When will NCAA tackle main issue with Todd Gurley -- the rule itself?

Todd Gurley's four-game suspension for taking more than $3,000 in exchange for his own autograph raises an age-old question that's being asked more frequently: What exactly is wrong with someone making money off his own name?

In any other walk of life, a person could be paid for signing his or her autograph. In college sports, where coaches get bonuses for the academic progress of their players, a player who gets paid for autographs receives a four-game suspension plus 40 hours of community service. It leaves the odd juxtaposition of community service -- a punishment typically used for criminals -- in order to mitigate how much money an athlete must pay to a charity for committing an NCAA violation.

“I'm a firm believer that rules are rules,” said ESPN analyst Jay Bilas, often a vocal critic of the NCAA. “But I also understand stupid rules are stupid rules, too, and the only time we get to reasonably discuss these rules are when they're broken, even if the rule is contradictory to the rest of the way the enterprise behaves.”

NCAA president Mark Emmert told USA Today Sports this week he believes now is the right time for members to look at rules relating to athletes and autographs.

“I hope the members do look at it,” Emmert said. “Whether they change it or not is less important than whether or not they look at it and say, ‘We still think this is a good rule for good reasons' or not, but we need to have it affirmed or changed -- one of the two -- and this is a good time to do it.”

But where are the ideas on how to adapt the NCAA, which will continue to face litigation over compensating players? Courts are starting to decide some cases as new ones get started, including Jeffrey Kessler's case that seeks a free market for schools to decide how they pay players.

“Think about this: If Todd Gurley had sustained a concussion and a coach knowingly put him back in the game, there's no NCAA rule against that, no punishment, no investigation,” said Ramogi Huma, president of the National College Players Association. “But when he's alleged to have gotten some money for signing his name, he's sitting for several games.”

Publicly and privately, some athletic directors and conference commissioners have said in recent months they think discussions will and should occur about players getting compensated for use of their names, images and likenesses, such as through autographs and jersey sales. But if there are ideas, no one is willing to say them publicly.

Could payments be administered by schools?

Geoff Silver has an idea: Allow athletes to be paid off their names, images and likenesses after one year on campus as part of the contract between a player and school.

Silver is a lawyer at the Indianapolis-based law firm Jackson Lewis and recently left the NCAA office after almost 10 years, most recently as director of academic and membership affairs. He was responsible for managing the rules interpretations process for Divisions I, II and III and found his views evolving on amateurism issues.

“I look at it like if it's my son or daughter, would I think it's great while as a college athlete they have an opportunity to put some money away and save for their future? Yeah, I want that,” Silver said. “I also want to the greatest extent we can keep the unique nature of college sports without pay-for-play.”

Silver's idea: After one year of enrollment, give athletes the ability to explore getting paid for use of their name, image and likeness as long as they keep the school informed of any agreement.

“Maybe that one-year delay keeps this out of the recruiting process so a coach can't say if you come here we've got an autograph show and car dealership endorsement here for you right away,” Silver said. “There would be some controls to monitor any kind of booster behavior or fraudulent deal.

“Maybe you address the fundamental fairness issue critics have, but maybe it helps retention. In men's basketball, you see the one-and-done phenomenon. If second-round picks know in year 2 they might be able to bring in a few dollars for their family, maybe they're more likely to stay. I don't think it blows up our whole notion of amateurism.”

The autograph rule exists so a booster can't give a star recruit an excessive amount of money for an autography that's essentially to buy the player's services to the booster's school. Bilas believes autographs and endorsements can be regulated much like player jobs are currently regulated.

“You can make the argument that by allowing players to have jobs, boosters will come in and give them phony jobs, or if a player has a legit job like a bartender, the booster will just come in and give $100 tips,” Bilas said. “It's really not that hard to regulate it. If they let players do endorsement deals or make money in autograph sessions, there's a recognized market for that stuff, and as long as it's within range of the market value by hour or item, they could easily regulate that.”

'It's going to take real leverage'

In many ways, allowing players to make money through the college sports system would shine light on an underground market that has existed for decades. Instead, NCAA rules push athletes into the underground market, where shady individuals exist along with additional dollars for some players beyond their scholarship at a time when they may never have more value.

“If someone says give them $10,000, so what? Nick Saban just had his house paid for (by the Crimson Tide Foundation for $3.1 million),” Bilas said. “I don't think folks are going to act irrationally. If we open this thing up, players have to pay taxes on it and folks are going to start giving out 1099s. It would be orderly and would it be done above board.”

Silver experienced firsthand some of the battles to make significant NCAA rules changes. He helped coordinate the activities of the NCAA Working Group on Collegiate Model for the past two years.

“So often we'd walk up to a rule and there would be general agreement why a rule shouldn't be there, and somebody raises that one doomsday scenario why we have a rule to begin with and the rule remains and is applied to situations where maybe you don't need it,” Silver said.

Huma believes allowing players to be compensated will only come through lawsuits or unionization. He is leading the efforts for Northwestern football players to form a union.

“There's nothing more personal than controlling your own name,” Huma said. “But it's going to take real leverage. Time and again when the NCAA has really been show to be in a bad spot with policies, it shows lip service with changes. But as Mark Emmert said in the Senate hearing, he doesn't have the power to change the rules.”

Instead, there's talk of a discussion that so far lacks real ideas from the membership. It's easier to fall back on "rules are rules," even as some industry leaders question the purpose of some of these rules in the rapidly-changing, multibillion-dollar world of college sports.