NIL Ruling Spells Big Money For Female Wrestlers, College Athletes

November 5, 2021,

It’s not about the money.

It is about the love of the sport.

Says the people who sat in nice offices, in very expensive suits, with a panoramic view, who raked in millions of advertising dollars for decades while the student athletes couldn’t receive any extra money.

Punished them if they did.

Place the death penalty on sports programs to send a message.

Did so with a tone of such, love of the amateur sport, self-righteousness.

Some of us actually believed they were doing that for the right reasons. That their behavior had nothing to do with protecting their money.

Old money.

Which it was absolutely about.

With the passing into law of the new NIL ruling, whether you wear a suit or shoulder pads, now everyone agrees, it is about the money.

It’s absolutely about the money.

Isn’t it wonderful when everyone is in agreement?

The NCAA speaks in great detail about the new ruling at ncaa.org when they announced on June 30, 2021, “NCAA college athletes will have the opportunity to benefit from their name, image and likeness beginning Thursday. Governance bodies in all three divisions today adopted a uniform interim policy suspending NCAA name, image and likeness rules for all incoming and current student-athletes in all sports.

femcompetitor.com, grapplingstars.com fciwomenswrestling.com Marcello-Farina-Own-work-Wikipedia.

“This is an important day for college athletes since they all are now able to take advantage of name, image and likeness opportunities,” NCAA President Mark Emmert said. “With the variety of state laws adopted across the country, we will continue to work with Congress to develop a solution that will provide clarity on a national level. The current environment — both legal and legislative — prevents us from providing a more permanent solution and the level of detail student-athletes deserve.”

The policy provides the following guidance to college athletes, recruits, their families and member schools:

Individuals can engage in NIL activities that are consistent with the law of the state where the school is located. Colleges and universities may be a resource for state law questions.
College athletes who attend a school in a state without an NIL law can engage in this type of activity without violating NCAA rules related to name, image and likeness.
Individuals can use a professional services provider for NIL activities.
Student-athletes should report NIL activities consistent with state law or school and conference requirements to their school.

“Today, NCAA members voted to allow college athletes to benefit from name, image and likeness opportunities, no matter where their school is located,” said Division I Board of Directors chair Denise Trauth, president at Texas State. “With this interim solution in place, we will continue to work with Congress to adopt federal legislation to support student-athletes.”

While opening name, image and likeness opportunities to student-athletes, the policy in all three divisions preserves the commitment to avoid pay-for-play and improper inducements tied to choosing to attend a particular school. Those rules remain in effect.

“The new policy preserves the fact college sports are not pay-for-play,” said Division II Presidents Council chair Sandra Jordan, chancellor at the University of South Carolina Aiken. “It also reinforces key principles of fairness and integrity across the NCAA and maintains rules prohibiting improper recruiting inducements. It’s important any new rules maintain these principles.”

Division III Presidents Council chair Fayneese Miller, president at Hamline, said the Association will continue to work with Congress to develop a national law that will help colleges and universities, student-athletes and their families better navigate the name, image and likeness landscape.

“The new interim policy provides college athletes and their families some sense of clarity around name, image and likeness, but we are committed to doing more,” Miller said. “We need to continue working with Congress for a more permanent solution.”

The temporary policy will remain in place until federal legislation or new NCAA rules are adopted. With the NIL interim policy, schools and conferences may choose to adopt their own additional policies.”

Okay, we understand most of it.

Translation?

If you are a student athlete and Company A or Alumni B wants to pay you a lot of money in endorsements, as a student athlete, you simply need to know how to spell the word “yes”.

Isn’t getting a college education grand? Now, you’ll make a lot more than a grand.

femcompetitor.com, grapplingstars.com fciwomenswrestling.com Post-of-Kazakhstan-1-2-Wikipedia.jpg

The sports and news leaders at ESPN can say it much better than we can, “College sports is in the midst of its most significant changes in a generation. A mixture of new state laws and NCAA rules changes that went into effect on July 1 have provided athletes with varying degrees of new protections and opportunities to make money by selling their name, image and likeness (NIL) rights.”

We understand better now.

This is really great news that coincides with more breaking news.

As reported at hawkeyesports.com, “The University of Iowa Athletics Department is adding women’s wrestling as an intercollegiate program, becoming the first NCAA Division I, Power Five conference institution to offer the sport.”

The University of Iowa is the first Division I, Power Five School to approve a women’s wrestling program.

The Power Five conferences are five athletic conferences which are considered to be the elite in college football in the United States.

They are part of the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of NCAA Division I, the highest level of collegiate football in the nation.

The conferences are the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), Big Ten Conference, Big 12 Conference, Pac-12 Conference, and Southeastern Conference (SEC).

Fully competitive women’s freestyle wrestling is moving into the big leagues.

femcompetitor.com, grapplingstars.com fciwomenswrestling.com Iowa-2021-Editorial-credit-Vladimir-Vasiltvich-Shutterstock.com-photo-credit-

Very impressive. It will place them in a position to achieve greater success and have their image and likeness become worth a lot of money.

The growth of female wrestling has been trending upward for some time.

As reported by ESPN, “87 girls from 55 high schools found their way to the mats for North Carolina’s first official high school girls’ wrestling invitational contest.

The state is one of many experiencing a boom in female wrestlers. For years, girls around the country were folded into boys’ programs. But since 2001, the number of girls in high school wrestling has soared from 3,405 to nearly 17,000, buoyed by the introduction of women to Olympic wrestling in 2004 and the rise of MMA.”

So, now that we all might agree that amateur sports is about love and money, even if you wear shoulder pads, it might be time to go out and purchase a very expensive suit.