This is an opinion column.

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Legalized cheating in college football hit a new level of desperation this offseason thanks to the rivalry between Ohio State and Michigan.

When Michigan won the national championship under scandalous circumstances, everyone in college football knew that Ohio State would have an answer. The Buckeyes responded by raiding the Deep South for the SEC’s best players. In a stunning flex of financial clout, Ohio State acquired Ole Miss All-American running back Quinshon Judkins and Alabama safety Caleb Downs, the national freshman of the year.

As an encore, the Buckeyes then hauled away Alabama quarterback Julian Sayin before fans could even watch him compete in his first spring scrimmage. Sayin was the Crimson Tide’s five-star quarterback prospect for the recruiting class of 2024. Not anymore. Now he’s the future of Ohio State’s offense.

If Ohio State doesn’t win a national championship in the next two years, then the school will fire Ryan Day. Just a prediction.

Former Alabama coach Nick Saban retired at the right time. Welcome to the new world of college football. For old-school fans of the game, it’s a place where things like school pride, traditions, rivalries, conferences and pageantry have gone to die. For TV executives, it’s a gold mine. For investors looking to profit off the chaos of an emerging new market, it’s a greenfield opportunity that represents billions of dollars.

The Buckeyes reportedly have dropped more than $13 million on its roster in the hopes of buying trophies next season. That’s chump change compared to what’s coming for major college football. Strap on your helmets. These next few years are going to be cataclysmic for an enterprise that fought change for far too long.

Are national championships cheapened when NIL collectives buy the best players off of other teams?

Answer: Only for the schools not winning them.

A quote from former Ohio State coach Urban Meyer frames perfectly the state of college football. Back in July of 2022, here’s what Meyer had to say about NIL collectives.

“From my understanding, it’s a fancy word for cheating,” Meyer said in an interview with Outkick. “When I hear that word I kind of cringe right now and I hear the stories behind it that they’re going to go to donors and boosters and ask for a lot of money, put it in a big pot, and then decide who gets that money based on ability level. Which, I think is 1A of the rule of NIL. You can’t do that.”

But Meyer is a prominent member of Ohio State’s NIL collective. Apparently, he changed his mind.

Watching Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh win the Big Ten, the Rose Bowl and then the national championship during a season highlighted by a pair of three-game suspensions and an investigation into sign stealing will do that to a guy.

Meyer has been accused of a lot of things over the years, but being a moral idealist was never one of them.

Why steal signs when you can steal players?

Over the next couple months, I’m going to write a series of columns about the changing landscape of college football and what it means for the game. This is college football’s era of desperate money. It’s not going to last forever, but the teams that take advantage of these lawless times could position themselves for future riches.

Locally, Alabama and Auburn can’t afford to get left behind. Regionally, the SEC is in a fight for supremacy with the Big Ten. Nationally, ESPN and Fox are steering major college football towards enormous paydays.

Nick Saban’s dominance at Alabama helped create an entire new economy for the sport. It started with Texas A&M’s No.1-rated recruiting class in 2022. Everyone is raising money to pay players these days, but NIL collectives for teams like Ohio State, Tennessee, Ole Miss, Auburn, Florida, Florida State, Miami, Georgia, USC, Oregon, Texas and Texas A&M are ahead of the game in an arms race to stay on top.

After firing Bryan Harsin, Auburn smartly focused all of its efforts into raising money for the Tigers NIL collective. It paid off with Auburn’s latest recruiting class, but Auburn isn’t done. It recently added a transfer from Alabama, and the big prize could be landing former Alabama commitment Ryan Williams, the five-star receiver from Saraland.

College football is changing, but the driving force behind everything remains the same: rivalries. The sport of college football is a flat circle that way. At its core, the era of desperate money and the transfer portal isn’t much different than the issues facing schools at the turn of the 19th century.

Back in 1893, there were no rules governing college football and players nicknamed “tramps” would hop around from team to team. Many of the “tramp players” weren’t even enrolled in classes. Some played for college football for seven and eight years. University presidents demanded rules or else. In response, schools formed conferences to regulate the game.

The point was to prevent players from being paid. All these years later, paying the players is all that matters.

MAILBAG REMINDER

Got an idea about sports? Want to get something off your chest? Send Joe a note about what’s on your mind and he’ll feature the best questions in his Friday mailbag.

Joseph Goodman is the lead sports columnist for the Alabama Media Group, and author of the most controversial sports book ever written, “We Want Bama”. It’s a love story about wild times, togetherness and rum.