College athletes around the country have their eyes on the NCAA, which will vote Wednesday on whether to let young players profit from their own names and images — a movement pioneered in California that supporters view as a matter of civil rights.
A “yes” vote would abolish the organization’s long-held rule prohibiting college players from being paid to endorse products, earn money as social media influencers or to license their images, even to raise money for charity.
The organization, which encompasses 350 Division I colleges and universities that play intercollegiate sports, had its hand forced by California’s Fair Pay to Play Act of 2019. That law, carried by state Sen. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, was the first in the country to allow student athletes to profit off their names and images, and 22 other states have since done the same.
Approval by the NCAA’s Division I Board of Governors would free each school to comply with such laws without interference from the NCAA, and would allow schools in states without such laws to create rules of their own. Athletes would still not be eligible to be paid directly by universities.
“Slam dunk! College athletes across the country are about to score big!” Skinner said in a statement when the NCAA’s Division I Council recommended Monday that the change be adopted.
But even if the NCAA approves the proposal, California’s top student athletes could not immediately sign any lucrative contracts. That’s because the state’s law doesn’t take effect until 2023, although a new bill from Skinner, SB26, would move the date up to Sept. 1.
But hopes among athletes are high that changes will happen sooner rather than later.
“I think it’s awesome that kids will have the opportunity to generate publicity and be compensated for what they’re doing,” Shane Griffith, a top Stanford wrestler, told The Chronicle on Tuesday.
“It’s a great opportunity to build your own brand, explore options and capitalize on yourself,” said Griffith, who won a national championship in the spring even as Stanford planned to cut wrestling from the roster. (The sport was saved.)
For decades, the NCAA has argued that letting college athletes make endorsements and otherwise profit from their images would turn amateurs into professionals. The University of California and Stanford were among the schools that fought against Skinner’s Fair Pay to Play Act.
But advocates for the practice call the restrictions hypocritical in an industry that reaps billions of dollars for universities — more than $110 million at Cal for the 2020 fiscal year, for example. Many of the athletes now barred from profiting off their likenesses are students of color and women, and most are top-flight athletes for only a short time.
“We’re getting equal rights. In a lot of ways, this has been talked about as a civil rights issue,” said Hayley Hodson, a Stanford graduate who was national freshman of the year for women’s volleyball in 2016.
“Female athletes have so many fewer opportunities to play their sport in America,” Hodson told The Chronicle. “There’s really no path for the vast majority of female athletes to monetize their skills.”
Hodson was a star, her talents heating up just as Instagram, too, was heating up. She finished her last high school year online because she was training with the women’s U.S. national volleyball team.
“I was ready to start doing social media influencing before that even existed and partner with brands,” Hodson said. She noted that nothing bars students in other fields from starting a business or capitalizing on their names and likenesses.
“I would have loved to have done that,” she said. “I had entrepreneurial instincts that were stifled right there.”
And then she had a concussion. And another. Four in all, ending her career — and what could have been her financial window — halfway through Stanford.
“This is a really important moment, and an exciting one that has always seemed like the right thing and obvious thing,” said Hodson, who is now attending law school at UCLA.
UC officials said they were reviewing the NCAA’s proposal and said it will “carefully assess any changes in NCAA policy.”
Stanford said it was working with the NCAA and other schools in the Pac-12 conference “to fully understand the nuances” of the developments and to see “how they relate to us at Stanford.”
San Francisco Chronicle sports columnist Ann Killion contributed to this report.
Nanette Asimov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: nasimov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @NanetteAsimov
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