Casagrande: Saban should be above Trump’s college sports savior sham

This is an opinion column.

Let me get this straight.

The President of the United States is convening a panel to save college sports, and the list of invitees is extensive.

As many as 40 big names from a cross section of American sporting culture are set to convene at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. as early as next Friday, Yahoo Sports reported Thursday evening.

We’re talking Nick Saban, Tiger Woods and every power conference commissioner.

The current Notre Dame AD. The former Notre Dame AD.

A whole bunch of other ADs.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver.

Some billionaires.

NCAA president Charlie Baker.

TV executives from ESPN and Fox.

Mack Brown. Tim Tebow. Charlie Ward.

University presidents from Tennessee, Kansas and Nebraska.

Condoleezza Rice.

Vice chairs Ron DeSantis (the Florida governor) and Randy Levine (New York Yankees president.

You get the point. It’s a who’s who of college sports past, President Donald Trump’s golfing buddies and politicians.

Now look at that list compiled by Yahoo Sports and tell me what’s missing. It shouldn’t take long to spot the gap.

Scan it again.

More than three dozen invitees. Not one current collegiate athlete, according to the current reporting.

Zero.

And, by our count, just three women.

Pardon my skepticism, but what a waste of time.

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For Saban, why lend your good name and reputation to such a sham?

You’re better than this. You know effective leadership and how to produce meaningful results.

Surely, Saban can see the folly of this whole idea.

There must be a golf course out there that needs playing.

Just imagine assembling a group even half that size, consisting of the loudest voices, biggest egos, and competing interests, then expecting anything meaningful on the back end.

These conference commissioners had months to negotiate something as focused as future College Football Playoffs formats and accomplished nothing.

An afternoon in the White House could fix everything?

Anything?

Even if there’s progress or meaningful conversation, it’s hard to imagine where it moves forward to produce anything actionable.

And how much would it really mean if major stakeholders like, you know, the athletes this involves, have no voice?

This isn’t to say college sports are perfect. Kudos for the thought.

But if this is going anywhere other than the scrapheap of failed Washington solutions to this complex puzzle, it needs a more defined objective.

A more focused goal.

Congress has failed repeatedly to hammer out related legislation that would survive both chambers and the presidential pen.

Trump took a swing at an executive order last summer titled “SAVING COLLEGE SPORTS.”

It didn’t.

Well, they’re not dead, but we’re not seeing any results from the order released July 24, 2025.

It said, among other points, that schools should not permit third-party pay-for-play deals outside of fair-market values. Tell me how that’s working out.

Whiff.

Section 4 was titled Legal Protections for College Athletics from Lawsuits.

Haha.

The feast of court filings and billable hours continues undisturbed.

These were never matters the stroke of a presidential Sharpie could solve alone, so the lack of progress is hardly surprising.

Now, Trump is assembling the “Saving College Sports Roundtable,” which would require a 90,000-square-foot ballroom to accommodate them all.

Prove me wrong, I’m really struggling to understand how a governor and professional baseball executive have the foundation to lead a group designed to fix collegiate sports.

It’s crazy because there’s part of me that sympathizes with the seemingly impossible job of untangling the organizational mess that is collegiate sports.

The other part recognizes the lack of foresight that led to this moment in our history.

One set of old guys dug this grave.

This set of old guys will have a hard time crawling out of it.

Especially without athletes on this bloated roster of invitees. Without them, this whole conversation is moot.

And Saban should know that.

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