STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Some other news now. A bill to reform college sports outscored the opposition in the U.S. Senate. The Protect College Sports Act passed 77 to 22. NPR's Becky Sullivan reports.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: Big-time college sports have been through a lot lately. So much so that even conservatives who are generally against government intervention say it's time for Congress to step in, like Republican Senator Eric Schmitt.
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ERIC SCHMITT: Some say Congress should simply stay out of college sports. Well, I understand that instinct. You would not have seen me giving this speech on the Senate floor three years ago when I got here. I would have been very, very skeptical of that.
SULLIVAN: He and other supporters of the bill point to decades of lawsuits that have eroded all sorts of longstanding NCAA rules about amateurism and who is eligible to play college sports and how often athletes can transfer schools. As a result, they say, the college sports landscape is in chaos, with runaway athletic department budgets and players switching teams every year to chase more money for their name, image and likeness deals, or NIL.
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SCHMITT: NIL, revenue-sharing and the transfer portal are here to stay. We're not turning back the clock, and whether you loved or hated the old system, we shouldn't try.
SULLIVAN: The bill would codify the ability for schools to pay players directly, and it would grant the NCAA a limited antitrust exemption to restore some of those old rules. Athletes would have a five-year window to play college sports, starting from their enrollment or the year they turned 19, and players would only be able to freely change schools one time. To switch again, they'd have to sit out a whole year. Critics say the bill puts too many restrictions on athletes without doing enough to address other sources of rising spending, like multimillion-dollar salaries for coaches. Among the senators who voted against it was Democrat Chris Murphy from Connecticut.
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CHRIS MURPHY: This bill constricts only - only caps the money going to the players - does nothing to the money going to the coaches, does nothing to stop the continued billions of dollars going in to feed this facilities arms race.
SULLIVAN: If a goal of the bill is to stem the flood of lawsuits against the NCAA, this might not work, says Sam Ehrlich. He's an associate professor at Boise State University who tracks college sports litigation.
SAM EHRLICH: I think it's folly to just assume that's going to completely kill all the litigation against the NCAA. For one, I think there's some questions out there about whether the bill itself is constitutional.
SULLIVAN: President Trump has already expressed his support for the legislation. But first, it has to pass the House, which is on recess until after the midterms. And it's no guarantee that this bill will be the top priority when lawmakers return.
Becky Sullivan, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF TIN HAT TRIO'S "BILL") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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