WASHINGTON, July 30 -- A college quarterback's ability to earn money off his name, stay at his current school without being poached, and seek legal recourse if a deal falls through still depends on which state he plays in. That is the problem the Protect College Sports Act was written to fix. Six weeks after it cleared the Senate Commerce Committee, the bill that would replace America's patchwork of 50 state NIL laws with a single national standard is stuck in negotiation, and the window to pass it before Congress breaks for August is closing fast.

As of late July, neither the Southeastern Conference nor the Big Ten (the two most powerful and politically significant conferences in college football) had received a revised draft of the leg...