Scott Satterfield cautious of name, image, likeness & one-time transfer rules

In an unprecedented move by the NCAA, their Board of Directors announced last week that they were moving towards allowing student-athletes to receive compensation from "third-party endorsements both related to and separate from athletics," essentially allowing student-athletes to capitalize on their name, image and likeness (NIL).

While he is all for giving his student-athletes as much as he can give them, Louisville Football head coach Scott Satterfield is not a huge proponent of the proposed NIL rules.

"I'm more of a purist when it comes to collegiate sports," Satterfield said in teleconference with reporters Tuesday. "I like the part of amateurism, and when we open up those can of worms, the amateurism part is really going away."

Instead of simply voicing displeasure of the idea for the sake of amateurism, Satterfield elaborated greatly on his stance and offered valid criticisms and concerns regarding NIL.

"If it's gonna come down to where now we're having to put packages together with recruits as far as how much money these guys can make and here's what we can set you up with, now we're not even talking about the education piece," he said.

One facet of the game that Satterfield believes will be the most impacted is recruiting, and that it could make way for an arms race against schools who have the financial capital to lure whoever they want.

"I just got to think that the ones who have boosters that are willing to provide money for these recruits to come in, they're gonna certainly do that and they're gonna offer that," he said. "If I'm a recruit, when I talk to this school I'm gonna say 'Hey, what are you offering me? What kind of possibilities will you guys have?' and so on and so forth."

When you combine NIL with the one-time transfer rule that has been proposed, Satterfield believes that it will "absolutely" create a slippery slope in terms of what can be offered.

"They are two separate entities (NIL & transfer rule) and we understand that. But if you're able to transfer at any point in time and be eligible immediately, don't you think that tampering is going to get involved if you couple it with NIL?" he said. "It's gonna happen. We know that's gonna happen. We don't want (tampering) in the game, and there's hardly any way to monitor that."

He also argued that a one-time transfer rule would affect football differently than other sports considerably the game's position-specific nature.

"For example, if eight offensive linemen decide to transfer, there's nobody else on your team that you can just put right in there to play offensive line. It just doesn't work that way."

The amount of these transfers a program takes could also impact players at the high school level and how many said program decides to sign.

"What if we're going to start holding our scholarship numbers to say 'Okay, transfers are out there. I'm gonna sign 10 high school kids and I'm gonna save 15 for transfers.' Well now we're hurting the high school kids."

The NCAA Board of Directors recommended that they delay voting on the one-time transfer rule due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, but did not rule out a vote taking place. It could still happen as early as the Board's next meeting this month.

Regardless, Satterfield believes that if left unchecked, the combination of both the NIL & one-time transfer rules could create a litany of unintended consequences to college football.

"It's just a very slippery slope," he said. "There's just so many tentacles out there that are going to come about."

You can follow us for future coverage by clicking "Follow" on the top righthand corner of the page. Also be sure to like us on Facebook & Twitter:

Facebook - @LouisvilleOnSI

Twitter - @LouisvilleOnSI and Matthew McGavic at @GeneralWasp