Urban Meyer's two most prominent coaching stints in his career happened at Florida and Ohio State, where he won a combined three National Championships. Those two programs have plenty of money and resources, and would have no use for a level playing field in college football making it more difficult to stack their rosters.
So it comes as no surprise that Meyer, now an analyst for FOX and a podcaster, would disagree with Deion Sanders and other coaches who have called for significant changes and guardrails in college football.
At Big 12 Media Days last week, Sanders spoke about the growing inequality in college sports, a theme for Big 12 coaches who see their teams and league falling further and further behind the burgeoning "power two" of the SEC and Big Ten.
Sanders opined about the same teams making the playoff year after year because of their ability to outspend the competition.
"All you have to do is look at the playoffs and see what those teams spent, and you understand darn near why they're in the playoffs," Sanders said. "It's kind of hard to compete with somebody who's giving $25, $30 n to a darn freshman class."
Sanders' words drew the ire of many, who criticized him for waiting to call for a cap until after Shedeur Sanders and Travis Hunter had moved on from college football, somehow simultaneously believing that Colorado is broke, but at the same time, was the highest bidder out there for those two players.
Cognitive dissonance aside, Sanders is far from the only coach who believes a salary cap could fix the issues in college football, but his words will always draw criticism before anyone else's.
Urban Meyer likens College Football to Major League Baseball
While there's a salary cap in both the NFL and NBA, there isn't one in the MLB, and that's the basis of Meyer's argument against it for college football. Because the MLB isn't struggling for ratings, and fans aren't annoyed by the Dodgers' ability to outspend every other franchise.
"It will never happen," Meyer said in response to a salary cap on the Triple Option podcast. "Because Colorado is not the same as Ohio State and Alabama, and big market cities that have alumni that are willing to do that."
"But in a perfect world, you'd like it to be like the NFL, but it's not. It's like Major League Baseball. And we said this over and over again, you've got the starting left side of the infield for the Dodgers making more than most major league teams. That's going to happen."
Meyer is fine with the canyon-sized gap that's forming between the two biggest conferences and the rest of college football. And why wouldn't he be? The inherent advantages he enjoyed at Florida and Ohio State made him forget the days he had to scratch and claw at Bowling Green and Utah. The divide benefited him.
Meyer is wrong overall, though. There may not be a "salary cap" in the same vein as the NFL or NBA, but further spending guardrails are ultimately coming. It's already started with the House vs. NCAA settlement and the supposed ending of booster-backed collectives.
It'll take some time for the details and rules to iron out. Teams will skate the rules and find grey areas as much as they can in order to create any advantage they can. That's just college sports. But more and more coaches will continue to speak out against the growing inequality, and eventually, drastic measures will be taken, for better or worse.