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As part of ACC media days, Clemson Tigers head coach Dabo Swinney faced reporters and was, unsurprisingly, questioned about his stance on the NCAA’s NIL decision and how he felt about the College Football Playoff expanding.
The Draft Network’s Trevor Sikkema passed along what Swinney had to say on the hot-button topics:
Even if he sounded like the old-school, stubborn type simply acknowledging that change was inevitable and he was powerless against it, at least Swinney’s rhetoric erred on the side of modernizing the sport.
Swinney’s seemingly reluctant acceptance of NIL and deflated admission that “money’s driving” a CFP expansion is the latest sign that he’s still failing to read the room.
Dabo Swinney’s remarks on key college football issues continue to disappoint
How can Swinney still be so tone deaf on players profiting off their name, image and likeness, and not see the obvious appeal of an expanded CFP?
Well, maybe it has something to do with his standing as one of the most handsomely compensated coaches in an ACC where Clemson easily reigns supreme over all year in and year out.
Making millions of dollars per year sounds like enough reinforcement for Swinney to be completely insulated from the realities facing contemporary players.
While he may be a charismatic leader, program builder and a seemingly well-intentioned human being, the more he speaks, the more evident it is that Swinney is out of touch with any progressive-minded or pro-player policies that may make college football better overall.
Yes, bowl games stand to suffer depending on how expanded the College Football Playoff becomes. However, the ability for NIL deals to happen can be a mutually beneficial dynamic between bowl sponsors and players, who could rock branded merchandise as part of the proceedings.
Schedule modifications would definitely need to be made to accommodate an expanded CFP, in order to keep players safe. Talk about something that’s “common sense” to use Swinney’s own words on what he allegedly believes and has all along on NIL.
But this self-explanatory point Swinney wants to run with to amplify his anti-CFP stance is made to appear that he’s standing up for the players. Maybe he genuinely believes that’s what he’s doing. It doesn’t come across that way.
Swinney sounded more like a politician backpedaling over his prior remarks. Had he specified in the first place, when he first spoke out in 2014 and infamously said, “I’ll go do something else” when the prospect of paying college athletes was posed, that he’d support NIL, then we’d have something to talk about.
That was seven years ago. Not once did Swinney, to the recollection of this author, ever publicly support NIL, or push for it. He’s had a huge platform all this time. Anything he said to support it could’ve expedited the process of enacting the policy.
Only once NIL was on the road to legitimately happening did Swinney say, in August, it could be a catalyst to “modernize the collegiate model.”
Better late than never. It just feels like Swinney doesn’t go far enough or is behind the curve when trying to clarify his alleged pro-player stances. That appears to be the case once again on NIL, and especially on the closely-associated issue of CFP expansion.
