This is a free online newsletter for Jason Stahl, Executive Director of the College Football Players Association (CFBPA). If you are a member of the general public who would like to financially support our efforts at the CFBPA you can do that here. If you are a past, present or future college football player, I ask that you consider becoming a member of the CFBPA. For a succinct YouTube primer on the CFBPA, click here. To find a static internet link for this newsletter, simply click on the title.
Deion Sanders is the new head coach of the University of Colorado and since he took over last December he has engaged in an unprecedented push to turn over his roster and bring in players more to his liking. The numbers are staggering but if you want the gory details, I recommend this David Ubben piece in The Athletic as it does the best job I’ve seen so far of including voices of many of the cut scholarship players. As of this writing, roughly sixty players have left the Colorado football team since Sanders took over as coach. Most, especially the recent departures, have been cut by Sanders.
For those unfamiliar with the world of college football, you might be asking at this point how a scholarship player can be cut primarily for his athletic performance as Sanders is doing at Colorado. The truth of the matter is that head college football coaches new to an institution have always found ways to “run guys off.” This article, again at The Athletic, gives a sense of how this happened in the past and why it is so much easier in the present. As to the latter, several recent rule changes have given players flexibility to easily move programs through the transfer portal. However, these same rules changes have also given coaches, especially new coaches, the ability to essentially fire players who they don’t want on their roster.
Even with these rules changes, Sanders is engaging in an unprecedented firing spree of scholarship players by a first-year head coach. Moreover, where most coaches prefer to do this type of “dirty work” under the cover of darkness, Sanders has done it in the full light of day. In his first meeting with Colorado players, publicized widely online, he told them to “hit the portal” and that he’d be bringing in “new luggage” of higher quality—i.e. better players from the transfer portal.
There are two ways to look at what Sanders is doing. Many players have told me that “at least he’s being honest” and not hiding his intentions as so many new first-year coaches do. On the other hand, others have suggested that his actions show a callous disregard for the scholarship players he’s cutting. For instance, just yesterday Sanders suggested the players he cut were like “old furniture” that needed to be discarded.
Whichever of these interpretations you choose—and I definitely lean towards the latter—it is undeniable that Sanders is doing us a huge favor in our work organizing college football players at the CFBPA. I say this because his mass firings are occurring against the backdrop of the administrative class in college sports making full-throated arguments against employee status for college athletes. For instance, just one day before Sanders mass fired his workers, new NCAA president Charlie Baker was making the case that most college athletes don’t want to be employees. One of the main reasons Baker cited is that they would then be subject to being fired for performance on the field. So, as I told Pete Nakos in his report on the subject, Sanders’ very public actions are showing that players can be fired right now and so a change in employment status would certainly not change college athletics in this regard.
However, Sanders’ actions have also helped us illuminate something else: the need for player representation right now in college football and the need for player representation in the future where college football players may indeed be classified as employees.
First and foremost, players need representation right now given Sanders is showing exactly the type of mass firings a new football coach can undertake. In short, this can happen anywhere and so players need representatives on the ground right now to help guide them through this undoubtedly confusing time. This is precisely why full-time representatives and player advocates, employed by the CFBPA, are so central to the vision we are putting forward in our Platform for Change. Representative-advocates could make a huge difference for players forced into this disorienting process.
Unfortunately, we currently have no active members at Colorado and have been unable to reach any of the players having to go through these firings. If we did have members, and if we had our CFBPA representative on the ground with the players, the rep would be in the room when the player was fired by the head coach. Players all to often have to go into meetings like this where the power is solely with the head coach and the institution backing him. With a player rep in the room, that power imbalance would at least subtly shift.
That player rep could then ensure the player knows his rights, is protected and could lean on his rep for advice regarding next steps. The rep would make sure the player was properly informed of NCAA rule 15.5.1.7 which allows for “Aid After Departure of Head Coach.” This rule ensures that if a player is fired from the team by a new head coach, he is allowed to keep his scholarship at his current school. The rep could then advise the player how best to explore his transfer portal playing options before he gives up his scholarship rights at his current school. A player could be warned at this point that he might not find a new football home in the transfer portal and, even if he does, it might not be to his liking and his academic credits might not transfer to his new institution.
In a possible future where employee status for at least a subset of college athletes is starting to feel inevitable, player representation would be even more necessary. I’ve outlined my concerns before regarding employee classification for college football players (especially Football Bowl Subdivision players) if they are not unionized with a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) in place. Without unionization and a CBA, these player-employees might be open to new types of exploitation which will need to be guarded against by a union.
However, in a future with employee status, collective bargaining and a CBA, college football players, especially Football Bowl Subdivision players, can finally get what they’re due. They can stop fighting over NIL scraps and start getting salaries. They can stop constantly searching for a better home in the transfer portal and instead have a CBA that ensures they are treated with dignity and respect wherever they are playing. Finally, they can experience true player empowerment that only a players association can offer.
If you’re a past, present or future college football player, and this sounds like a future you want to help build, I urge you to become a member of the CFBPA today.