Syracuse athletic director John Wildhack is the latest voice calling for serious reforms in college football, including a holistic rethinking of the schedule, collective bargaining with athletes and solidifying television media rights to build a sustainable future.
Wildhack told ESPN that he believes it is imperative for college sports (and football, in particular) to use the current moment as an opportunity to make radical changes to address current issues such as the transfer portal, in-season coach departures, player eligibility and revenue gaps.
“We have a tendency to see things as a one-size-fits-all and we need to look at the sport holistically,” Wildhack said. “When you're in a moment where you have that popularity and fan support, you have to take advantage of it and improve it.”
Wildhack, a former ESPN executive who served as AD at Syracuse since 2016, said the sport's popularity should not be an excuse to continue to avoid addressing key issues, but rather an endorsement to find solutions now. His concerns have been echoed in recent days by other power brokers in the sport, from Georgia President Jere Morehead to Clemson's Dabo Swinney.
At this week's American Football Coaches Association convention in Charlotte, coaches attempted to address one part of the eligibility issues by unanimously supporting a plan to extend redshirt eligibility to any player who plays in fewer than nine games in a season.
Meanwhile, a subcommittee of coaches and athletic directors met in Charlotte outside of the formal AFCA agenda to discuss changes to the schedule that one athletic director described as “very productive” with a focus on “progress, not perfection.”
Still, Wildhack's public support for collective bargaining and broadcast media consolidation marks one of the most emphatic pushes toward meaningful reform by a current athletic director.
“There needs to be collective bargaining,” Wildhack said. “The players should be paid, there's no doubt about that. But with collective bargaining there are rules that have been negotiated. It's a legal document that everyone has obligations that they must respect. That's where we have to go.”
Wildhack said a deal with “real teeth” is also needed to combat schools that “flagrantly ignore” guidelines set by the College Athletic Commission.
Wildhack also called for a holistic reinvention of the college football schedule, which has been a hot topic among coaches and fans after former Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin departed for the LSU job before the Rebels began a playoff run that ended in the Vrbo Fiesta Bowl. In the lead-up to that loss to Miami, Kiffin and Ole Miss fought over how many outgoing assistant coaches would be available to the Rebels instead of joining the rest of LSU's new staff in Baton Rouge.
Amid the debate over the schedule, college football commissioners will meet this weekend to discuss expanding the College Football Playoff beyond its current 12 teams.
The last piece of the puzzle, and perhaps the most complicated, Wildhack said, is revenue generation.
With $20.5 million in revenue sharing starting this year, schools have been left scrambling to cover the costs, and the revenue gap between the biggest brands in the largest conferences and the “have-nots” in the smaller leagues has grown significantly in the process.
But Wildhack pointed to strong ratings for bowl games and this year's College Football Playoff as evidence that the sport is leaving huge sums of money on the table by not negotiating television deals as a unified bloc.
Wildhack pointed to the ACC's successful new initiatives and brand distribution model as ways to ensure that college football's biggest brands don't take a financial step back by accepting consolidated television rights, but said it's in everyone's best interest to consider options to increase television revenue on a national rather than per-conference basis.
“There's no 100% approval rating, but let's take what we have now and make it better,” Wildhack said. “The time is right and there are many opportunities left on the table. If we address the key issues and can start to make progress, we will do better for everyone and the sport will prosper. There is no doubt.”
