Drake Maye Likes Pat Narduzzi's NIL Salary Cap Idea

Pitt Panthers head coach Pat Narduzzi has one believer in his NIL salary cap idea.

PITTSBURGH -- Pitt Panthers head coach Pat Narduzzi caught some heat and made some headlines after responding to a question about NIL's use in college athletics and what he would choose to change about the practice if he could. 

Narduzzi floated the idea of an NIL salary cap, similar to what the NFL and some other professional sports leagues have, so that smaller schools like Pitt wouldn't get automatically outpaced by schools with richer donors and larger donor bases who can out bid them in the NIL deals that become part of the recruiting pitch. Many from the college football world disagreed with Narduzzi but he has one supporter from within his conference. 

"I think one of the best things that I heard from yesterday, anf I forget who I heard it from, would be to create something kind of like the NFL salary cap," North Carolina quarterback Drake Maye said. "That way each team in each league can spend the same amount of money on players, even earning money company-wise."

Like Narduzzi, Maye is concerned about the imbalance that exists between the haves and have-nots in college athletics. 

"But from the university itself, with collectives, I think teams with more money are always going to get the better players, so just trying to find a way to even out that spread between all the ACC schools."

Maye, who is a certified superstar not just in the ACC but in college football as a whole, will likely be a first-round draft pick when he inevitably leaves school at the end of this coming season. 

His head coach, Mack Brown, claimed that schools attempted to tamper with his star quarterback last winter and use NIL to induce him to leave, but to no avail. Maye is still with the Tar Heels and should contend for the Heisman Trophy as he leads them in 2023. 

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