Deion Sanders roster moves expose Protect College Sports Act 'hypocrisy,' critics say
NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos...
Colorado football coach Deion Sanders recently kicked three players off his team and previously has admitted that he “got rid of” players to make room for better replacements in the transfer portal.
Sanders is far from the only coach who manages his roster like this these days. But unlike other coaches, Sanders put himself in the middle of a hot political debate recently when he filmed an advertisement supporting the Protect College Sports Act (PCSA).
And that makes Sanders’ roster moves an especially rich example for why this pending legislation is a bad deal for college athletes, according to the leaders of college athletes’ rights organizations. They see it as “hypocrisy” because:
▶ Under the PCSA, coaches are not restricted from kicking players off of teams or pushing bunches of them into the transfer portal. Nor are they restricted from taking in dozens of new transfer players each year when it benefits them. Coaches also can join new teams for more money as many times as they want.
▶ By contrast, players generally are allowed only one free transfer within a five-year window under the PCSA. If they want to join a new team after getting kicked off their old team (fairly or not), they must burn their free transfer if they haven’t already. In Colorado’s case, USA TODAY Sports has learned the recently dismissed players have transferred at least once already.
“This bill would limit athletes to only one free transfer and doesn’t make exceptions for this,” said Ramogi Huma, executive director of the National College Players Association. “So a coach like Deion can run a player off, which burns his transfer, and if another coach runs him off later, the athlete pays the penalty. Meanwhile, coaches can move from job to job, make millions, and happily bring in waves of transfers when it benefits them. That hypocrisy is hard to miss.”
Where the Protect College Sports Act stands
The PCSA is pending in the U.S. Congress after passing in the Senate by a bipartisan vote of 77-22 on Sept. 28. To become law, it next must pass in the House of Representatives, where its future is uncertain. Supporters of the bill say it would stabilize college sports after so much upheaval in recent years caused by antitrust lawsuits — court cases that unlocked the door to unlimited annual player transfers and direct payments to players from schools.
The bill would cap the amount of combined pay for players but not coaches. It also would roll back player transfer rules to how they used to be — one free transfer per player, with limited exceptions, such as for graduate players. Additional transfers after that would require players to sit out a year of competition as a penalty.
But critics of the bill say one of the problems with this is that players often want to transfer to a new team because they’ve fallen out of favor with their current coach, fairly or not. They want another chance to play.
In Sanders’ case, he is “pushing the PCSA, but on the flip side, he’s also (responsible for) the things that Congress is using against the athletes (when they transfer multiple times),” said Brandon Copeland, executive director of Athletes.org, a players association for college athletes. “He’s pushing them into the portal.”
Sanders said it in his first team meeting at Colorado in December 2022. “I want you all to get ready to go ahead and jump in that portal,” Sanders told the players he inherited from a 1-11 team. Dozens of Colorado players left the team after that.
‘Players get fired… every day’
Under the PCSA, players could be stuck in a bad situation without the freedom to start over somewhere else right away after already transferring once.
The situation at Colorado is not unique, however.
“Players get fired from college teams every day,” said Andrew Cooper, executive director of the United College Athletes Association. “It’s not publicized the way it is with Coach Prime. And the NCAA argues that players would be harmed by labor rights (for players), because then (players) could be fired. But the reality is right now, that is how the business is operated.”
Under the PCSA, Cooper notes if a player violates team policy, their protections in the bill no longer apply. The PCSA says a school cannot revoke a player’s scholarship for “roster management decisions,” athletic performance or injury. But it makes an exception for violating team policy.
“Well, who determines what the team policies are and how do you prove whether they’re reasonable or not?” Cooper asked.
If the PCSA became law, it would give the NCAA, coaches and schools more power over their teams in this regard. Rules restricting player transfers and eligibility would be the law of the land. It’s a big reason why the NCAA, schools and coaches support the PCSA while labor and player advocates do not.
Take-it-or-leave-it leverage for schools?
The capped amount of player compensation also factors into more power for schools, said Copeland, a former NFL linebacker.
That’s because schools could claim they only have a certain amount of money left out of their pot of capped compensation for players. If players already have burned their free transfer, Copeland said schools could try to reduce what they promised to pay players with “take it or leave it” offers that take advantage of players’ reduced freedom under the PCSA.
If they already transferred once, they might feel compelled to “take it,” because if they “leave it” and transfer again, they’d have to sit out a year, if they have any years left to sit out. Players could try to fight it in court, but that takes time and money they might not have.
“A player can do everything right and still be victimized two or three times by one coaching decision: losing his roster spot, being forced to burn his one penalty-free transfer, and, if he has already transferred once, potentially losing a year of eligibility just trying to find somewhere else to play,” Huma said. “Meanwhile, the coach faces no restriction on how many players he can run off or how many transfers he can bring in to replace them.”
Deion Sanders' response to questions about the PCSA
In Colorado’s case, Sanders did not identify the players he kicked off the team. He later confirmed they weren’t coming back. Colorado’s athletic department still said last week that “any potential roster changes have not been finalized.” This week, the department said there was no update to that statement.
When asked about his support of the PCSA on Sept. 15, Sanders said he was asked to do so.
“I did it because I thought it was the right thing to do, along with certain colleagues of mine that shared in on doing their version of it as well,” he said then. “But… I shot (the advertisement) and that was it. I haven’t thought about it since.”
Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Deion Sanders roster moves expose Protect College Sports Act 'hypocrisy,' critics say
More at NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos