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2035 Vision For College Football

date
2026-05-05
source
patreon

Context

Show response to Lori's question — what's the realistic-optimistic version of college football in 2035? Four-part wishlist:

  1. Somebody actually in charge. A top-tier football structure with real leadership. Right now there are satellites with influence and their own bubbles (mostly SEC and Big Ten). Some level of professionalization, while still using university brands.
  2. Quasi-collective bargaining. Some form of CBA equivalent. The current system tries to regulate labor without admitting it's labor — that contradiction has to be resolved one way or the other.
  3. Revenue share as baseline; NIL returns to its original endorsement-marketing intent. Currently NIL has bled into general roster compensation. The fix is structural: rev share covers the floor, NIL goes back to actual endorsement value.
  4. More balance in roster spending. Show is uncertain on the mechanism (a salary cap is the obvious lever but flagged as imperfect), but the unbounded escalation of $50M / $60M / $100M roster numbers concerns the show. Parity isn't required, but a check on unlimited spend would be healthy.

The show acknowledges this is more wishlist than prediction. The honest prediction is that new problems will be introduced that make people forget the severity of the older ones — college football is "an unkillable amoeba that is just going to find new ways to exploit the rules."

Subject(s)

  • College football structural future
  • NIL / revenue share / collective bargaining