Archie Manning Concerned About ‘Wild West’ NIL Landscape

Manning: "I do know I love the game of college football and I don’t want it ruined.”

Archie Manning had the privilege of watching his sons, Peyton and Eli, have Super Bowl-winning NFL careers. Before watching his progeny, the two-time Pro Bowler played at Ole Miss in the late 1960s before playing with the Saints, Oilers and Vikings in the NFL. Nearly 40 years later, as he prepares to watch his grandson, Arch, navigate the college football landscape, he is worried about the current state of the game due to chaotic nature of name, image and likeness rules.

During the first annual Nick Saban Legacy Award ceremony Monday in Birmingham, Manning said he is not “crazy” about what NIL has done to alter the apparent.

“I wish they were a little more uniform in nature throughout the school,” Manning said. “It’s like the wild, wild west. I do know I love the game of college football and I don’t want it ruined.”

Dellenger: College Leaders Urging NCAA to Enforce New NIL Guidelines, Or Else

On Thursday’s Sports Illustrated’s Ross Dellenger reported that leaders around college sports have “strongly urged” the NCAA’s enforcement team to start examining what would be considered as recruiting violations. In today’s college football landscape, donors have “struck deals” with players before they signed letters of intent. It is what Colorado’s athletic director Rick George considers a violation of rules that needs to be changed by the NCAA.

“This is the time we have to put our stake in the ground,” George said during this week’s NIL meetings in Phoenix. “This is not acceptable. What we’re doing is not good for intercollegiate athletics, and it has got to stop.”

Like Manning, several other college coaches in previous weeks have spoken out about the perceived NIL imbalance and, if not changed, will lead to wide-ranging issues in the future of college sports.