Baker: Settlement helps NCAA stabilize, avoid 'bankruptcy' - ESPN

ORLANDO, Fla. — NCAA president Charlie Baker told hundreds of collegiate athletics administrators during a keynote address Tuesday that the recent multibillion-dollar House settlement approval creates «a far better future» for the organization, one that «comes with choices, instead of bankruptcy.»

Baker made his first public comments since Judge Claudia Wilken approved the deal between the NCAA, its most powerful conferences and lawyers representing all Division I athletes, as he addressed the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics convention. The House v. NCAA settlement, reached last Friday, ends three separate federal antitrust lawsuits, all of which claimed the NCAA was illegally limiting the earning power of college athletes.

In front of a standing-room-only crowd, Baker told the assembled group, «No one in this room needs to hear me say that this is one of the biggest changes ever in college sports. I hope you also understand that it's a far better future than virtually every other alternative that could have been in front of us.

»Blame whoever you wish to blame. But the simple truth is clear: College sports' collective inability or unwillingness to change years ago put the entire enterprise at risk. Is the settlement disruptive? Very much so. But it is an opportunity for the D-I community to pay for back damages over 10 years, instead [of] triple that amount all at once. And it creates a future that comes with choices, instead of bankruptcy."

As a result of the settlement, the NCAA will pay nearly $2.8 billion in back damages over the next 10 years to athletes who competed in college at any time from 2016 through the present. In addition, schools are now permitted to pay athletes up to $20.5