In competition, all anyone — you, me or our rival — should ask for is a level playing field.

But football, the premier college sport, isn’t fair, and doubly so since 2021 when unregulated dollars were allowed to “buy” teams with fake name, image and likeness deals.

Illini coach Bret Bielema takes pride in Illinois’ 10-3 season in 2024 while pointing out that he was “working off a $5 million pool” of player salaries, while Big Ten champion Oregon, national champion Ohio State and several others were “north of $20 million.”

So, while Illinois is currently paying several times more than last year’s salaries, Bielema says traditional elites are outrunning the July 1 deadline on capped NIL payments by entering the $35 to $40 million category.

Whatever Illinois, Iowa, Indiana and their mid-level partners do, they are forever outspent. And if they have a special season, everyone understands that it can’t be sustained under the present rules.

Relief on the way?

Amazingly, we are simultaneously at an all-time competitive low with this insane avalanche of pay-for-play dollars pouring into the 2025 season and — hold your breath — perhaps only a year away from a setup that would establish long-overdue competitive balance.

How can that be? All-time unfairness in 2025! And just the reverse beginning in 2026?

Excuse me for hallucinating about the long-term future. Optimists in this business always hit unexpected snags. But, at least, college administrators are presenting a good idea for dissidents to shoot at.

Commissioners, administrators and leaders of the four major conferences — Big Ten, Big 12, SEC and ACC — have constructed a document that is circulating for acceptance. The document keeps football within the NCAA for academic and other reasons, but would transfer rules enforcement to a new College Sports Commission, and require strict adherence to market value of NIL payments over $600.

Stepping in to help?

With compensation off the NCAA plate, legal liability on NIL debates would fall to the new commission.

And here’s the kicker: Any school unwilling to sign the document faces possible expulsion.

All this assumes the House v. NCAA anti-trust case is finally settled.

Then, if by some miracle the circulated document is signed by all, it means football players would receive (1) a portion of each school’s $20.5 million allowable all-sports distributions and (2) any permitted NIL income, with anything over $600 being carefully scrutinized by a non-NCAA agency.

Why, you might ask, would Oregon and Georgia and Alabama and other dominant programs be willing to give up their monetary edge? Would they willingly engage in reforms that would limit their advantages and benefit the whole? The questions abound.

Shopping spree

Where does Tennessee stand? Just this month, the legislature there passed a law making it permissible for universities in that state to reject rules governing revenue sharing, and denying any punishment for inappropriate collective deals. They are determined to be, shall we say, above the rules, and others are certain to follow.

We are, as you might suspect, a long way from home on enforcement. And even more so with attorneys lined up with cases headed for the post-July 1 docket.

It seems to me that schools rejecting the document are announcing their desire to operate beyond the rules ... and should be allowed to go their own independent way.

Bielema, growing as a spokesman in this massive disorder, said it best: “Whether we’re all shopping at Walmart or Louis Vuitton, as long as we’re all shopping in the same mall, I can live with that.”