Baltimore Ravens star safety Kyle Hamilton, just like us?
Not quite. The average person isn’t one of the NFL’s best safeties, but Hamilton shares some college football fans’ frustrations with the sport’s direction. With the College Football Playoff potentially expanding to 24 teams in the 2027-28 season and NIL reshaping the sport, the three-time Pro Bowler isn’t thrilled with where college football is headed.
“Yeah, I kind of hate where college football is headed, honestly. Just, I think the NIL is kind of getting kind of exploited, and 24 teams in a playoff. I don’t think there’s 24 teams that can win a championship,” Hamilton told OutKick in a recent interview.
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While college football is embracing the tournament style, the former Notre Dame star doesn’t think it’s fair to the players.
“I think the tournament is its own thing. I understand like baseball has the College World Series and basketball has March Madness, but football is just a different sport. Like asking kids to do spring ball, do summer workouts, do that, and then like perform their best going into the draft, combine prep, like it’s kind of unfair,” Hamilton said.
“But I do not make those decisions, so I will sit back and watch, like a good fan.”
The 25-year-old played at Notre Dame from 2019 to 2021, when NIL was in its infancy.
“I had it for six months. I was the first wave, I guess, of NIL, and that’s when it was truly name, image and likeness. I would do like an apparel deal for like 1500 merch and be ecstatic, and it was awesome,” Hamilton said.
While Hamilton is happy college athletes are now being paid, he acknowledged that there needs to be a salary cap to maintain fairness.
“Nowadays, kids are getting like millions of dollars. I don’t want to sound like a hater, ’cause they’re getting paid, and I’m glad they are, but if that’s the case, there needs to be a salary cap or something, so that it’s fair for all the teams,” Hamilton said.
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Hamilton said there is a little more “instant gratification” among today’s rookies than when he first entered the NFL.
“It’s also funny when guys have to get up to saying, they have to say the name, school, signing bonus, and their NIL money, what they made at NIL, so that’s kind of a new thing that’s going around the league,” Hamilton said.
When asked if he needed to humble any rookies who arrive in the NFL with pockets full of cash, Hamilton said the game does that for him.
“I mean, that kind of just happens naturally through camp and, you know, playing against Lamar Jackson in practice, but I think, yeah, the NFL and just football in general is very humbling games, so it’ll, it’ll happen at some point,” Hamilton said.
As he has gotten further from playing for the Fighting Irish, Hamilton said he doesn’t pay as much attention as he used to, but he was locked in for then-No. 11 Notre Dame’s win over then-No. 1 Miami on Saturday night.
The two-time first-team All-Pro selection said he hasn’t been back for a game yet, vowing to return only after he graduates, which he said will be about a year from now.
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The Ravens have had a hectic couple of weeks at the quarterback position.
In Week 8, Lamar Jackson was returning from his ankle injury against the Buffalo Bills, but he was injured on his first play back. Bills linebacker Greg Rousseau hit Jackson’s hand as he followed through on a pass, and Jackson fractured and dislocated his right thumb.
Compounding matters for Baltimore, backup quarterback Tyler “Snoop” Huntley suffered a severe turf toe injury requiring surgery that will sideline him for the remainder of the season.
Without Jackson and Huntley, the Ravens were forced to turn to undrafted rookie Joe Fagnano against Buffalo and on short rest against the Jacksonville Jaguars in Week 9. The Ravens lost both games and are now mired in a four-game losing streak.
Regardless of injuries to key players, Hamilton said the Ravens are capable of winning games.
“There’s been a lot happening, some flukey stuff, some unlucky stuff, that kind of is just how the football season goes sometimes. But, I think we still have the capability to win games, and that’s most important, no matter what’s going on within the building, outside the building, we just need to win games cause winning solves a lot of problems. So, I think we’re still built to do so, and we’re hopefully gonna go on a run soon here,” Hamilton said.
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The Ravens acquired veteran journeyman Jacoby Brissett to help steady things in Jackson and Huntley’s absence. Brissett is expected to start in the team’s Week 10 matchup against the Los Angeles Chargers on “Monday Night Football.”
At the time of the interview, Hamilton said he had not met Brissett . Ravens head coach Jesse Minter was the Chargers’ defensive coordinator before being hired as Baltimore’s head coach.
Hamilton said while a win against Minter’s old squad would be nice, the only significance of the game is that the 4–5 Ravens and 0–8 Chargers need a win.
“I think the significance is two teams who really need a win at this point. I think if you ask pretty much anybody, um, if this game, the combined record would be what it is before the season, nobody would say it is [what it is], but that’s why the games need to be played. It’s the NFL and anything can happen any given Sunday, and the games still need to be played,” Hamilton said.
“I think we have to take the emotion out of it. I’m sure Jesse will feel happy about getting a win against his old team, but, you know, we need to approach this game like any other game and, go out and get a win.”
While the offense will look much different without Jackson or Huntley, Hamilton insisted the defense should play the same way regardless of who is at quarterback.
“Yeah, I don’t really like the notion that you should like pick it up a notch as a defense if something happens on offense, cause you should have already been at that notch, I think, in my opinion. Like you should play the same way no matter what’s going on,” Hamilton said.
“Week 1, Week 18, Super Bowl, preseason, there’s a standard that needs to be upheld and that’s something that we could get better at. So, we need to get better at upholding the standard. I don’t even think we need to change who we are, but just get better at doing us.”
If the rest of the team plays at Hamilton’s level , the wins will start rolling in. In nine games this season, Hamilton has 60 total tackles, nine tackles for loss, one interception, five passes defended and one forced fumble.
Kyle Hamilton, a Team Toyota athlete, and Mary Crippen, the elementary school teacher behind NFeLementary, paired up for an afternoon of football-themed learning and play at the Baltimore Ravens Boys & Girls Club on Monday. Hamilton, who grew up participating in Boys & Girls Clubs, said it was pretty cool to come back and interact with the kids.
“Yeah, it was pretty cool and meant a lot. I’ve, I’ve done a lot of work with the Boys and Girls Club over the years and, um, it’s always great seeing kids who remind me so much of myself when I was at the Boys and Girls Club, even at such a young age, and um to be an NFL player and uh have the opportunity to partner with Toyota and everybody that’s helped me get to this point. And it’s, it’s always pretty cool to come back and see the looks on their faces and be able to interact with them,” Hamilton, who spoke on behalf of Toyota, said.
Toyota’s involvement will extend beyond Monday’s event , as the Ravens Toyota Community Touchdowns Program will see Baltimore-area Toyota dealers donate $414 to the Baltimore Ravens Boys & Girls Club for every Ravens touchdown scored this season.
“The Toyota partnership has not only put me in different opportunities to help the community, but I mean, it’s put me in opportunities to just meet great people. Everybody at the company has been great to me ever since I’ve partnered with them, and it’s been a seamless partnership and, all the work they do in community just aligns right with my values too,” Hamilton said.