Kiffin told SI that 100% of high school players are choosing schools based on the highest NIL guarantee—and he doesn’t blame them. Despite those saying otherwise, he believes the current model is, in fact, sustainable, yet it will produce uncomfortable locker-room environments where boosters evolve into team owners, manipulating coaching decisions and so on.
The NIL-disguised inducements are widening the gaps in FBS, he says, further separating the Group of 5 from the Power 5 but also creating more separation within the Power 5. NIL will allow Saban to win more championships, he claims, and he does not believe the 70-year-old Alabama coach will ever retire.
Finally, in a dose of honesty and reality that few care to admit publicly, Kiffin does not understand how college football has not yet moved to a professionalized model.
“We’re a professional sport,” he says, “and they are professional players.”
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You take a 17-year-old who, a lot of them, don’t come from money and family doesn’t come from money … if any person tells you that their NIL is not the No. 1 thing … take 100 of them and ask about the No. 1 thing that’s going to make the decision … it’s not the size of the stadium, not the head coach, not the campus or the conference, the No. 1 thing will be money.
And how would you blame them? A professional player already has money, and they usually follow the money [in free agency]. So when you don’t have it and are three or four years away from getting money in the NFL, you take what is guaranteed. How can you blame them when a lot of them never make it to the NFL? How do you not take it?
It’s totally changed recruiting. I joke all the time about it. Facilities and all that. Go ahead and build facilities and these great weight rooms and training rooms, but you ain’t gonna have any good players in them if you don’t have NIL money. I don’t care who the coach is or how hard you recruit, that is not going to win over money.
The thing that seems simple is there’s a cap. How are we not a professional sport? What is the difference? [Players] are making money. They can opt into free agency. We’re a professional sport, and they are professional players. Contracted employees without contracts. They can get out whenever they want. And how is it not being seen that, unless there are changes of rules around caps and contracts, how is every elite college player not at the end of their season [entering the portal]? … Let’s be realistic, in professional sports, if you are the agent of a player, and the player can opt into free agency and come back to where they want after testing the waters, who says, ‘No, I’m not going to do that,’ unless there’s a penalty?
Why did Bryce Young not go into the portal? If you are advising Bryce Young, why do you not go into the portal and walk into Nick Saban’s office and say, ‘Hey, I want to be here, but I’ve got to protect myself so I’m going to go into the portal. And I want to come back as long as it’s matched with what I get out there.’ The kid would make 10 times what he would have made. How’s that not going to happen all the time? It should. It will.
You have kids going to schools now, and some haven’t even taken a visit. [They sign] because of their NILs. You’ve got to think that it is here to stay. To say that it’s not sustainable, why? Ten years ago, no one would have said schools were going to pay coaches $10 million a year. Well, they do now.
When people argue and say there is no way donors are going to come up with the money to pay players this much? Wait, those are the same donors that pay $30 to $40 million to one coach—when they fire him! But they’re not going to raise $20 million a year for players? Yeah, they are. It just means they’re not going to give it to other things on campus, like facilities.
If there’s something big-money people are motivated to do, they do. Everyone wants to own an NFL team. It’s essentially like you’re a minority owner if you are a big-time investor [in a collective]. You get to show up on Saturday and see your product.
