Jim Harbaugh takes aim at NCAA, conference leadership, networks and more after winning national title

HOUSTON, Texas – The Michigan Wolverines closed out their 2023 season with a national championship win over the Washington Huskies on Monday night. Tuesday morning, head coach Jim Harbaugh, running back Blake Corum and cornerback Will Johnson spoke at the champions’ press conference at the JW Marriott, but one of the bigger responses of the day came in a big-picture question.

Harbaugh has been an advocate for change in college sports that revolves around player compensation since arriving at Michigan. A reporter asked him to share his thoughts on where things are headed, which kicked off a several-minute response from Harbaugh on what he would like to see now that the season is over and the time has come to address it.

Here is the Michigan HC’s full, unaltered response, which aimed the NCAA, lawyers, television networks, conference commissioners and more:

The thing I would change about college football is to let the talent share in the ever-increasing revenues. We’re all robbing the same train. And the ones that are in the position to do the heavy lifting, the ones that risk life and limb out there on the football field are the players.

And not just football players, student-athletes. The organizations are fighting hard to keep all the money – the universities, the NCAA, the conferences. And it’s long past time to let the student-athletes share in the ever-increasing revenues.

I mean, it’s billions. I keep reading facts about how much money is being made. I mean, product placement. I can’t have a can of a different kind of soda up here. I have to put it into a cup here. (Laughter).

I mean, everybody, they’re maximizing every single revenue source there is, but they’re not sharing it with the talent. There’s no business that that would ever fly. I mean, the Supreme Court has said the same thing. So, yeah, that’s a big one. I would change that one.

And there needs to be a voice for the young people, the student-athletes. Right now there is no voice. I mean, there are armies of attorneys, and I’ve seen them at the NCAA, I’ve seen them at the universities, the conferences. And then if they don’t have enough firepower legally, they go out, hire the tall-building law firms and they get more firepower.

But there’s no voice for the student-athletes right now, and it just needs to change. That’s a wrong that needs to be righted. Starting to compile a list of just the excuses that people give for not – it’s complicated. What about this? What about that?

All I know is there’s plenty there. There’s some – I have simple math. Anybody that’s profiting off the student-athletes, me included; anybody who is drawing a salary, making a livelihood, a lot of people sitting here robbing the same train as well that it could take 5 to 10 percent less of what they’re getting.

Every organization, universities, a lot of them are collecting money tax-free. At least if you give it to these guys and it will go back to the economy through taxes. The NCAA, conference commissioner, Big Ten office, all the conferences, 5 to 10 percent into a pool, that’s one way. And things happened fast this year. You saw it. People say it’s complicated or it takes time. We saw a lot of change in one year, just this year. A whole conference went into the portal overnight.

These things could happen. Hopefully there will be some real – I mean, for a long time people say that unionizing would be bad. If people aren’t going to do it – if they’re not going to do it out of their own goodwill and do what’s right, that’s probably the next step. I have nothing against unions. That’s the next step, fellas. I think that’s the way you’ve gotta go. That’s what I’d like to see change in college athletics.

Next up for Harbaugh and Michigan is a happy flight back to Ann Arbor before a parade tentatively set for this weekend.