The landscape of college athletics has changed so much in just the last handful of years, and probably too quickly. From the transfer portal to NIL and eligibility concerns, the NCAA has awarded a ton of power to the athletes. So much that it’s difficult for coaches to build a program, regardless of sport. Instead, they’re stuck building a team on a yearly basis.
For a variety of reasons, that has to change. For one, student-athletes can’t excel in the classroom when they’re bouncing around to three, four, or in some cases, five schools. It also puts their athletic development at risk because they are having to start over every time they hop in the portal.
One of the biggest problems in the NCAA right now surrounds NIL. I’d say the majority, if not everyone, in the industry believes the athletes should be paid. Receiving hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars before setting foot on campus? That’s a bit ridiculous. It also causes deterioration of non-blue-blood programs since their pockets aren’t quite as deep.
There are no guardrails on this thing, and that has to change soon. Recently, President Donald Trump and former Alabama head football coach Nick Saban met in Tuscaloosa to discuss the state of college athletics. Trump has since appointed Saban as the head of his commission on college sports, hoping to find a solution in the near future.
In a recent interview with Sirius XM radio, West Virginia head coach Rich Rodriguez told Dusty Dvoracek and Danny Kannell that he would like to join Saban and join Trump’s commission.
“I’m gonna give them my cell number if they want an active coach on that deal, I’ll be on that sucker.”@RealCoachRod tells @DustyDvoracek & @dannykanell that he would love to be part of a college football commission and thinks Nick Saban is the perfect person to lead it. pic.twitter.com/muAvRDP2a2
— College Sports on SiriusXM (@SXMCollege) May 14, 2025
“He (Nick Saban) is the greatest college football coach of all time, and he has a great grasp of the game in general. I’m going to give them my cell number, if they want an active coach to be on the deal I’ll be on that sucker. I’ve got some experience from my current standpoint. I don’t know if they need me, though, but having Coach Saban on there…he doesn’t have an interest to help his team; he’s truly about college football. College football is such a great entity. It’s hard to screw it up. You can do whatever you want, and there’s still going to be that passion for your school and for that level of athletes. We’ve done enough things to screw it up in the last couple of years. I think we’re going to start trending the other way and get it right, and coach will help that for sure.”
Rodriguez has not been shy to voice his opinion on the transfer portal, NIL, and all of the things the NCAA has messed up. In just about every spring practice press conference, he talked about his issue with roster limits, among other things. The more coaches and prominent voices in college athletics step up and take action, the more likely it becomes that something gets done.
MORE STORIES FROM WEST VIRGINIA ON SI
West Virginia Resides Near the Bottom of Post-Spring Big 12 Power Rankings
West Virginia’s Win Total for the 2025 Season Forecasts Rough Year One for Rich Rod
ESPN Predicts Who Will Be West Virginia’s Top Three Transfers in 2025
Former West Virginia WR Hudson Clement Named a Top Newcomer by ESPN
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