The NCAA settlement is unjust & discriminatory. Student-athletes deserve a deal that reflects their true value they bring to college sports

"The bottom line is that the NCAA and its member colleges are suppressing the pay of student athletes who collectively generate billions of dollars in revenues for colleges every year. Those enormous sums of money flow to seemingly everyone except the student-athletes. College presidents, athletic directors, coaches, conference commissioners, and NCAA executives take in sixand seven-figure salaries. Colleges build lavish new facilities. But the student athletes who generate the revenues, many of whom are African American and from lower-income backgrounds, end up with little or nothing." - Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh

- Marc H. Morial, President and CEO National Urban League

The U.S. Supreme Court ruling in NCAA v. Alston was clear: the NCAA had taken advantage of college athletes in violation of antitrust laws, and the matter had to be addressed.

"The NCAA's decision to build a massive business on top of student-athletes who are not fairly compensated is not just old-fashioned; it is legally flawed," Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote.

"The NCAA couches its arguments for not paying student athletes in innocuous labels." Justice Brett Kavanaugh concurred. "But the labels cannot disguise the reality: the NCAA's rules fix the price of student-athlete labor."

It was the responsibility of the lower court in the House v. NCAA case to correct this injustice. However, the House settlement completely missed the mark.

The proposed settlement to reform the NCAA's name, image, and likeness policies is a structurally unjust system masked as reform. College athletics has long operated as a plantation-style economy, where predominantly Black athletes generate billions in value while being denied basic pay and labor protections.

No professional sports league in America would accept a framework without adequate revenue-sharing or player protections. Yet the proposed settlement enshrines this exploitation into federal law under the false pretense of fairness.