How revenue sharing could alter the Alabama student-athlete experience

HOMEWOOD, Ala. — The college experience will soon be changing for student-athletes.

The pending settlement in the House vs. NCAA antitrust case will allow schools to pay their players directly as soon as 2025. However, current athletic directors warn that effects from that shared revenue could limit some of the luxuries athletic programs have provided in recent years.

According to most estimates, schools will be allowed to provide roughly $20 million to players across all of their athletic programs. Now it’s up to athletic directors to decide where that money will come from and how it will be budgeted per sport.

As is the case at nearly every school, Alabama’s only two revenue-generating sports are football and men’s basketball. Those two programs fund the Crimson Tide’s other 19 scholarship sports.

Alabama athletics director Greg Byrne made an appearance at the Associated Press Sports Editors South region meeting on Birmingham Southern’s campus Monday. He had just got off the plane from Oklahoma City where he took in the softball team’s run at the Women’s College World Series. In praising the softball team’s performance this season, Byrne pointed out that despite often leading the nation in attendance for the sport, the program doesn’t come close to making a profit.

That’s not a criticism, but it is a harsh reality for Alabama moving forward, especially with a new $20 million yearly expense set to hit the books.

Amidst the current panic and speculation surrounding college athletics, there have been concerns over whether some non-revenue programs will be cut altogether. At the moment, that seems like a last-resort option for Byrne at Alabama.

“You don’t want to do that,” Byrne said during the SEC’s spring meetings last month, via the Athletic. “You’ve seen a couple schools in the last few years since COVID who have reduced sports. Obviously, that would be the last thing we would want to do.”

So where will Alabama find the money to operate in college athletics’ new landscape? Monday, Byrne and Auburn athletics director John Cohen hinted that it might come in cuts to some of the amenities athletes have become accustomed to in recent years.

“There’s this really difficult balance that we’re all trying to maintain,” Cohen said. “None of us wants to take anything away from any of our sports. We know for a fact that that gymnast works every bit as hard as that running back. But there’s these challenges, and there are these laws that are colliding, and we’re in the middle of it.”

Byrne brought up a statistic he shared two years ago that estimated Alabama currently spends $195,000 on each of its full-ride scholarship athletes every year. Those costs range from food and transportation to upgraded facilities that might help a player on an individual basis.

“If you haven’t noticed, food costs have sky-rocketed,” Byrne said Monday. “We’re not immune to that. … our uncontrolled costs like food, like travel, insurance — just in the last few years our food budget alone has gone up probably almost $3 million.”

Some of those costs will be offset by the $12 million to $15 million per year Alabama and other SEC schools will receive due to a new television deal with ESPN. More money will also be generated from an expanded College Football Playoff. However, that sum will help determine the percentage of revenue sharing teams can provide to players, meaning the estimated $20 million could end up being higher than expected.

There’s also the question of funding teams at a championship level. Sure, Alabama can probably find a way to provide for all of its 21 teams. However, it’s going be a challenge to keep up the required level of competition in all sports, especially considering the increased demands for recruiting in football and men’s basketball.

Last month, The Athletic reported that one CEO of a college collective estimated that roughly 80 percent of their school’s projected $14.5 million in NIL earnings would be devoted to football this year. While there could be differences between how NIL and revenue sharing are handled, it’s safe to assume most schools will put a similar emphasis on football when it comes to funding.

Byrne affirmed Monday that will certainly be the case at Alabama.

“We’re not going to stop investing in football,” Byrne said. “That will not happen because the impact it makes on everything else. One of the best investments the University of Alabama has ever made was in Nick Saban. There’s criticism in that at times, but that was a really good investment for the university.”

Byrne and the rest of the nation’s athletic directors are now tasked with balancing the books while making sure they make similarly wise investment decisions with their respective programs. That will come with a few tough budget cuts and inevitably a change in life for college athletes moving forward.

“Our goal is to keep the experience level in how we operate at a level that we’re used to,” Byrne said. “But there will be decisions that have to be made in order to accommodate what the new model will be moving forward. … We’ve been very honest with our coaches about it.”