utah’s position in the food chain is sustainable, that is a different question all together. We have moved downward compared to the P12 days. Development of diamond-in-the-rough players has been a big part of Utah’s recipe for success and for this to continue working they will have to find a way to retain their best players. But Utah should be able to compete for B12 championships and playoff bids.

On the other hand, drastic change to a new system would not be surprising. The top programs could bolt from the NCAA and start over. Would it be the top 20 or the top 40? Who knows. I’ll not lose sleep worrying about it. I’ll hope to see some quality games this fall. Perhaps Utah’s offense will score, the defense will stymie, and we will get a shot in the playoffs. That would be fun.

The issue that I have with football breaking away and forming a closed league of 30 to 40 teams is that it shuts out the majority of the country. Let’s face it, college football is regional while the NFL is national. I believe that you can’t apply the NFL method to college football because fans have much more of a sentimental attachment to college football teams. For example, let’s say, for argument’s sake, that BYU gets into this college football Super League and Utah gets shut out.

The way I see that is that it immediately shuts out half (or more) of the college football watching population in Utah; because if there’s one thing I know better than my name, it’s that Utah fans are not going to turn into BYU fans or start watching BYU football. As a personal example, the only college football teams I watch are Utah and Miami, and maybe games that impact either of those two teams. I don’t watch the B1G, I don’t watch the SEC, I don’t watch the ACC, I don’t watch the Big XII, and I don’t see that changing ever.

Maybe I’m an outlier, and there are more people out there just willing to consume college football writ large. However, I doubt it because why would people watch teams that they have no emotional investment in, and where the talent level is arguably significantly lower than the UFL?