You Son of an Onion. You sucked me in to this conversation with this post. Great discussion and great points from everybody.
The "Market" analogy is good one. I think a lot of people want it preemptively corrected because 1. They just arent used to status quo being disrupted. Change is hard for some and takes longer to accept/adapt 2. Fear that the product we love so much could really deteriorate to a terrible product, and 3. we all know its unsustainable without correction...human nature, we like to fix things.
Im personally glad the wealth is justifiably shifting towards the players. Long time overdue. This sport has been deteriorating and painfully predictable the past 10 + years. So many fans are sick of knowing which 4 schools will probably be in the playoffs before Week 1. The status quo needed to change. We are in the beginning phase of everything being shaken up. We dont quite know how to put value on some of these NIL's. ****, the market could go up even more the next few cycles before it starts crashing, which I think it will. But as you said, it will be corrected. Once the return on investment drops from these massive payouts, or the blue bloods feel the pain, then you will see change.
Right now there are 2 buses. The Haves (Bus #1) and the Have Nots (Bus #2). The good part about NIL is that now there are more teams in Bus #1 that can now compete for a title. Thank the fcking Lord that Miami can afford to be on Bus #1 right now. The problem is that the gap will completely widen between Bus 1 and Bus 2. Those on Bus 2 wont have a prayer to be competitive once we get through a few cycles of this. So what happens then? Will those universities basically give up on trying to compete/jump on Bus 1 if they dont have the resources, so they pull what resources they do have into football out and towards other programs? If that happens, that eventually hurts the student athletes who arent playing for the teams on Bus 1. That could hurt the sport and the fanbase. If/when they do start putting regulations in, the cheaters will quickly try to figure out how to get around them to get an advantage. This is where this **** needs to be policed, audited and enforced, without bias.
I do think however, there can be at least SOME level of equality in competition. The NFL has done pretty well in that aspect. Even in MLB that has notoriously been unbalanced, have made adjustments that have helped create some level of equality. No system is perfect. The NIL system is a good place to start change. But it wont be the finished framework. Not everyone will be on the same bus in college football. But as things get tweaked, I think the system can make sure that the buses are closer together, while still giving these young student athletes a truly fair opportunity to share in the wealth of the product that they work so hard at making. This is where "ingenuity and intelligence" is needed. I chuckle though at the thought of it coming from the NCAA.