Editorial

TCU Football Coach Gary Patterson Says Players Will Leave If Boosters Don’t Start Paying Them

Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports via Reuters

David Hookstead Sports And Entertainment Editor
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TCU football coach Gary Patterson wants boosters to know it’s time to start spending more money.

Now that we live in the era of NIL in college sports, athletes can earn money and profit off of their name, image and likeness.  That has led to an arms race among the powerful, and Patterson sounds worried that TCU might get pillaged if enough money doesn’t start flowing. (RELATED: David Hookstead Is The True King In The North When It Comes To College Football)

 

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“We’re going to have to be up and running for my group by the end of November, or I have a chance to lose 25, 30 guys. That’s as plain and simple as I can speak of it,” Patterson told the media about NIL deals for his players, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Patterson also said the following about a player on his team getting pitches from SEC teams to leave for the chance to get paid:

There’s five SEC schools calling him and telling him, ‘Here’s what we’ll give you if you come here and not stay at TCU.’ At the end of the day, that’s just real life. If we don’t do anything about it, within a year we lose him. The rules have changed. There is no wrong anymore… Players recruit players. When a kid calls, ‘Well, how are they taking care of you?’ If they don’t say they’re giving me this then the kid is not going to come. Players recruit players.

That’s about as blunt as it gets, folks. I’m not sure Patterson could be any clearer. He’s telling fans with money that they need to start peeling off some cash if they want good players to stay.

Is this something he should be saying out loud like this? Probably not, but clearly, the ship has left the dock at this point.

He needs players to make money and he needs it ASAP.

 

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I can promise you the NCAA won’t like the fact Patterson is being so blunt about the situation, but this is now the era we live in.

Players are finally able to earn some cash, and coaches have to learn how to adapt and deal with it.

 

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We’ll see if anyone steps up and helps, but it sounds like Patterson 100% understands the situation he’s facing. Get some money for his guys or risk losing them. It doesn’t get any simpler.