Texas Tech's Cody Campbell Driving Force Behind Surge of Change in CFB
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LUBBOCK, Texas — Every college football team wants to be the next big deal.
Some schools want to be at the top and are given the resources neccesary to get there.
Other schools have those aspirations, but don't want to take the next step forward to compete for a national championship.
That's where Texas Tech megadonor Cody Campbell stepped in at Texas Tech to make sure his alma mater, a school he poured his own blood, sweat and tears, can compete in an all new environment.
Everything changed in college athletics, whether that be good or bad, ahead of the 2021 season as athletes could earn money off their name, image and likeness. Campbell has taken full advantage of helping fund the Red Raiders a roster fully capable of making a run to the playoffs.
“At Texas Tech we’ve been fortunate to have some donors that have led the way for sure," Campbell told the Will Crain Show. We have 3,500 different people who have donated to our NIL collective, and we had a couple dozen people who are willing to write seven-figure checks.
"We have wealthy donors but also wealthy donors that are willing to give because they love the school and they believe in the coach, the administration, what’s going on. That’s been the key is just how organized are you and how much money can you manage to raise?”
The college football playoff field has been full of teams over the past two seasons that have rockets attached to its backs due to NIL funding. That aspect of the sport won't go away anytime soon, even if guardrails are put in place eventually.
From in-state rivals such as Texas A&M and SMU to national champion Indiana and the donor-driven machine at Oregon led by Phil Knight, the sport has undergone a dramatic transformation in just five years.
There are other schools around the nation that are waiting for those guardrails to be put in place before attempting to conform to the new normal.
For those schools, it has become a matter of adaptation or irrelevance, as college football and its counterparts continue to evolve at a rapid pace.
“Other schools have kind of just stuck their head in the sand and said, ‘We’re not going to do this, we’re not participating in it,'” Campbell said. “'We don’t want to raise all this money just to give it to the football team because we have other priorities at our university,’ which is not a wrong way of thinking. Ultimately the mission of these universities is to educate people and get them ready for the workforce. So is it right to be giving all this money to athletics?”
Campbell's been a driving force for change around the country and has quickly leveled the playing field around the nation. The SEC is no longer the strongest league in the country due to great players having options to not only play, but be compensated well for their production that likely leads to wins elsewhere.
No longer do players desire to play ball at a specific school because of a coach anymore.
No longer can a coach pull in talent nationwide because they don't want to lose to them somewhere else.
The Red Raiders have officially arrived as one of the best players of the game because one donor wasn't afraid to put his money where his mouth is.
"Darrell Royal had the famous quote: ‘I’m going to recruit a kid because he can’t beat me if he’s sitting on my bench,'" Campbell said. "That’s what the SEC did in many cases. They would have an incredible amount of, obviously their starting 22 was great, but their backups could beat everybody else also.
“Well now if you’re sitting on the bench at Georgia or Alabama, you’re not going to sit on the bench. You’re going to go somewhere, make a little bit of money somewhere else and get developed, get coached and turn into a great player.
Athletes have learned they can be premier without the largest names, the biggest brands, or most popular school.
"That’s what schools like Indiana have done," Campbell said. "They’ve picked up those guys that might not have been playing at one of the schools that used to be considered premier and they’re going other places and getting playing time.”
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Jacob is a contributor to Texas Tech and a seasoned journalist with over eight years of covering college football on digital platforms. He also contributes to Arkansas On SI and has previous writing experience at Saturday Down South and SB Nation. He is a graduate of Southern Arkansas University.
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