bearsandgiants said:
As postulated by many, NIL is going to help smaller and middle schools up their game as backups on major programs seek playing time. Once your position is taken by a guy getting a paycheck, you have no hope of seeing the field unless there's an injury. Depth on major programs is about to disappear. What was once thought of as a menace is about to improve the quality of play across the entire ncaa spectrum. The only thing that sucks is that it's now even harder to win a championship, but even a smaller school might catch lightning in a bottle with a few second or third string players coming together in a single season.
Smaller schools aren't going to attract the same level of second-stringers as the bigger ones, so I don't really see that happening. Plus they can't afford to load up on them like the bigger players can.
The problem I see with NIL and a program like Cal (small power in a big pond), is your view regarding depth. However, the traditional powers will continue to accumulate the better benches, just not at the same level they did in the past.
What I see is a couple of the perennial powers not having a good year due to depth issues and a couple from the next level below taking their place from season to season.