Mr. Saban Goes to Washington D.C.

Coach Saban along with SEC commissioner Greg Sankey and others arrived in Washington D.C. this week for an NIL discussion on the Hill. The issue that is on everyone's mind is how can name, image and likeness be regulated on a national level.

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Coach Saban met with Majority Leader Steve Scalise along with Senators Katie Britt and Tommy Tuberville. Coach Saban has never wavered on his stance that there should be a unified set of rules for NIL, nationally.

Since there is no national law concerning NIL, universities' hands are tied by state laws which regulate NIL. This gives an advantage to states such as Missouri and Texas which allows an athlete to be compensated before actually enrolling in school.

The hope is to have a national set of rules in place by the end of the year. Until then, it would appear that it's a bidding war for the country's top athletes.

If the SEC goes looking for help from our nation's highest court in the near future on NIL, let's just say that will be the Hail Mary of all time.

In a 2021 case concerning NIL, the Supreme Court upheld in a 9–0 unanimous decision the lower court’s decision that NCAA restrictions on “education-related benefits” for college athletes violated antitrust laws.

Justice Kavanaugh was quoted as saying, “Nowhere else in America can businesses get away with agreeing not to pay their workers a fair market rate on the theory that their product is defined by not paying their workers a fair market rate. The NCAA is not above the law.”