Marsha Blackburn Asks Nick Saban If Agent Fees For College Athletes Should Be Capped

[0:00] your back. Thank you. Senator Blackburn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to each of you for [0:06] being here. As you can see, there is a lot of bipartisan interest in doing something to correct [0:14] this situation that seems to be running off the rails. And quite frankly, I think Congress is [0:20] late to the game on this. I think the NCAA has really dropped the ball on this. They should [0:27] have done something years ago. And as you can see from the audience behind you, I think [0:33] every intern, college intern that is up here has tried to get in this room today so that [0:40] they could see this. And I know that some from Tennessee are saying, go Vols and go Vanderbilt. [0:47] Mr. Gee, they've had quite a season. We loved having you in Nashville at Vanderbilt. Coach [0:54] Sabin, I want to come to you. We've heard a lot about navigating this marketplace. We're [1:00] talking about a billion-dollar marketplace right now that basically has no framework, no constraints. [1:09] Senator Cantwell and I had introduced the Hustle Act, which put in place some baseline transparency [1:16] standards by requiring these agents to be registered. And we've heard from Mr. Holstclaw, sometimes [1:23] you don't know what you don't know until you're too far into this. And I really appreciated your [1:30] opening testimony. So I'm glad that provision is in the Protect College Sports Act. But I'd [1:39] like for you to talk a little bit about why there should be registration, why there should [1:46] be transparency, why there should be disclosure requirements that would help protect the student [1:54] athlete from exploitation. [1:56] Well, we mentioned this before earlier in our testimony that I think it's imperative that [2:04] student athletes, their families, you know, have protection from agents. Right now, you don't [2:09] have to be registered to be an agent for a college player. So anybody on the street can [2:14] do it. We don't have any regulation on how much they can charge. [2:20] Would their fees be capped? [2:22] No question. I think that, you know, if you look at NFL, they're 3% to 5%. We have college [2:29] players paying 20%. We have agents that encourage players to get in a portal when it's really not [2:36] in their best interest to get in a portal only to try to stimulate more revenue for them, but [2:43] really for themselves with no guarantee that they're going to get a more revenue. So I do [2:49] think there should be regulation. I do think there should be rules. I do think they should [2:53] be registered. You know, look, the NFL has a lot of really good rules and you have to be a registered [3:00] agent with the Players Association and the NFL to be able to represent players. And I think families [3:06] and student athletes have the same, should have the same protection in terms of the framework that [3:17] we put around agents for college kids. Okay. That's great. Mr. Holstclaw, do you agree with what [3:22] he said? And I want you also to talk, pardon me, about the financial literacy. Should that be a requirement? [3:34] I do agree to parts of what Mr. Saban is over there saying. He is definitely speaking truth [3:41] on to what happens in the lives of our student athletes when they have to deal with agents. [3:46] Agents do encourage a lot of decisions for student athletes that they have signed to their agency. [3:52] And again, agents do get paid through what college athletes get paid. So them trying to influence [3:59] the decisions of student athletes will influence their pay. Again, I think this goes back to the [4:05] education piece of educating a lot of student athletes on the fact that your agent works for [4:10] you and that you don't work for your agent. Your agent is supposed to be helping you. And again, [4:14] those ridiculous amounts of money that's being taken from a lot of these student athletes is [4:19] is a disservice to the game, you know. And I've had great experiences when it comes to [4:27] me and an agent. I've also seen the bad side of other teammates that I've had that I've had to [4:34] deal with bad agents and have said, this agent hasn't done anything for me. They're taking too much [4:38] money. They're this, they're that. And there's definitely an issue with anybody just being able [4:43] to be an agent without those type of regulations. I agree that there should be that. That's great. [4:48] Ms. Google, I want to come to you on the transfer portal and just have you talk for a minute about [4:54] the damage that can be done not only to the school and the program, but to the athlete with this constant [5:01] transferring. Yes, thank you for that question. And certainly, while I think everybody at this table, [5:09] you know, supports freedom of movement and freedom of choice for student athletes with [5:14] guardrails in place. I think there are so many consequences of what's happening right now. [5:19] Lance talked a little bit about how it feels to kind of jump from program to program and have [5:25] lots of transition. What it does academically, if I think we're going to start to see with graduation [5:31] rates around transfer student athletes that our core purpose of tying college athletics to the [5:36] educational mission is being lost because of this hopping around from institution to institution. [5:42] It really does undermine the foundational team culture and team atmosphere when you don't know [5:49] year to year, month to month, who your teammates are going to be. And really, these relationships [5:54] that happen in these locker rooms are some of the richest and most transformational relationships that [6:00] a student athlete can have in their life. So I think there are academic impacts. I think there are culture [6:05] impacts to teams. And I think there are mental health pressures, too, when you have agents in your ear, [6:11] you know, kind of pressuring you to consider other options when maybe it's not in your best interest, [6:15] or maybe you're happy where you are. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, [6:21] Senator Blackburn. And I will note, I think one of the most important parts of Senator Cantwell's in my life,