Duke is making a big mistake fighting its ACC champion QB.
Darian Mensah is a poster child for what has gone wrong with college athletics, which is in total chaos.
He signed for a reported $8 million from Duke to leave Tulane and play for the Blue Devils. No one is quite sure whether the money came from the new revenue share or NIL.
It was perhaps both because rev share began last July 1 and NIL has been going on for several years, and those two payments could have overlapped. Duke was the big winner after Mensah led the school to its first ACC championship since 1989. Now it is the big loser.
Who is Duke suing and for what reasons? Miami and other schools have apparently offered Mensah more money; there is no legal precedent and may never be one because NIL is completely broken.
Charlie Baker, the new NCAA president, wanted to get their collective arms around NIL, which has been unregulated since schools started paying athletes big bucks and telling them they will figure out the NIL part of it later. That never happened.
The revenue share of $20.5 million that schools can now divide among varsity sports and athletes will be much easier to police than NIL. When Deloitte, which is being paid by the NCAA, tried to find out how much athletes are receiving, it got the big middle finger from collectives refusing to play ball.
“We’ve been handling NIL the way we want to, so buzz off,” Deloitte was told by boosters who have been cheating one way or another for years and now refuse to capitulate. Thus, most schools that were intending to do so are letting their collectives do their bidding. So look for the NCAA and Baker to fire Deloitte.
Mensah, the MVP in the ACC championship win over Virginia, continued to receive offers from other schools and entered the transfer portal on the very last day.
Instead of simply refusing to pay Mensah what he was owed for year two, the Blue Devils filed a lawsuit. Judges who are alumni of Duke and other schools trying to land him are all recusing themselves. It looks worse that ACC member Miami may land the one-year Dukie.
The program that coach Manny Diaz maintained over two years will have plenty of other quarterbacks looking to get in the game, and Duke should drop the charges and use its rebuilt football reputation to get another quarterback like Alberto Mendoza, the younger brother of Indiana’s national championship QB.
Now it’s a scrum Duke cannot win and would be better off thanking Mensah and wishing him best of luck in the new game that college football has become. For years, Duke has used its brand to proclaim superiority and should get back on the high road.
After all, it has more football cards to play than ever before.
chapelboroaudio.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/2026/01%20-%20January/22/Art%27s%20Notebook%20012226%20-%20FINAL.mp3
Featured image via Associated Press/Scott Kinser
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs daily on the 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
Chansky’s Notebook: The Low Road Chapelboro.com.
Hence then, the article about chansky s notebook the low road was published today ( ) and is available on chapelboro ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Chansky’s Notebook: The Low Road )
Also on site :