AMELIA ISLAND, Fla. — NCAA President Charlie Baker spoke to the Atlantic Coast Conference’s coaches and administrators on Monday about the pending NCAA vs the House settlement, which is expected to be approved soon.

However, when Baker met with the media following the league’s opening spring meeting at the Ritz Carlton on Amelia Island, his attention was turned to President Donald Trump, who reportedly plans to create a commission on college athletics.

After Trump met with former Alabama head football coach Nick Saban two weeks ago, the Wall Street Journal reported the Trump administration is considering an executive order that “could increase scrutiny” of NIL payments to college athletes.

“Obviously, we have spent a bunch of time in Washington over the last couple of years talking about some of our issues,” Baker said. “The issues we have really boil down to three big things. One is we have more than 40 states now that have laws that relate to how college sports work in those states, most of which are designed to give special standards to sports in those states. It is hard enough for conferences, much less the NCAA, to create a level playing field.

“The second issue is we have spent a large amount of time talking about employment, which is not news to anybody.”

Baker says they have made a fair amount of progress because most schools have explained to the people in Washington what the consequences might be for their schools.

“The third is about some sort of limited liability,” Baker said. “I think eligibility is a really good example of that, as we won a case this morning in South Carolina around eligibility. We have probably won more of those than we have lost.

“We just create so much uncertainty for schools, student-athletes and everybody around how this is all supposed to work. I think there is an executive side on this and, I think, it speaks to the fact that everybody is paying a lot of attention, no matter what is going on, to college sports.”

The NCAA’s win on Monday involved an eligibility case concerning a University of South Carolina athlete, Rahsul Faison, who was seeking to play football for the Gamecocks. Faison, who had played three seasons beyond high school, including one at the JUCO level, was facing eligibility issues related to the NCAA’s rules.

Baker does not know how or if the Presidential Commission will help with the ongoing issues in college athletics, but he does know they will need some kind of help at some point.

“We do need some help at some point to create some clarity around some of these issues in Washington,” he said. “Trading clarity with one lawsuit at a time is bad way to try and do it fairly.”

— photo by Michelle Pemberton / USA TODAY NETWORK