Colorado coach Deion Sanders thinks one radical change could help address the NIL issues that continue to go unaddressed around college football.
Speaking at Big 12 Media Days on Wednesday, Sanders was asked how he believes NIL should be handled by the NCAA. The coach essentially called for some sort of salary cap to create some parity across the sport.
“I wish there was a cap. The top of the line player makes this, and if you’re not that type of guy, you know you’re not going to make that. That’s what the NFL does,” Sanders said. “The problem is, you’ve got a guy that’s not that darn good, but he can go to another school, and they give him a half a million dollars. You can’t compete with that.
“All you have to do is look at the playoffs and see what those teams spent. You understand darn well why they’re in the playoffs. It’s kind of hard to compete with someone who’s getting $25-$30 million to a darn freshman class. It’s crazy. We’re not complaining, because all these coaches up here and coach their butts off … but what’s going on right now don’t make sense. We want to say stuff, but we’re trying to be professional.”
"All you gotta do is look at the [CFP] and see what those teams spent, and you'll understand darn well why they're in the playoffs."
— ESPN (@espn) July 9, 2025
Deion Sanders on NIL and the current state of college football. pic.twitter.com/y6A5C3dWUP
Sanders’ point is that teams with the most NIL funds available to them are inevitably going to land the best players and make the playoffs repeatedly. NIL creates plenty of other problems and nudges players to transfer sometimes, but the wealth is not exactly being spread around.
We have seen that a big NIL budget is no guarantee of success. There is no doubt, however, that it helps. The irony is that Sanders used the transfer portal to establish his program nationally, but there is only so much he can do now that other programs are catching up.
