What I find interesting, everyone thinks this will be fixed when the playoff moves to 12 teams. Heck even March Madness has trouble with 48 + 4. Below are the top 13 teams at the end of the year as or yesterday. You'll notice 12 of the 13 will be in the BIG 10, or SEC next year, only team not in those conferences is FSU. Do you really think they are going to make room for G-5 Schools, or the ACC or Big 12? I am sure those 2 conferences will claim they are entitled to all 12 spots, they'll settle for 10, and there will be 2 spots left for the ACC, Big 12, and G-5, needless to say one group is left out.
The gap between about 15-20 big money schools and the rest will get worse. Look at Cam Ward, they say he has offers from around 10 schools of 1 million, I wouldn't be surprised to see him go for 2 million plus, many of these schools have the money, WSU had to pull nickels out of a piggybank to come up with 100K.
The Cougs are not getting back into a "power 5 conference" and won't be part of the BIG or SEC, or those 32-40 teams the networks pick, they just don't have the money to compete. And it is sad it has come to this, but we have to move on, and I am OK with that, they just have to strive to be the best of the rest. WSU has always had to play "Billy Ball", so moving forward, work on the high school recruits, and work the portal for stars sitting on the bench. As the top schools will spend more time in the portal picking off top talent, now that these kids realize how much they can make, more top players will be free agents. Players have two shots, build a resume, transfer once, then the grad transfer for the big payday. This can actually work to the Cougs advantage is played right, develop the players to help them to the big payday. Don't look at the 85 scholarships other schools have, with all this money and transfer portal, there are only 22 starters, so there are a lot of solid players sitting on the bench in the big programs, just have a find a way to lure them away. So unfortunately, NIL money is still an issue, you just have to manage that money and look ahead. Top of the line grad transfers are out of our budget, but that kid with 2-3 yeas left is who they need, and will possibly lose them their grad transfer year. You have to look at the portal similar to the JC programs, you get two years out of them at best. If they are stars, they are probably gone the 3rd year. Unless they are like Jackson and Stone.
This is one thing Dickert is doing right, he is helping Cam Ward getting to the next team and his big payday. If you are trying to lure portal players, tell them you'll develop them, give us 2-3 years and if you hit that big payday, we will help you with that too. It's like getting players ready for the NFL, except now you start getting them ready for their big NIL deal in their grad transfer year. I don't like, but that's the game these days, and the sooner you adapt the better off you are.
