It’s the latest acronym we’re all getting accustomed to at the end of this college football season.  N-I-L, name, image & likeness.  It’s part of a legal settlement that allows student-athletes to be paid for the use of their name, image or likeness in advertisements or promotions for the school’s athletic programs.  It hits square on the head the old complaint that schools are making money off of the student athletes by promoting them, but not paying them.  Forget the scholarships they received for housing, food, books, classes and a possible degree, this is beyond that.  It’s like a precursor entering the possibility of advancing to the professional leagues where money is tossed around like leaves being stuffed into a Fall Day’s garbage bag.  Some of these top-line student athletes are pulling in one to two million dollars a year to play for a certain school.  That’s straight on, now introduce the other new words we have become used to this college season, “transfer portal.”  Basically, free agency in amateur (should we even call it that now) sports.  Coaches who have a need at a certain position, can go shopping for the best player available.  Negotiate an NIL deal and you are set for one to two seasons in plugging a hole in your lineup.  That route has also attracted billionaires like Oregon’s Phil Knight, he’s behind the money purse for the Ducks.  A little research shows the college football game has become a Billionaire’s game.  Each one trying to top the other with live teams and live players.  They compete for the best players, the best coaches, invest and then sit back and watch their investment play out.  Oregon’s football team just lost to Indiana in the NCAA semi-finals.  Ducks vs. Hoosiers, or was it Phil Knight vs. Mark Cuban, like Knight, Cuban is an alumnus billionaire supporting his school.  Look at some of the other teams in the twelve-team playoff this season, Texas Tech, whom the Ducks beat in the quarter-finals, is backed by billionaire Cody Campbell, Miami by billionaire John Ruiz and Ohio State has always had the Buckeye Sports Group (BSG) behind its teams.  Where will it top off at?  Will we ever have amateur sports at the collegiate level again?  How soon before high school student-athletes start getting paid to commit early?  There was a time when allegations of deep-pocket boosters were wooing student-athletes to attend and play for certain schools.  Some got caught, got spanked and it went away until the next one was caught.  It led to a probation against the school, and in some cases, boosters were barred from schools/games and some players even stripped of their honors if not their scholarships.  All of that was big news back then, today, it matters about as much as a hill of beans.  So, when watching the NCAA Football Championship game between Miami and Indiana, Monday, Jan. 19, look as the TV cameras pan the VIP suites and you might just see Mark Cuban and John Ruiz pull out dollar bills for their one-dollar bet.