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    "original_url": "https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/7641123\/2026\/09\/29\/protect-college-sports-act-politicians-ncaa-college-athletes\/?emc=edit_na_20260930&nl=breaking-news&segment_id=227279",
    "parsed_content": "Back in the quaint days of 2021, politicians across the country, in both blue and red states, all coalesced around a common enemy: the NCAA. Some 25 states passed bills overriding the NCAA\u2019s longtime ban on athletes earning name, image and likeness (NIL) compensation.\u201cFlorida\u2019s athletes will be liberated from the economic chains of the NCAA, with no thanks to the NCAA,\u201d said Florida state Rep. Chip LaMarca, a Republican who authored that state\u2019s bill.\u201cThe NCAA should stop nickel-and-diming the young men and women who are under their control and just open it up,\u201d said Illinois State Rep. Kam Buckner, a Democrat who pushed for that state\u2019s bill.That summer, just 11 days before many of those NIL laws were set to take effect, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its own bipartisan takedown in NCAA v. Alston, a 9-0 ruling that, while not directly related to NIL, took a sledgehammer to so-called amateurism.\u201cThe NCAA couches its arguments for not paying student athletes in innocuous labels. But the labels cannot disguise the reality: The NCAA\u2019s business model would be flatly illegal in almost any other industry in America,\u201d conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in a concurring opinion.The Protect College Sports Act passed the Senate. What's next?Ralph D. RussoOn Monday, after five years of seeing what college sports look like when the athletes are liberated, Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. Senate coalesced around a new cause: giving the NCAA its control back.The Protect College Sports Act, which passed the chamber Monday by a\u00a0decisive 77-22 vote, doesn\u2019t exactly transport NIL back to its pre-2021 status. The bill does not prohibit athletes from earning NIL money, nor does it limit their deals to a certain amount. It does not preclude them from eventually being classified as employees or forming unions.But make no mistake: If the House of Representatives passes anything close to this form, it\u2019s an indisputable win for management.PCSA establishes a hard cap on how much revenue schools can share with their athletes over the next decade, which, if it proves enforceable, would slow the pace of ever-escalating deals for quarterbacks and point guards. The cap is actually much higher ($48.5 million) than it is now ($21.5 million), but schools such as Ohio State and Oregon are already spending more than that $48.5 million through loosely regulated over-the-cap deals. In a free market, where total NIL spending has nearly doubled over the past two years, according to Opendorse, many other schools will soon surpass $48.5 million.The bill also restores the NCAA\u2019s 2021-23 rule that limited athletes to one free transfer (without having to sit out a year) before earning their degree \u2014 a rule that a coalition of states sued to overturn back in the days when politicians such as Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost (a Republican) still said things like, \u201cThe transfer eligibility rule needlessly curtails the fundamental rights of college athletes.\u201d\n \n \n \n Again, there is nothing in this bill that formally caps what athletes can make, but their agents will have considerably less leverage in a restricted portal.Arguably most importantly, the bill grants the NCAA and the conferences limited antitrust immunity to create and enforce rules without the constant threat of athlete litigation. Not even a Supreme Court justice will be able to tell the NCAA that those restrictions are \u201cflatly illegal.\u201dBut at least all of this resulted from earnest negotiations between NCAA members and the affected athletes.Just kidding!Legislative aides for Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) negotiated the rev-share cap details with lawyers from the Big Ten and SEC. Texas Tech booster Cody Campbell\u2019s mitts were on other parts of it. New York Yankees president Randy Levine \u2014 appointed by President Donald Trump to help spearhead his \u201cSave College Sports\u201d campaign \u2014 became a major player. That means an exec for one of the biggest spenders in a pro sports league with no salary cap played a key role in establishing one for college sports.Give them all credit for at least one thing: They had a plan and executed it.They enlisted seven-time national champion Nick Saban as the public face of their campaign. When Saban retired in early 2024, he was making $11.3 million. He later recounted that he had made his decision after his wife, Terry, pointed out that \u201call (the players) care about is how much you\u2019re going to pay them.\u201dThey blitzed Saturday airwaves with TV ads featuring Saban, Campbell or Deion Sanders. They took full advantage of ESPN\u2019s platform, where Saban openly campaigned for the bill on this season\u2019s first ESPN \u201cCollege GameDay\u201d episode, and Cruz delivered a nine-minute infomercial the next week in Austin.But most of all, they had a message that resonated with much of the college football public: Everything is in chaos, and this bill will solve it.Opponents of the bill, meanwhile, frankly had no cohesive plan or effective message. Even if you believe, as they do, that NIL\/portal restrictions like those in the bill should be collectively bargained with the athletes, that\u2019s an extremely complicated issue that will take years to play out, if it ever does. Fans just want to know how you\u2019re going to keep their teams\u2019 best players from transferring in January.Meanwhile, Democratic Sens. Chris Murphy and Cory Booker and NAACP President Derrick Johnson seemed completely oblivious to the current climate. They constantly invoked an intentionally charged term: \u201cexploited athletes.\u201d This isn\u2019t 2011, when athletes weren\u2019t allowed to receive cream cheese on their bagels. Good luck selling that framing to the fans in 2026 as they read about Miami quarterback Darian Mensah\u2019s $2.3 million, six-bedroom house in South Florida.Of course, multimillionaires such as Mensah or Ohio State receiver Jeremiah Smith make up a tiny fraction of the 200,000 Division I athletes. Most outside of Power 4 football or major college basketball aren\u2019t paid anything beyond their scholarships, and a major part of Cruz\u2019s and other PCSA backers\u2019 selling points is that those scholarships will be cut in large numbers if Congress doesn\u2019t act to rein in schools\u2019 expenses.Never mind that the number of NCAA sports teams and women\u2019s athletes has only gone up since 2021. Even if there is legit concern, there has never been serious consideration of implementing cost controls for any aspect of college sports other than athlete compensation. Even the one expense being capped \u2014 athlete rev-share payments \u2014 is optional to begin with.But here we are.The bill\u2019s backers still have a major hurdle to clear before it becomes law. The House is unlikely to take up the matter until after the midterm elections on Nov. 3. No one can reasonably predict how a lame-duck Congress will respond. Members of that chamber already tried to pass a similar bill, the SCORE Act, but it stalled out earlier this year.But the PCSA\u2019s decisive Senate margin gives it a much better chance.Five years ago, politicians widely supported granting college athletes NIL rights by an even wider margin. Five years later, two-thirds of the Senate voted to roll some of them back. Originally, they wanted athletes to make money. As it turns out, just not\u00a0that much money.\nStewart Mandel is editor-in-chief of The Athletic's college football coverage. He has been a national college football writer for two decades with Sports Illustrated and Fox Sports. He co-hosts \"The Audible\" podcast with Bruce Feldman.Follow Sep 29, 2026Connections: Sports EditionSpot the pattern. Connect the termsFind the hidden link between sports termsPlay today's puzzleWhat did you think of this story?MEHSOLIDAWESOME",
    "published_at": "2026-09-29T09:30:54+00:00",
    "author_name": "Stewart Mandel",
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    "ai_headline": "The Protect College Sports Act passed the Senate. What's next?",
    "ai_simplified_title": "US Senate Passes Protect College Sports Act, Reversing NCAA Athlete Freedoms",
    "ai_excerpt": "The U.S. Senate passed the Protect College Sports Act, aiming to restore NCAA control over college athletes' NIL compensation and transfer rules. This bill, a significant shift from 2021 legislation, faces further hurdles in the House.",
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