Most sports fans are currently watching the NCAA basketball championship game. Since my own basketball interests are usually confined to the NBA, I am instead going to take this opportunity to denounce the NCAA’s cartel-like effort to use the power of government to keep its members from paying student athletes for their labor. Economist David Henderson has an excellent summary of the case against the NCAA:
The NCAA runs a tightly controlled cartel whose “profits” go to colleges and coaches. It’s not simply a private cartel but one backed by government force. Armen Alchian and William Allen, in their 1964 textbook, University Economics, were the first people I know to point this out. They pointed out that those colleges that decided to pay athletes would find their academic accreditation at risk. So why don’t new schools sense a profit to made and then enter and compete players away by paying them? Alchian and Allen answer: “[N]o new school could get subsidies from the state or major philanthropic foundations without recognition by the present accreditation group.” They add, “We have finally arrived at the source of the value of membership in the NCAA and related organizations: subsidized education.”
One could argue, “Well, the student athletes will cash in on their skills later when they go on to become professional athletes.” Not so, as the NCAA admits in its advertising [noting that most players don't go on to professional careers].
Because so many students are dependent on government-subsidized loans that are only available to accredited schools, few schools are willing to openly buck the NCAA’s restrictions on paying athletes (though of course many do so under the table). Whatever money the school earned from having better sports teams would be outweighed by the loss of government funding.
The traditional NCAA response to such criticism is that the players’ are “scholar-athletes” who get compensated with education. This is probably true for many college athletes in lesser-known sports. In Division I football and basketball however, the players are essentially full-time professionals. Most of them have little time to spend on their studies, and many have academic credentials far weaker than those of the regular students at their schools. Few people can do well academically if placed at an institution where their credentials are far below the norm and they had to work at a demanding full-time job at the same time.
I don’t believe that student athletes are morally entitled to be paid for playing. If no one wants to pay to watch them, I have no objection. The reality, however, is that there is a high demand for their services which is being artificially suppressed by government coercion. Indeed, some schools and boosters pay players under the table despite the threat of severe NCAA sanctions if they get caught.
Another particularly galling element of the NCAA cartel system is the way in which it is surrounded by a veneer of righteousness. The NCAA has managed to persuade the media and most of the public that the real bad guys are actually those schools that try to undermine the cartel and pay their players at something more closely resembling market rates. Few people seem to care that most of the athletes who get shortchanged are poor minorities who are being deprived of a key opportunity to create a nest egg for their future. As Henderson points out, only a small percentage of them go on to make big bucks in the pros.
There is a conceptually simple, though politically difficult, solution to this problem. The government should withdraw its support for the NCAA cartel. Universities will gradually stop pretending that Division I football and basketball players are primarily students, and start treating them as the employees they actually are. The players will get paid for their work, and they and the universities won’t have to waste time and money forcing players to attend bogus classes in order to keep up appearances. Those who have the desire and academic credentials to do real coursework should of course be allowed to do so.
UPDATE: It’s also worth noting that the same universities who loudly condemn the very thought of paying players often pay huge salaries to coaches and athletic administrators. I don’t begrudge these people their riches. But it seems strange to claim that paying players any salary at all will somehow sully the academic ethos, while simultaneously contending that there’s nothing wrong with paying big bucks to Mike Krzyzewski or Jerry Tarkanian.
Tim says:
Maybe when the NCAA loses its power, we can have Chief Illiniwek back.
April 5, 2010, 10:52 pmChris says:
Preach on brother. The trick for good one and done players is to not get caught during the first year which isn’t that hard. That said, your arguments cannot win because the system works well for the fans and the colleges. It further appears to most people that it works for the players since the vast majority of people think that players making millions of dollars today somehow owe the NCAA for giving them that opportunity. Go figure.
April 5, 2010, 10:56 pmll says:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0030860210/thevolocons0d-20/
April 5, 2010, 10:58 pmjellis58 says:
What about the argument that if people knew the athletes were being paid, people wouldnt be as interested in watching. Isnt part of the fun of college sports knowing that these guys are amatuers and doing it because they love the school they are at and the game they play (except the few who do go pro)? I know when I was in college a big reason I liked the games was because I was watching people who go to the same classes as me and with whom I shared a common experpience.
Also if players just went where they could command the highest salery I think people would see college sports as just a less talented version of NBA/NFL/MLB etc etc and it would lose a lot of fans. It would also tend to concentrate talent at fewer schools which would decrease the level of competition and the thus fan enjoyment (this is actually the legal anti trust justification for reviewing sports restraints on trade that would normally be per se unlawful as subject to the rule of reason; unlike a traditional cartel which controls output to raise price, this sort of aragment actualy shifts the demand curve outward increasing output and consumer satisfaction) see NCAA v Board of Regents of Oklahama 468 U.S. 85, 101-102(1984) “As Judge Bork has noted: “[S]ome activities can only be carried out jointly. Perhaps the leading example is league sports. When a league of professional lacrosse teams is formed, it would be pointless to declare their cooperation illegal on the ground that there are no other professional lacrosse teams.” R. Bork, The Antitrust Paradox 278 (1978). What the NCAA and its member institutions market in this case is competition itself-contests between competing institutions. Of course, this would be completely ineffective if there were no rules on which the competitors agreed to create and define the competition to be marketed. A myriad of rules affecting such matters as the size of the field, the number of players on a team, and the extent to which physical violence is to be encouraged or proscribed, all must be agreed upon, and all restrain the manner in which institutions compete. Moreover, the NCAA seeks to market a particular brand of football-college football. The identification of this “product” with an academic tradition differentiates *102 college football from and makes it more popular than professional sports to which it might otherwise be comparable, such as, for example, minor league baseball. In order to preserve the character and quality of the “product,” athletes must not be paid, must be required to attend class, and the like. And the integrity of the “product” cannot be preserved except by mutual agreement; if an institution adopted such restrictions unilaterally, its effectiveness as a competitor on the playing field might soon be destroyed. Thus, the NCAA plays a vital role in enabling college football to preserve its character, and as a result enables a product to be marketed which might otherwise be unavailable. In performing this role, its actions widen consumer choice-not only the choices available to sports fans but also **2961 those available to athletes-and hence can be viewed as procompetitive”
April 5, 2010, 11:27 pmjellis58 says:
and before someone hits me over the head with it I know the court ended up finding 7-2 that the particular NCAA practice at issue in that case was unlawful. But it subjected the NCAA to a lower level of scuritiny than a non-sports defendant would have been and the passage above specificly endorses an agreement to not pay players and make them go to class
April 5, 2010, 11:37 pmFloridan says:
Perhaps the best argument for the current system is that there has been no successful competition.
Nothing is stopping the creation of a profession football minor league that pays its athletic talent. Likewise, talented basketball players can leave high school and play as professionals in Europe or elsewhere (but very few do).
One could argue that in the case of baseball, the trend is in the opposite direction — more and more skilled baseball players are, after high school, foregoing the traditional minor leagues and playing on college teams.
Most of the complaints about the current system come not from players, but from observers. Leave well enough alone — when the system doesn’t work any longer, it will be obvious to all.
April 5, 2010, 11:46 pmmyalterego says:
So where do you draw the line? Do you allow high school players to be paid if there is a market for it?
April 6, 2010, 12:13 amGuy says:
Are colleges having trouble attracting athletes? The fact that these athletes often receive scholarships and (formally or informally) an increased chance of admission, and possibly even, in some cases, preferential grading, seems to compensate them sufficiently. I have trouble believing that paying them directly (rather than through scholarships) would have a significant impact on the number of qualified athletes seeking to enroll in college. And since the official purpose of collegiate sports is to fund the institutions, it makes sense for all the “payment” the players receive to be in the form of education, rather than money.
April 6, 2010, 12:21 amAllan says:
An interesting conundrum.
I would think that, were a substantial number of student athletes to actually graduate, especially from the premier schools (sportwise) the problem would be less severe. I would advocate a rule that for every percentage point of lower graduation rate for student athletes than other students, a scholarship be lost. For every 5 percentage points above the average, a scholarship would be gained. I would base the calculations on a four year program and allow the summer as the fourth year as a grace period. If the administration wants to lower academic standards to allow non-qualified student-athletes to graduate, I guess we would have to live with it. But the school would have to live with a lower academic reputation.
April 6, 2010, 12:49 amyankee says:
What’s the basis for this claim that paying athletes would cause schools to lose their accreditation? The authority they cite is a textbook published half a century ago.
A quick glance at the NEASC’s accreditation standards doesn’t disclose any written policy on paying athletes. There might very well be an unwritten policy, but what’s the basis for asserting that there is?
Even assuming that nonpayment of athletes is an accreditation requirement, I see no reason to believe that a bunch of schools would leave the NCAA and form their own league with paid players if the accreditation rules were suddenly relaxed tomorrow. Forming a new league would require solving a large coordination problem and the schools would have to risk the possibility of an enormous backlash from alumni and the public.
April 6, 2010, 1:36 am“Choice for me but not for thee” « Blunt Object says:
[...] getting paid far below what they’d command in a free market. Go RTWT. (Update: Also, read this post by Ilya Somin, which expands upon Henderson’s [...]
April 6, 2010, 3:18 amOhReginaldIDisagree says:
Disclosure: Since I’m a football-guy I thought about this from a football perspective.
I would like to see someone try to compete; but *Everyone* involved has a vested interest in the status quo (except the students), and even a majority of students would never play if there was a successful professional league for younger players (one would have to admit, the moment such a league was formed there goes half of the college teams). There would have to be a major public campaign mounted to get people to buy into watching, the “Football Club of Ohio” play “Southern California Football Club” on Saturday’s. I’m sure ESPN and Fox Sports would not enjoy the competition and provide no pull (both in their TV and radio arms) to support such a move; and they would probably defend the status quo and attack athletes who wish to benefit more from their exploitation.
But the question is, what’s the impetus for paying? The schools get their talent for peanuts, and athletes don’t seem to mind. It would only be the high quality 10% athletes who would provide some impetus for a sports league, but then again, they are getting allegedly world-class instruction for free. As much as I would love to watch some type of college league with concentrated sports talent, since there are a lot of stakeholders the current system works for, we get status quo.
April 6, 2010, 3:30 amBaba Ganoush says:
Somin has given an excellent argument for abolishing all revenue producing college sports. Students will once again will be students, and athletes can seek training and their fortunes as professionals elsewhere. Admissions committees will no longer need to consider a college applicant’s athletic prowess and can focus on a student’s intellect and academic promise. The unfairly exploited poor minority students that Somin mentions can learn their trade elsewhere and perhaps get reasonably paid for their effort as honest professionals instead of as fraudulent scholarship “students.” It’s win-win. Abolish college sports. Eliminate the hypocrisy.
April 6, 2010, 3:42 amq says:
“Nothing is stopping the creation of a profession football minor league that pays its athletic talent.”
Network effects essentially create a large barrier to entry. A player with his eye toward the pros will want to play against the best competition he can. We’re already at the equilibrium where the NCAA has the best teams; it would be incredibly difficult to create a league out of nothing that could compete talent-wise.
“The fact that these athletes often receive scholarships and (formally or informally) an increased chance of admission, and possibly even, in some cases, preferential grading, seems to compensate them sufficiently. I have trouble believing that paying them directly (rather than through scholarships) would have a significant impact on the number of qualified athletes seeking to enroll in college.”
Actually, it probably would as college players will be less likely to leave for the professional leagues. Moreover, the NCAA has monopolized the market, so of course there’s going to be a lot of entrants despite the literally subsistent wages. But the fact is, the universities receive a substantial majority of the surplus at the expense of generally poor minorities.
April 6, 2010, 4:49 ambyomtov says:
I agree wholeheartedly with Ilya here.
The current system is corrupt in many ways, not least in the veneer of righteousness Ilya refers to. There are fortunes being made in college sports. That the players see little of that money, and often don’t even have a reasonable chance to get an education, is disgraceful.
I’d actually prefer a minor league system like baseball’s. Players are under contract to MLB teams, and the minor league teams are, as I understand it, subsidized by their MLB partners. But I think the reality is that this would be a very difficult thing to get done. After all, the NFL and NBA have a free minor league at hand. Why would they pay for one?
April 6, 2010, 5:28 amAngus says:
Surplus? Except for a few top schools, most universities lose money on their athletic programs. Paying athletes will just increase the loss for universities and take more money away from academics. Is that really a wise thing?
April 6, 2010, 6:29 amStephen Lathrop says:
Even in major team sports, victories by Notre Dame, Stanford, or Georgetown are not unheard of. But perhaps more to the point, the notion that athletic excellence is incompatible with academic excellence is demonstrably untrue as a matter of individual performance. Athletes who are the best in the world at their sports commonly attend the most demanding colleges while excelling academically.
Harvard, for instance, has often been in contention to be ranked as the best rowing team in the world. That sport is every bit as demanding of athletes’ time as football or basketball. In a yet-more-demanding sport, Yale has again and again featured some of the strongest swimming performers in the world—its athletes have captured 19 Olympic gold medals. Neither school gives ground academically to recruit athletes in those sports. (In fairness, Yale’s previous dominance of swimming seems to have declined as other schools have increased emphasis on swimming recruitment.)
Football and basketball, because of inherent spectator interest, and not because of the presence or absence of high level of performance, happen to be strong draws for paying customers. The games are more fun to watch than a swimming meet, and for spectators, a rowing regatta is more an occasion for a picnic than an exciting sports contest.
Access to facilities to learn to play football and basketball is better supported with public funds than for swimming and rowing, which probably explains why minority-member talent is concentrated in the former. For some reason which remains a vexed question, the same broad support for minority-member opportunity doesn’t seem to extend to educational opportunity. One predictable result is a bountiful crop of minority athletes whose career aspirations never get beyond the playing field. That doesn’t seem to have as much to do with educational institutions making money from sports as it does with other factors of a more public nature.
The loss to minority-member college athletes certainly includes the fact that they aren’t paid for their sports service, but that is the smaller portion of it, compared to being cheated of an education. Paying college athletes for sports, while encouraging them to train without educational requirements, could hardly make that better. It is hard to see how it wouldn’t make it much worse. Indeed, in the places where that is now the practice, it does seem to make it worse.
April 6, 2010, 8:14 amAgainst the NCAA Cartel « Daniel Joseph Smith says:
[...] Against the NCAA Cartel [...]
April 6, 2010, 8:25 amPeteP says:
A ) They ARE getting paid ( usually ), right up front, with scholarships.
B ) What ever happened to the good old days when college was supposedly about getting an EDUCATION ?
and to those who worry that ‘paying them would make college look like a NBA farm team’ – what is it now ?
April 6, 2010, 8:31 amBlau says:
It seems to me like the good athletes are already paid in the form of full scholarships plus room and board. A second string football player at the University of Michigan is getting almost $50,000 in benefits (assuming that they are an out of state student) per year. That’s more than players in the now-defunct arena football league used to make.
April 6, 2010, 9:26 amGuest Again says:
The calculus of paying players in the major sports reduces or eliminates the subsidy to the minor sports. Even if you could pay them (because you are one of the few athletic departments that has major programs that make money) the cost of losing a number of minor sports and, perhaps violating title nine, is too scary for any AD or Administration to contemplate.
April 6, 2010, 9:27 amIlya, it ain’t gonna happen.
S says:
I agree with PeteP on A. I also think that if there were a demand for something different, there would be supply, but there is not. No one (except for a few Fanatics) wants to watch minor league football or basketball.
April 6, 2010, 9:29 amthrill says:
The NCAA creates much of the problem itself, in somewhat ostensibly defensible view that they’re ‘doing it for the children’ (a’la every other bureaucracy on the planet). By limiting player eligibility to 4 years of play, most athletes are forced to offset their 30+ hours per week of varsity performance by taking classes of limited value or not giving them sufficient attention (the Toby Gerharts of the world getting engineering degrees while being high performing athletes are the rare exception, and not the rule, and need to be recognized as such). The NCAA also limits the number of scholarships per sport, which on the surface allows schools with smaller budgets to compete with the Dukes, however the end effect of these limitations are that far too many students with great athletic talent end up at schools they struggle at academically.
There’s no reason to limit the athletes to 4 years of play – at a minimum they should be allowed 5 along with earning their bachelors, and a commensurate reduction in full time academic requirements during the year. Also, the universities should be allowed to offer as many scholarships as they want – but the caveat is that the entering players *all* are in the upper 50% of the class with SAT and GPA, and not simply the average of all the sports, etc.
Guys like Gerhart will still end up playing for Stanford, as he well should having earned that privilege athletically *and* academically. However the lesser academically qualified talent will now spread out to all the other schools competing, where they are better academic fits, giving us the audience the pleasure of watching star talent on a variety of teams, and giving the athlete-scholars a manageable place to be both.
April 6, 2010, 9:54 amS says:
“the universities won’t have to waste time and money forcing players to attend bogus classes in order to keep up appearances”
The snobbery of the academic nerd? Maybe, sports therapy, or sports-in-art, is bogus to you but some people make careers out of that stuff, more than the philosophy students. Also, learning, in fact, does take place within the sports program, itself. Some students find those lessons invaluable off the field and throughout their lives.
April 6, 2010, 9:56 amsureyoubet says:
A little off topic, but as to the “academics” aspect of this, I honestly don’t see why football or basketball shouldn’t be academic majors. Are they really that different than dance or theatre majors (except that our society actually values the skills and talent of excellent football and basketball players more than excellent dancers or actors)? All are simply studying entertainment professions, yet we consider dance and theatre as legitimate majors, while scoffing at football or basketball players that study their crafts for years (even as NCAA rules attempt to actually limit the number of hours they can practice.)
Why are dance and theatre majors any more “academic” than football?
April 6, 2010, 10:00 amBob from Ohio says:
Yeah, let’s pay poor minority students and eliminate all chance of them getting an education. Because they will just save all their salary and not spend it.
Many NFL and NBA stars end up broke after making millions. Is there any reason to not expect the same from those making mere tens of thousands?
Under this libertarian nightmare, we just guarantee that the non NFL/NBA ready athlete is working at McDonald’s. At least under the present system, they have a chance of getting an education.
April 6, 2010, 10:06 ambyomtov says:
Angus,
Except for a few top schools, most universities lose money on their athletic programs.
Probably, but so what? That hasn’t stopped them from paying coaches millions. I don’t think the suggestion is that the schools have to pay players, just that they should be allowed to, just like they are allowed to pay coaches.
April 6, 2010, 10:09 amSmooth, like a Rhapsody says:
Players do get compensated for their services in the form of a 4 yr education.
April 6, 2010, 10:10 amThe only intercollegiate athletics that engender these “moral outrage” discussions are mens football and basketball. The average NCAA athlete graduates at a higher rate and does just as well academically as the average student. While the physical incompetents are busy banishing sports, I suggest that they please feel free to banish all other extra-cirricular clubs.
There is no logical reason why football and basketball could not be run like baseball; with a major league draft of high schoolers who then go into a minor league system. The two main forces opposing this change are, first the pro leagues who want to watch the talent develop and not have to pay for it; and, second, the schools who derive enormous prestige (increased applications) and alumni support from successful athletic programs.
One of the main reasons that athletic departments lose money (and no it isn’t because Mack Brown and Nick Saban make $5mil a yr–that money is almost entirely privately provided) is because of title IX, which also has had the effect of killing a number (like wrestling, which was my sport as a youth) of smaller revenue sports for men.
Adam J says:
sureyoubet- Do you really think a college is going to create a major for football, when it would know that few or none of the football graduates will get a professional job in their major? They’d look like idiots.
April 6, 2010, 10:13 amdan says:
It is really the TV money that supports the NCAA. The players are, in reality, unpaid employees of CBS. On the eve of the tournament, the players should inform the network they want to be paid to play or they will sit. Let the NCAA and CBS work it out between themselves.
April 6, 2010, 10:14 amSlow says:
Can you provide proof for this claim. I know often times singing bonus and large payouts are privately donated, I think the yearly salary is paid out of the school’s budget.
April 6, 2010, 10:18 ambyomtov says:
no it isn’t because Mack Brown and Nick Saban make $5mil a yr–that money is almost entirely privately provided
Contributions are a revenue source just like ticket sales and broadcast rights. Why wouldn’t those same donors contribute to paying good players? Presumably they are motivated by the desire for the school to have a successful team.
April 6, 2010, 10:26 amBama 1L says:
I go to church with Nick Saban and assure you he merits no singing bonus.
April 6, 2010, 10:29 amBama 1L says:
A fun exercise would be to replace “football” with other words, such as “sociology,” “comparative literature,” “computer engineering,” or “law.”
April 6, 2010, 10:32 amsureyoubet says:
Dan…
How many theatre and dance majors make a living at their professions? Not many. Except as teachers. And there are many who can’t play football or basketball professionally that go on to coach those sports. Is there really a difference?
April 6, 2010, 10:36 amSlocum says:
I don’t like the NCAA cartel, but that said, I don’t think that fans are paying all that money because of player talent, they’re paying to see minor-league level competition because of team/brand/alma-mater loyalty, not sheer talent. The NBA developmental league features players who are at least as good as most division I college teams, but how much money do D-league teams generate?
April 6, 2010, 10:45 amBob White says:
A typically frustrating discussion thread, but then again I expected no less.
1. MLB’s minor league system is allowed to exist in its current form because of MLB’s antitrust exemption, which no other sport has. Creating a minor league system in any other sport would have to be collectively bargained. This is possible, see, e.g., the NHL, but it’s much more complicated and much more expensive.
2. Total coaching compensation to top collegiate coaches comes partially from the school, and partially from outside sources. To what extent the salary paid by the school comes from a special athletics-only fund and to what extent it comes out of general revenues varies somewhat by school. USA Today has a useful database of collegiate football coaching contracts, which I recommend perusing if you’re interested in how coaches at different schools get paid.
3. The abolition of revenue sports makes the case for keeping non-revenue sports harder. Non-revenue sports have become a way to let more of the “right type” of people into the school without passing through normal channels. A mix of fundraising and admissions don’t want the big sports to go away.
4. Direct comparisons between graduation rates of athletes and non-athletes are fraught with peril, especially if they’re across the board. A good number of non-athletes who fail to graduate do so because school becomes unaffordable. If you normalize graduation rates for number of years on campus, non-athlete do better than athletes.
5. Before the NCAA put scholarship limitations on football programs, a number of schools, including for instance virtually the entire Big Ten, awarded almost all of their athletic scholarships in football and hardly any in other sports.
6. The rules against compensation of athletes beyond scholarship are NCAA rules, not conference rules. For violation of NCAA rules, the NCAA can de-accredit schools. This can draw antitrust scrutiny, but can also be a very effective weapon; for example, the threat of doing so forced Notre Dame and Penn to drop their TV contracts in the early 1950′s.
Personally, I’d be in favor of eliminating all links between schooling and sports, from college football down to junior high volleyball, but there are very strong reasons why this will never happen.
April 6, 2010, 10:57 amSmooth, like a Rhapsody says:
As for evidence for the source of e.g., Mack Brown’s salary: here’s what I found in 30 seconds of googling:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/15/mack-browns-5-million-sal_n_392484.html
Also, note that all Brown has to do is get to a BCS bowl game every 3rd yr or so, and that alone pays for his salary.
I don’t have a particular opinion on paying players a stipend, but a lot of these arguments are not very strong or realistic.
April 6, 2010, 11:10 amAdam J says:
Bama 1L – I’m sure there are majors that compete with football as being completely unmarketable, but you failed to name any. All of those fields have greater marketability then football. Even comparative literature degree gives you significant career opportunities in writing, editing, or as a teacher or professor.
April 6, 2010, 11:32 ambellisaurius says:
What’s the difference between being a player and the NCAA and being an unpaid intern? Looks pretty similar to me. Some folks are there for the scholarship, but many are getting the oppurtunity to either learn the job they want (in sports), or to perform in an extended interview (which is how I’ve generally seen internship/coops). Pretty good deal in all reality, probably better then the MLB apprenticeship system (low paid, nothing to show for it if one fails).
The one thing I might make different is to allow for 5-6 years of athletic eligibility, which is about the time it takes for someone with a coop/professional side gig to graduate. That way the person can realize “hey, I’m not going to get drafted I’ll get that degree now”, and the school gets a nearly professional level player, making for better teams. It would limit the number of people allowed to come into the entry pipeline, but it’s a better net deal for the school and individual athletes.
April 6, 2010, 11:35 amElliot says:
Can someone elaborate on the loss of accreditation? If Harvard paid the fencing team, would the whole university lose all accreditation, students become ineligible for student loans, and all government grants halted? Is this law somewhere? If so, where? Is it a requirement of the accrediting agencies?
April 6, 2010, 11:51 amBob White says:
Elliot,
It’s up to the NCAA. I haven’t perused the bylaws re this precise subject, but the NCAA governs all inter-collegiate athletics, so they theoretically can likely punish every sport for infractions in a single sport. The general practice, though, is to impose sport-specific punishments, unless there’s a broader problem at the athletic department or higher level. So, if e.g. Alabama gives extra benefits to football players, Alabama will face football-related punishments, like losing football scholarships or possibly foreiting wins.
The link is on the home computer, but the NCAA had, and may still have, its infractions database online, so you can search by school and sport and see what kind of transgressions resulted in what kind of punishment.
But, the NCAA just controls athletics. There are no student loan or government grant issues or anything along those lines at stake.
April 6, 2010, 12:00 pmJust Dropping By says:
It’s not simply a private cartel but one backed by government force. Armen Alchian and William Allen, in their 1964 textbook, University Economics, were the first people I know to point this out.
The editorial cartoonist, Herblock, did a cartoon that touched on this point over ten years before that. It was published in his original cartoon collection, The Herblock Book, which was printed in 1952. IIRC, it shows a college athlete (I believe a basketball player even) being busted with “payola” and an adult reprimanding him to the effect of “How could you kids lose your sense of values,” while big money flows into the school behind him.
April 6, 2010, 12:13 pmRoscoe says:
I find this statement to be somewhat naive. Colleges and universities have far more political power than the NCAA. The reason why college sports players aren’t paid is because the colleges and universities don’t want to pay them (other than with a free education).
There are a lot of reasons why colleges don’t want to pay players. First, they wouldn’t get to keep the money for themselves. Second, it would damage the belief (fiction?) that they are educators and the players are “student athletes.” Most importantly, American’s love affair with college football and basketball would likely not survive the programs being turned into semi-pro teams. (I mean, who watches minor league baseball?) I doubt that college presidents are anxious to risk a program that delivers a product that 10s of millions of students and alumni love, and which makes them lots of money.
So, if the NCAA disappeared tomorrow, I have no doubt that the day after tomorrow the SEC, Big 10, Big 12 etc. would create conference rules against paying players, and against scheduling teams that pay players.
April 6, 2010, 12:36 pmCurmudgeon says:
It’s also worth noting that the pro leagues will not allow you to go straight from high school anymore – basically, the player is forced into the NCAA cartel. The NCAA also try to prevent competition among members for players (e.g., sit out if you transfer) and try to restrict exit (e.g., players can’t hire an agent to investigate their market value). And don’t get me started on the anti-competitive nature of rookie salary caps, etc ;-)
April 6, 2010, 12:45 pmRich Rostrom says:
The present system of athletic scholarships arose to harness the enthusiasm for college sports fans, and turn it into support for student-athletes. College athletics generates $millions in scholarship money. Much of that money goes to students whose families have some degree of financial need.
This is a Good Thing. Over the years, thousands of poor kids have been enabled to go to college by athletic scholarships. There is some water in the glass.
What is Not Good is that student-athletes in some sports are allowed (or even enouraged or required) to skip their studies for more intense practice. If the athlete in question has a good chance of a pro career, this is not necessarily against his interests. But only a small fraction of college players go to the pros.
In many cases, there is an athlete from a poor family, whose talent is enough for a scholarship, which is his chance to get a college degree and “move up in the world”. But the coach insists that he practice all the time, steers him into “gut” courses, and fakes grades for him, so that when his eligibility runs out, he’s got nothing.
Cui bono? The coach, who gets a fat contract, and whose pay may be more than all the scholarships in his program together.
My remedy? 1) A program may issue only as many scholarships as it has athletes graduating. Well, 25% more, because even an honest program will have some dropouts. 2) A program may not pay more in coaches’ salaries than in scholarships. If the boosters want to give the coach a bonus, they have to give an equal amount to the school’s scholarship fund.
April 6, 2010, 12:48 pmRich Rostrom says:
Oh, and Bama1L wins the thread!
April 6, 2010, 12:49 pmSmooth, like a Rhapsody says:
To amplify on Bellisaurius’ good idea: one thing that most people do not realize is that athletic scholarships are not 4 yr deals–they are one yr and renewable each yr. As soon as Calipari took over at UK, he went to a couple of players and basically told them to move along. A change to 4 or 5 yr scholarships would benefit the student athlete.
April 6, 2010, 1:08 pmAs far as grad rates are concerned, you would have to be careful about what counts as a success. Does a player who leaves early and goes to Australia to play pro count against the university?
John Thacker says:
And Duke. The football team not as much, except for our repeated winning of the “Best Graduation Rate in Division I-A” award. Duke basketball players live in normal dorms and take normal classes and majors. My several friends who took classes with basketball players (and one who worked on a sociology project with Elton Brand), said that they got no special treatment and did the work. Some of the players are better academically than others (Langdon, Battier, Zoubek, Horvath, Bilas, for example), of course.
April 6, 2010, 1:25 pmJohn Thacker says:
Tim Floyd was horrible for this. He would routinely recruit twice as many guys as he needed then run half of them off.
April 6, 2010, 1:26 pmRR Ryan says:
Tim is adorable. Can I have one? Of course, I’m gay so it probably wouldn’t work. But seriously, I’ve never understood why the kids don’t get paid. And save the scholarship argument. For every Kareem that actually took real courses, there are a hundred taking management courses that a talking parrot could ace.
April 6, 2010, 1:31 pmwalrus says:
You challenge the argument that the athletes are paid by receiving an education by saying it is hard to graduate while a full time athlete and inferring that not many do. But according to the NCAA stats about 79% do graduate. That degree should be worth $150,000 if not more. That’s not bad pay, coming with free room and board. Just ask all the other students faced with huge student loans to pay off.
If indeed is so hard for athletes to graduate and play at the same time, are you advancing the argument that athletes should not go to classes? That their sole function at the university is to play ball? Is the purpose of the university now to be the sponsor of high quality athletic teams comprised of hired athletes who don’t attend classes because of their busy athletic schedule?
Or is it some in between state where they attend some classes but they are not interested in receiving degrees. And if only a small percentage go on to play pro ball, instead of leaving college with a degree, now the college athlete will only have his 4 year pay stub to show for his college time. How is that helping this athlete?
It’s not hard to see why donors would have a problem with a situation like that.
April 6, 2010, 1:33 pmSmooth, like a Rhapsody says:
I am with you, RR Ryan up to a point; but then you need to ask who is teaching the talking-parrot-level classes? Do the profs feel any compunction about cashing the check that they get for teaching classes like that?
April 6, 2010, 1:38 pmAnd how valuable is a degree in Post-Colonial Studies compared to one in Sports Management or General Studies?
GoodTry says:
The easier more palatable way to go for this needed reform is to point out that schools routinely pay stipends to graduate students that work at the university academically. There is really no reason why the sports scholarships should not include a stipend at something like 2x the average grad student stipend for that school. Politically this would get grad students involved with pushing for the change as well. As increasing their stipend would ease sports recruitment for the school(by increasing the pay to the athletes).
April 6, 2010, 1:39 pmhattio says:
A couple of points, some already made above.
1) The NCAA doesnt’ force anyone to play. There have been stories recently about two high school kids skipping college, (and in one instance their last year of high school) to play pro overseas. For one, it worked out, for another it didn’t. That will happen no matter what the farm system is, whether foreign pro teams, D-league, or collegiate sports.
2) I don’t think your eligibility is limited to 4 years. Someone with more knowledge than me should explain what a redshirt year is. But I think you can basically get 5 years of scholarships though you can only actually play on the team for 4 years. Even in the most rigorously demanding athletic fields, you should be able to get all of your requirements in 5 years. Oh, and even if you don’t, having 3/4 of your college paid for is still a hell of an advantage
3)Everybody talks about how athletes should still be submitted to academic standards. The funny thing is the teams that have a reputation for that, at least in basketball, (yes, I’m thinking Duke) are hated. Oh, and Duke has one of the higher graduation rates.
April 6, 2010, 1:40 pmhattio says:
Oh,
April 6, 2010, 1:44 pmAnd as far as football or basketball not being any training, I guarantee you that if you play football at Tennessee, or basketball at Duke, even if you ride pine most of the time, you can get a job coaching somewhere, and likely at a private high school that pays their coaches well.
BobDoyle says:
And what percentage of students with dance or theater majors get professional jobs in their majors? Or students with English, Math, Sociology, Psych, Classical Studies, Poli Sci, Philosophy, etc. majors? Not to mention students with majors in the faux disciplines such as Women’s Studies, Critical Studies, and various other ethnic and political studies “disciplines”?
April 6, 2010, 2:05 pmA Clark says:
Kind of bad timing on your point about big-time basketball players being “full time” athletes in that both Butler and Duke players do attend classes and, for the most part, graduate. It was pointed out by the broadcasters last night that three of the Butler players attended classes during the day before last night’s game. I don’t know if there really is a legit NBA player on either of those teams — maybe a couple will be drafted, but certainly hard to see any of them as potential stars. The fact is those guys WILL have to use their degrees — degrees that at both of those Universities cost around $40k per year for those not on athletic scholarship — that’s a pretty sweet deal.
April 6, 2010, 2:06 pmDavid Drake says:
Adam–Although only a few are going to turn professional, a football major or basketball major could be structured to teach each player how to (a) present himself properly–learn to read, write, converse and act like an educated person, and (b) make a career based on having played big time college sports. In my legal career, I have seen a fair number of former college athletes who were successful insurance agents or manufacturer’s reps because they had the ability to get in the door to see people that few others could.
One big problem with the system now is that the academics are a joke, particularly in big time basketball. “Student athletes” are brought in, tutored, etc., up until the point they play their final game, and then ignored. Many have learned nothing in college except how to be a better player.
And those who make the pros will make more in a short career than many lawyers, accountants, etc., let alone English and drama majors. So why shouldn’t the sport be a legitimate major?
April 6, 2010, 2:07 pmVercingetorix says:
What the h#$%? Since when is a scholarship a Roth IRA?
Hey, you can’t cash in a scholarship and buy a car, or a beer, or even a pack of gum. You aren’t go to the Bahamas off your “small classroom sizes” and “generous library endowment.”
If you’re getting something in trade, drop the BS. It’s trade. You’re getting something IN TRADE. You’re not getting paid.
The proof is your wallet. Ain’t nothing in it, because you didn’t get paid. Money = pay. Back rubs and favors = barter.
So college students might get some totally kick-ass trash in trade for their services, but, hey, they ain’t paid.
April 6, 2010, 2:24 pmStephen says:
While we’re talking about “compensation,” let’s not just focus on scholarships, room and board, etc. Athletes are provided with world-class training facilities, top notch athletic instruction, and ample opportunity for free publicity. Even semi-important football games from mid-major conferences are broadcast on one of the ESPNs nowadays, and almost half of Division 1-A football teams receive bowl invitations. In college basketball, 65 teams make the championship tournament each year, and 32 more make a lesser tournament (this system is likely going to change to one 96-team tournament, dropping one team but giving much more exposure to the extra 32 teams). When “normal” students are given such advantages, we call them “unpaid internships;” why is it only exploitative when the unpaid labor involved is playing football instead of cite-checking a junior associate’s brief?
April 6, 2010, 2:58 pmSage says:
The basic problem is that paying players under a competitive wage system will radically alter not only the sport but, more obviously, the relationship between the player and the school. A player in the pay of, say, the University of Alabama will be an employee of the state of Alabama. It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see how fundamentally this could alter the sport, and as another poster remarked, people positively adore college football just the way it is (however much they may grumble about championships, hypocrisy, and the like). I firmly believe that paying players a salary would completely transform the sport into something that very few people will be interested in watching.
Now none of that counts as a principled argument, and maybe Somin has the argument right on the merits. But we should be clear that there will be massive, unreformable consequences to creating a such a system and be upfront about the fact that what we’re arguing for is a sport that looks almost nothing like the sport we’re watching today. It’s not clear, for example, why a football player in such a system should necessarily be a student at all, and if he is, the problem with corrupt grading practices and “tutoring” will likely get substantially worse rather than better.
And at the end of the day, college football works because the players are students and have at least that much in common with the boosters and most of the fans.
April 6, 2010, 3:27 pmepeeist says:
Preventing any sort of compensation for student athletes is an anticompetitive measure and I look at it skeptically for that reason, as well as the gross unfairness (from my perspective).
Aside from fairness arguments (a big issue when dealing with a “non-profit” entity with a virtual monopoly), the biggest problem I have is that the NCAA by setting a “zero salary” requirement, as supported by the government (as noted in terms of scholarship/student loan/government fundng eligibility etc. for accredited schools) is doing essentially what people object to with minimum wages by setting a maximum wage (of zero). And without the arguable benefits (“preventing exploitation”) of a minimum wage. Also without any sort of potential liability (or at least not much if any enforcement) for the sort of misrepresentations (during recruitment) that if done by an employer or vendor might allow for repudiation of a contract.
April 6, 2010, 3:28 pmVercingetorix says:
Totally. Slaves were fed, clothed and housed; circus freaks got to see the world; and witch-hunts gave alot of publicity for poor peasants. Right.
Athletes play hurt, they suffer in practice, they are emotionally ‘abused’ by opposing and peer players, fans, and coaches. If we’re going to tally up all the airy little stuff, might as well add the phenomenological stuff too. Suffering trumps Cybex and free press packages, I think. Also, it trumps 90% of the ‘education’ they receive.
April 6, 2010, 3:41 pmq says:
lol at the people claiming a college scholarship is enough “compensation.” For many student athletes, they attend college not to receive an education but because it’s a step up to the pros. Those are the same student athletes that generate the most revenue for their university. I’d like to see some evidence that for those sorts of players that a few years of classes had any effect whatsoever on future earnings potential. The scholarship is essentially worthless to them. Their payment is basically free room and board which pales in comparison to the millions of dollars in surplus the university receives.
Look, just because we advocate paying student athletes their fair share doesn’t mean all athletes need be paid. Most athletes participate in sports that are not high-revenue generating; they can continue to do so without expecting payment. If an athlete wishes to obtain an education, he can still do it. But to assume that all “student athletes” should receive an “education” is ridiculous; many of them have no need for it.
April 6, 2010, 3:47 pmCCTrojan says:
Well if it is so horrendous, they don’t have to do it. No one is forcing them to play college ball. They can flip burgers or get another job requisite with their mental abilities. The fact is that MOST of these players are not good enough to get paid to play professionally and they are getting an education that would otherwise be unavailable to them.
Without NCAA athletics less than 5% of these kids would be playing professionally, the more intelligent remainder would be going to college on their own dime, and the rest would be working for minimum wage or selling dope. Is that really an improvement over the “evil cartel” we have now?
April 6, 2010, 3:54 pmhattio says:
q,
April 6, 2010, 3:58 pmOf course, the college athletes who are JUST using this as a stepping stone to a pro career are few and far between. And, they only spend a year. If they’re not good enough to go after their first year, then they are getting something out of the relationship, coaching, training, etc. If they are good enough to go pro after a year, but stick around despite the money they could make, they are clearly getting something that is valuable to them out of the relationship.
Adam J says:
David Drake – I certainly think playing college sports can be an asset in the professional world- particularly in sales oriented professions. I’m not arguing that it wouldn’t be useful for colleges to develop programs that allow their student-athletes to better exploit this advantage. That said, none of this has much to do with a “football major”, which unless its a total misnomer would involve learning about football. It’s not that sports are illegitimate majors, its just a school would look presumably look very bad if only a tiny percentage of its graduates had success in the field.
April 6, 2010, 4:15 pmtdiinva says:
Point 1: The NCAA may be a cartel that restrains trade but what trade are they restraining? For example there are 102 D1A football programs but does anybody really believe that there would be a market for 102 minor league football teams? College athletics creates its own market from students, faculty and staff, plus all the alumni or those who identify with the school. Separating the athlete from the school would bring an end to major college sports as the bond between the team and school weakens and dies.
Point 2: How much do you think minor league players get paid? Just look it up and you will see that it is generally less than the value of the scholarship, other gifts and amenities that schools give to the athlete. If anything colleges overpay their athletes. (Yes, I know that in kind payments result in lower utility then cash)
This thread is just another example of neo-libertarianism gone wild. It is first order thinking that ignores all the unintended consequences of a change to the artificially constructed market for college sports If schools were to drop the pretense of the student-athlete you wouldn’t have paid players representing the school. You wouldn’t have college athletics at all.
April 6, 2010, 4:18 pmJC says:
I think the argument that college athletes are being exploited isn’t all that strong. First, no one has forced these kids to play in any sport. It was their choice, and for some of them it is the only way they would even attend college. I suppose they could saddle themselves with the student debt that their peers are going to be dealing with and not play at all. Second, the vast majority of NCAA athletes, the ones that are below the radar for everyone except parents, friends and dedicated alumni, are no different in their academics than any other student. I played college football at a DI-AA school (its called the FCS now) and managed to balance football and academics. Its only a tiny portion of NCAA athletes who don’t go to class and get their grades inflated, yet they get trotted out to argue against college athletics as a whole.
April 6, 2010, 5:21 pmstudent says:
The NCAA is a cesspool of corruption, lies, thuggery, and hypocrisy. It’s a disgrace to higher education, and its disgracefulness is only surpassed by that of the college presidents and trustees who don’t have the moral integrity to zero it out of existence.
April 6, 2010, 5:40 pmBama 1L says:
I agree, but for which post?
April 6, 2010, 6:10 pmFollow the Money . . . « Oh, My! says:
[...] the Money . . . By jbiii Being a diehard, baseball first fanatic, what I find amusing in this whole discussion, is [...]
April 6, 2010, 7:08 pmDr. Funke says:
The NCAA should have lost their tax-exempt 501(c)(3) status long ago
Most of the money earned through major sports is spent on the sports OR funneled back to the school. Many of the donations are again put THROUGH the sports programs.
Average students do NOT benefit
Schools should be taxed PERIOD on their BILLION DOLLAR DEALS with CBS and other TV stations for other sports
April 6, 2010, 7:37 pmhattio says:
JC,
April 6, 2010, 8:59 pmYou didn’t happen to go to Chicago-Kent for law school did you?
Vercingetorix says:
I don’t think athletes are terribly put upon. There should be amateur sports and college sports.
On the other hand, college football and basketball are extremely large businesses. The school might lose money on the sports, but if we’re going to seriously consider in-kind contributions to be payments – like one commenter mentioned ‘publicity’ or tuition – those schools obviously benefit in-kind from having a program.
I don’t follow college sports. Tomorrow, every college football and basketball team could disband and I’d shrug. I don’t have a dog in this fight.
But if you have a business, you pay for your labor. A full-ride scholarship and a shiny new Soloflex are nice bennies, but they’re benefits, not salary or wages. I don’t see how you can get around not paying employees for their work.
April 6, 2010, 9:41 pmMike Giles says:
I think that the scholarship should be for as long as it takes for the athlete to get his/her degree. I also think the individual scholarships should be subtracted from the total scholarships for that sport, for that time period. I think coaches should receive – or forfeit – pay based upon the graduation rate of their athletes. I also like the idea of a degree in football/basketball. I’m guessing that the modern professional game – management/labor relations, financial issues, coaching, clock management, salary caps, statistically judging player performance – is complex enough to warrant as much of a degree as theater and dance. I also think that athletes shouldn’t be separated from the rest of the student body, as they are at some schools.
April 6, 2010, 10:15 pmbyomtov says:
Many of arguments here against paying players seem to miss the point entirely.
Imagine an outstanding high school quarterback. Enormous State University would gladly give him a scholarship and pay him some amount to come there and play football. Why exactly should the NCAA be able to block that transaction?
That seems to me to be the core question.
April 6, 2010, 10:21 pmLarvell Blanks says:
So if the system is so horribly biased against “student-athletes,” and if they are getting such a raw deal and being exploited by the evil schools, why is there such a huge number of people who are willing, even eager, to subject themselves to such exploitation? Perhaps because they believe they get something out of the deal. For many, it is the chance to continue playing the game they love at a high level as long as possible, while also gaining the status of being a collegiate athlete. For others it might be the chance to get a free education. For a relatively small number, it is the chance to show that they are ready to move up to the next level, where they can hope to reap an enormous financial payoff. Whatever the reason, there is certainly no shortage of people who are willing to do whatever it takes to get the opportunity to play college basketball. It seems to me that the free market is working exactly as it should.
April 6, 2010, 11:20 pmJC says:
hattio:
No, I didn’t. I’m currently a 2L at a midwestern law school.
April 6, 2010, 11:50 pmll says:
I agree with that. And the “majors” would include such things as coaching techniques for all levels of schools, sports injury prevention, recognition, and treatment, elements of kinesiology, elements of money management, negotiations and negotiating techniques, and such.
April 6, 2010, 11:56 pmMichael says:
I’ve kinda wondered if there isn’t an NCAA old boy network that uses the ‘hypocritical rules’ to settle other scores. Jerry Levias was the first black athlete in the old Southwest Conference. He played for SMU. Later SMU was the first and last college to get the ‘death penalty’ which has ruined their program to this day for sponsors giving something to students. Actually I believe in this case it was kind of trivial. OTOH, I kind of liked it that where there would be a real star there was the possibility that a fan would give him a suitcase full of money to play for the school. It seemed to me like what is needed it something like Talmudic proof for a capital murder conviction (thus keeping more skullduggery).
April 7, 2010, 1:37 amAspen says:
Because parallel minor league and NCAA systems exist for baseball and hockey player development, they are much less corrosive to the ideal of the student athlete than basketball and football. The NFL and NBA also get to outsource much of the expense of player development to the NCAA. Substantial resources are invested in these systems, so any attempt to create a parallel minor league for either of these sports is unlikely to succeed.
All NCAA athletics could be transitioned into private club systems affiliated with each school. The subsidy for non revenue-producing sports could be maintained assuming there is administrative and/or legislative support to do so. This would preserve most of the existing system while allowing non-students to participate in NCAA sports.
Removing the incentive to make academic concessions would benefit the schools. Opening the door to financially compensate athletes might benefit some of the athletes. Illuminating or eliminating a hidden public subsidy for professional athletics would benefit the public.
April 7, 2010, 1:47 amtdiinva says:
Aspen:
Nonsense. Fans are willing to pay $100/game to see the Notre Dame Fighting Irish but I doubt that they would pay more then $20 (if that) to see the Fighting Irish Football Club of South Bend sponsored by the University of Notre Dame. The franchise value of a College football or basketball team accrues to the university and is not intrinsic to the team itself. This is why the argument that these players generate revenue for the school is wrong. The sports-university complex is irreducible into its separate components. The actual value of the sport taken out of its university context is near zero. A player’s value in such a situation would be far less then scholarship value that they current receive.
April 7, 2010, 9:28 amAspen says:
tdiinva:
I agree about the probable marketability impacts of separating the team from the school. The ideal of the student athlete is part of the branding used by the NCAA and contributes to the overall marketability of these sports. Minor league hockey and baseball teams are usually not self-sustaining and I would not expect developmental leagues for football and basketball to be much different without the existing subsidies, monetary and non-monetary, embedded in the NCAA system.
I think that a scholarship given to an athlete who has no intention of completing a degree is worth much less than face value. It also corrupts the admissions process if other, more academically qualified, students are passed over in favor of athletes. As a non-monetary payment for services, it serves more to lock students into a program than to compensate them for services rendered.
April 7, 2010, 10:30 amTexas Lawyer in DFW says:
Well, depending on how you calculate the revenue and the costs of a football team, in the televised area, somewhere between 15% and 30% of the teams do better than break even. I talked with a world class analyst (who ran a top 25 MBA program) about that once, and his thought was that if the players were paid and the economics were clearer, you would get a collapse of college football to where you only had about forty teams left, and that once that level was hit, the sport would hit a death spiral.
Some interesting stuff there, though. And why the NCAA enforces against cheating by alumni so much.
The real question ought to be whether or not the NCAA ought to relax rules that prevent alumni from paying atheletes. That would create an entirely different set of issues.
April 7, 2010, 1:06 pmTexas Lawyer in DFW says:
Err, some typos. The text box I get does not display everything typed in (so that much of it is “off-screen” when I have typed in a comment. Just FYI. Using IE. Firefox doesn’t seem to have that problem.
April 7, 2010, 1:08 pmtdiinva says:
Aspen:
Overall only a few athletes plan on leaving school without completing a degree. Most football players know that their career ends on the last day of their senior season. You are confusing the few players who will even have shot at the NFL with the overwhelming majority of players on the team. Most know that they need to get a degree in something.
Basketball is different now. Many players who feel they have a shot at the NBA don’t even go to college. The go to the NBA developmental league or Europe to play. You see the result of this in leveling of competition in the NCAA tournament.
It is a myth that unqualified athletes take slots from qualified students. Football, basketball baseball and in some places hockey are slots that wouldn’t be there at all. These slots aren’t fungible.
April 7, 2010, 4:09 pmSandy MacHoots says:
I dislike the NCAA as much as anyone, but the fallacy in the lead argument is that people are not, by and large, paying to see “the players” play. A college team’s roster turns over dramatically; every couple of years; college fans root for whoever happens to be wearing their team’s laundy. If Alabama and Auburn (or Yale and Harvard) traded rosters tomorrow, it’s not likely that a single fan of either school would change allegience.
True, fans develop passionate affection for some players — but that’s because the player is on THEIR team. If Tim Tebow had played ball at Florida State, everyone in Gainesville would hate his guts.
April 7, 2010, 7:42 pmbyomtov says:
Sandy MacHoots,
the fallacy in the lead argument is that people are not, by and large, paying to see “the players” play. A college team’s roster turns over dramatically; every couple of years; college fans root for whoever happens to be wearing their team’s laundy. If Alabama and Auburn (or Yale and Harvard) traded rosters tomorrow, it’s not likely that a single fan of either school would change allegience.
But this is also true of professional sports to some degree. And even so, having good players, and winning, is what makes the teams popular. Anyway, if the players are as irrelevant as you and others claim then the schools really won’t end up under pressure to pay them. So it seems like a self-defeating argument that comes down to:
“We shouldn’t let schools pay players because they really don’t need to.”
tdiinva,
It is a myth that unqualified athletes take slots from qualified students. Football, basketball baseball and in some places hockey are slots that wouldn’t be there at all. These slots aren’t fungible.
I don’t think this is true. Why do you think so?
April 8, 2010, 12:39 pmJohn says:
The solution to the issue of power imbalance between the parties seems to be returning the: coaches, administrators, NCAA Corporate/ affiliated parties etc. and student/athletes back into ameteurs again. The coaches should be similar to coaches at the High School level, who are qualified teachers, and coach for more than personal gain. While other parties and the head coach may be a full time job, they should be paid no more than instructor salaries.
The student & athlete should have to meet all regular entrance requirements. They can however, recieve scholarships as other extra-circular activities such as band etc. do. However, these scholarships would be at the discretion of the school, not the athletic department, which would be merged with the university.
Those athletes who can’t meet entrance requirments, would have the option of playing in minor leagues. In the case of football, a minor league would emerge from the NFL. This would their way of protecting product quality. If the athlete wanted an education at the same time, they could do what some NFL athletes opt to do now (who have’t graduated) and enroll in classes part-time during the off-season.
In this case the athlete would want an education, and would seriously pursue it, because they are paying for it and sacrificing for it, instead of having it being forced upon them, or given to them, as it is now.
Other opportunities for players’ education would come from the NFL, which most likely would seek to provide minimum education in terms of: media interaction, pr, money management and conduct, to ensure that there is good publicity for the league.
As it exists now, the current NCAA would need to be demolished and re-structured so that it supports education first. This could be system-wide so that instead of the NCAA sanctioning spending money to recruit and provide benefits to recruits, that it instead provides funds to lagging high schools to help them meet universities educational admissions requirements.
April 8, 2010, 1:08 pmRich Rostrom says:
Bama 1l: April 6, 2010, 10:29 am
April 8, 2010, 2:02 pmRich Rostrom says:
tdiinva says: “Overall only a few athletes plan on leaving school without completing a degree.”
Many programs have graduation rates of less than 50%, even excluding athletes who go pro before graduating. The athletes may not plan on it, but coaches often encourage them to neglect their studies with mirages of a pro future.
April 8, 2010, 2:08 pmtdiinva says:
byomtov:
Because at one time in the distant past I was on the faculty of Indiana Univerisity. It provided me with insight into the undergraduate and graduate admissions processes. If athletics disappeared there would have been no increase in the size of the regular freshman class.
Rich:
That does not refute my point. You have to be arrogant to be an athlete at any level but after a player has a season under his belt he can figure out where he stacks up. Coaches at places like USC, Ohio State or Miami might dangle that line to motivate a player but I don’t think someone going lesser programs is going to buy the line.
April 8, 2010, 3:48 pmBob says:
There is no basis to the claim that a college that employed paid athletes, or even owned entire professional teams, would lose its accreditation as a college. It would have to withdraw those teams from NCAA, NAIA, AIAW, or NJCAA competition, that’s all. Accrediting agencies don’t require varsity, JV, or freshman extramural sports at all, let alone membership in the NCAA, NAIA, AIAW, or NJCAA.
That doesn’t stop those bodies from being cartels, of course. The NCAA has even squeezed out the AIAW and the AAU from prominent positions in amateur sports. I’m not sure the AIAW still exists, and the AAU has lately been relegated to sports for the less-than-college-age. The AAU was squeezed out by not only the NCAA, but also the USOC.
April 12, 2010, 12:23 amThe Volokh Conspiracy » Dubious Grousing over the Percentage of African-American Players in Major League Baseball says:
[...] African-American athletes (along with some of other races), they should cast a more critical eye on the NCAA cartel. Categories: Baseball, Sports and [...]
April 16, 2010, 1:21 am