Wasson: Matthew Sluka, UNLV NIL saga proves there are no guardrails or justice in college football’s Wild, Wild West

Back in the olden days, when west of the Mississippi was known as native land instead of “Mike Gundy’s Curious Playground,” there was always a grizzled Sheriff in each new town who would keep the peace – to police against a rash of stagecoach robberies and to maintain order before saloons got shot up. Frontier justice got rough every now and then, but that was what had to be done to establish normalcy.

College football, at this very moment in time, feels just like that same Wild West – but unlike back then, there are no 6-guns and tin badges to deliver justice.

Exhibit A for the prosecution is UNLV quarterback Matthew Sluka, who unabashedly and brazenly announced overnight that he was leaving the undefeated 3-0 Rebels football program due to “certain representations that were made to me which were not upheld after I enrolled.”

Read that again. A starting quarterback for an undefeated team – one that is being bandied about as a potential College Football Playoff squad – quit on his teammates less than a third of the way into the season.

And what can UNLV do about it, you ask?

Bupkus. Squat. Zilch. Zero. Absolutely nothing.

What was left unsaid in Sluka’s social media message announcing his abrupt departure from UNLV was the “why,” which got filled in later Wednesday by Sluka’s agent, Marcus Cromartie, who told reporters that that UNLV didn’t come through on a verbal offer of $100,000 from an assistant coach.

Welcome to the new world, y’all.

In an interview with ESPN, the quarterback’s father, Bob Sluka, said UNLV coach Barry Odom told him that the offer wasn’t valid because it didn’t come from him and instead came from offensive coordinator Brennan Marion.

Welcome to the new world, y’all.

Name, Image and Likeness almost instantly started spiraling out of control as soon as it became “legal” in July of 2021 – ostensibly allowing athletes to monetize themselves from their name, image and likeness. Critics of NIL immediately said “wait a tick, how on Earth are we going to police this?” to which the reply was a collective shrug of the shoulders from the NCAA.

Pay-for-play had arrived. And believe me, it ain’t going anywhere now – no tin badge or 6-shooter on Earth can stuff the contents of NIL back into the stadium-sized Pandora’s Box from which it came.

For every Livvy Dunne, who seems to rake millions on the up and up by doing TV ads for stretchy leggings, there are 1,000 Slukas out there – players who are promised 6- and 7-figure deals simply for the honor of signing on the correct dotted line.

Sluka began his college career at FCS Holy Cross, playing 3 seasons with the Crusaders and earning preseason All-American honors as a senior in 2023 before graduating with over 9,500 total yards and 97 total touchdowns in 4 seasons.

Sluka ultimately transferred to UNLV, which in the current transfer portal era made hardly a blip, but while in Vegas he led the Rebels to their first 3-0 start since the first Reagan administration and had his Group of 5 team starting to be mentioned as a shot for the expanded CFP.

But apparently not all was well in Sin City – as Sluka wasn’t getting paid what he said he was promised. So what does he do? A game before his eligibility would be expired and his college career would be done for good, Sluka announced he will redshirt himself (I didn’t even know that was a thing, but I digress …) and not play any of the Rebels’ remaining games in 2024.

“Quitter!” you exclaim loudly. “He abandoned his team!” was the shouting from sea to shining sea. Which is all dead-on accurate. But there is another side of this, as we all know if we just stop a second and consider how this works in the real life in which we operate.

You go to work at a new job expecting to receive a certain salary, but when payday comes and everyone hits Amazon with their paychecks, you are left holding air.

What, exactly, would you do?

I know what I’d do. Teammates be damned, when it comes right down to it – my only teammates are ultimately the ones who depend on me to bring home the bacon.

So yeah, Sluka dipped out on his team in the most dramatic NIL consequence to date. He is far from the only one. Players (we are looking your way, Gainesville …) have come and gone from programs even before they touch grass because of NIL deals gone awry.

This current state of college football looks precisely like the dusty Main Streets of the long-gone Wild West more and more every day – only without any lawman to keep the peace.

Welcome to the new world, y’all.

David Wasson

An APSE national award-winning writer and editor, David Wasson has almost four decades of experience in the print journalism business in Florida and Alabama. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and several national magazines and websites. He also hosts Gulfshore Sports with David Wasson, weekdays from 3-5 pm across Southwest Florida and on FoxSportsFM.com. His Twitter handle: @JustDWasson.