SACHA PFEIFFER, HOST:
A bill to reform college sports is about to clear its biggest hurdle yet. The Senate is expected to vote later today on the Protect College Sports Act. The bill's supporters say it will help tame what they call a Wild West era for college sports. It's expected to pass in the Senate with a bipartisan majority, but its future in the House is unclear. NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan is with us to tell us more. Hi, Becky.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: Hey there.
PFEIFFER: What does this bill do?
SULLIVAN: You know what? Actually, right now, it does a lot. You know, broadly speaking, I think the summary to say is that it tackles, you know, as you point out, what its supporters say is this sort of era of chaos in college sports. That Wild West quote that you mentioned - you know, that's something that Ted Cruz, the Republican of Texas, has been saying. He is one of the lead negotiators on this.
And what they're referring to, essentially, is this kind of decade-or-more-long period now that we've been in with litigation against the NCAA that has upended all of these long-standing rules and principles that govern high-level college sports. Like, you know, we've seen college football and basketball, especially, become these massive multibillion-dollar businesses, and athletes, understandably, wanted a piece of that pie. And these lawsuits have piled up, and they've cut away at rules like transfers, eligibility, obviously pay for athletes.
And the way that college sports works, especially at the highest levels - Division I, revenue-generating - it changes rapidly year to year. And so I talked late last week to Eric Schmitt, a Republican from Missouri. He is a conservative who's generally against the government getting too involved in things, but he decided to be a cosponsor on this bill, and here's what he said about that.
ERIC SCHMITT: If you would have asked me a few years ago - just a few years ago - whether or not Congress had a role in any of this, I would've been very, very skeptical. But watching it as closely as I have just as a fan, and then getting to know people, whether they're coaches or athletic directors or players or university presidents, the current trajectory is just unsustainable.
PFEIFFER: And then, Becky, what exactly would the bill do to change this Wild West environment, as Ted Cruz calls it?
SULLIVAN: Yeah. I mean, the big one is that it basically grants - it would grant, I should say - the NCAA a limited antitrust exemption to restore some of those rules. So a five-year eligibility limit that starts once a player has enrolled in school or on their 19th birthday. Players would only be able to transfer once without any penalty. If they want to transfer again, they'd have to sit out a year, with some exceptions. It dramatically ups the salary cap, so to speak, sort of, of revenue that universities are allowed to share indirect payments to players. It would up that to $49 million across all sports for any given school. And it attempts to crack down sort of on some of these, you know, above-market-value name, image and likeness deals that have been compensating athletes, trying to get everything on the books.
There's a handful of other provisions, too, like about agent pay and health and safety requirements. There are some requirements for schools to maintain roster spots and scholarships for women's sports and Olympic sports, although there are some key exemptions there, and those clauses would expire after a set number of years.
PFEIFFER: Becky, I assume the bill has some opponents. What do people oppose?
SULLIVAN: Yeah, it does. I mean, you know, I think what you maybe have heard is that, broadly speaking, the bill works to limit what athletes can do, while opponents say it doesn't do enough to address other issues. So the bill's supporters do cite runaway costs of college athletics - things like jumps in spending for recruiting, game-day experience, travel costs, because, you know, some of these conferences have gone from regional to national, not to mention a ballooning pay for coaches. And so, you know, there's like 60 or so coaches, for example, who are now paid more than $5 million per year. That's according to USA Today. And so opponents of the bill says it does too much to limit athletes while not doing enough to address other things.
PFEIFFER: And real quickly, Becky, today, a vote is expected in the Senate. Tell me how you expect this to play out.
SULLIVAN: Yeah. There's a few amendments they're going to consider, and then this evening is when the vote is scheduled to happen. After that, it'll go to the House. The catch is the House is on recess right now - not scheduled to return until after the midterms in November. And so it's a little hard to predict what's going to happen there.
PFEIFFER: That is NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan. Thank you.
SULLIVAN: You're welcome.
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