In August, Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh kicked off one of the most bizarre, dramatic college football seasons in history by doing something coaches rarely do: He talked about money. The NCAA has historically limited college athletes’ compensation to tuition, room, board and, in the wake of a 2021 Supreme Court decision, small grants. Michigan, for instance, spent $75 million on coaches and staff in 2022, compared with $33 million on athlete aid and meals. But NCAA rules still maintain one philosophical red line, that schools can never pay athletes to play for them. The gap between what colleges pay coaches and what they allocate in athlete funding provides a dramatic backdrop to the rising pressure for college athletes to be paid, and specifically out of the billions of dollars generated by their sports.

Source: Wall Street Journal December 26, 2023 19:15 UTC