Former Florida Gators coach Urban Meyer was among an esteemed list of personalities invited to the White House on Mar. 7 for a roundtable on the current chaotic state of college sports. Meyer, who has had a storied college football career, is one of a handful of coaches to have won the national championship with two different programs.
After the roundtable, Meyer received a lot of backlash from fans and analysts for his controversial stance about abolishing NIL collectives in college sports and calling them “pay for play.”
Urban Meyer Clarifies Controversial Stance
During Wednesday’s segment of the “Triple Option” podcast, Meyer clarified his controversial stance and recommendation to the president at the roundtable on players getting paid.
“When the president asked me my thoughts, is the one, the collective issue,” Meyer said. “I actually spoke to some people and they said, ‘How do you get a group of people there that do not want the players to get paid?’ Of course, they’re gonna get paid. I don’t know where that comes from. There’s revenue-share and there’s NIL opportunity.
“Those are two ways that players can get paid, should get paid and keeps everybody moving in the right direction. My recommendation was to eliminate the collective. The university can simply revenue share and that’s it and let the real marketplace take care of any NIL opportunities.”
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The NIL era that has collided with freer movement of players via the transfer portal has been beset by legal cases between student-athletes, programs, and the NCAA, with eligibility issues at the forefront of those tussles.
ESPN Analyst Blasts Meyer’s Roundtable Perspective
During Monday’s segment of the “McElroy & Cubelic in the Morning” show, ESPN analyst Paul Finebaum blasted Meyer for his widely discussed comments at the White House roundtable last week.
“I think the continuum of speeches got a little monotonous, because we know what the problem is and Saban (Nick) brings a great perspective,” Finebaum said. “We really didn’t need Urban Meyer ranting about something that everybody in that room that has a clue about college athletics is aware of.
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“The question is, if you have a group of 15-20 speakers out of a room of 50, what does anyone remember? Unfortunately, most people will remember the end of it when it got a little bit off the rails.”
After his retirement from college football in 2018, after a seven-year tenure in Columbus with the Ohio State Buckeyes, Meyer made a brief return to the NFL as the head coach of the Jacksonville Jaguars before embarking fully on his career as an analyst on Fox Sports.
