Abstract
This paper explores a future in which two “super conferences” dominate college football. Considering the erosion of the PAC 12 Conference and the looming threats to the Atlantic Coast Conference against the skyrocketing media rights revenues of the Big Ten Conference and the Southeastern Conference (“Power Two”), thought leaders across college athletics anticipate that future industry changes will be characterized by a continued consolidation of valuable college football brands into fewer high major conferences than we see today. At the same time, the frequency and public sentiment toward legal attacks on student-athlete compensation restrictions are now such that major college football student-athletes are soon likely to gain access to greater compensation, through employment, collective bargaining, revenue-sharing, or otherwise. As college football becomes captured by the Power Two, there will be a greater incentive for the two rival conferences to work together to maximize the revenues associated with their media rights agreements and minimize the expenses associated with student-athlete compensation. This article argues that antitrust concerns related to media rights agreements are more salient than those related to student-athlete compensation, because courts will be more likely to find that the Power Two controls the relevant product market with respect to high major college football broadcasts than with respect to elite football student-athlete talent. The distinction is grounded in the presence or absence of a reasonable substitute for Power Two products in the context of different consumer groups. Regardless of the legal viability, this article also argues that public perception is such that conferences should avoid using their authority to cap student-athlete benefits. Instead, each institution should decide to compensate its student-athletes at fair, but fiscally responsible, levels that will sustain the college athletics framework.
Recommended Citation
Kamron Cox,
Exploring Key Antirust Implications of Conference Consolidation in College Football,
89 Mo. L. Rev.
(2024)
Available at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/mlr/vol89/iss2/8