One argument I rarely hear is that these athletes get paid on the back end. The athletes get national TV exposure and press. They get an opportunity for an education with a scholarship that many people don’t. I don’t buy that they make millions/billions for other people is a reason to pay them beyond what they’re getting. Welcome to the real-world! How many Wal-Mart, McDonalds or Microsoft workers get paid commensurate with the value they provide the company? And the argument that somehow it is unfair that the “have” to go to college e.g. one-and-done in NCAA basketball. You are not forced to go to college. Take a year off or play in Europe. “But.” you whine “That is not the same exposure as college ball.” Exactly! That’s how the college is paying you! Oh and at the same time why don’t you whine how teachers, lawyers and other professions have to get degrees (not just be enrolled in classes) to partake in their chosen career.
However, I do think it’s BS that athletes do not get to cash in on their fame. If I want a Jameis Winston jersey or Marcus Mariota autograph then they should be allowed to get a cut for their identity. I would definitely change the rules so that they can get money for that AFTER they start school viz. it cannot be used as a recruiting school.
Paid by whom? The schools? I don’t think schools should pay their athletes but I think they should be able to if they want to. I also think that citizens of a state whose state school pays the athletes should sue the living fuck out of the schools.
Winning teams are apparently really important to certain boosters, fans and alumni. Yet none of them are allowed to gift the athletes any money. This is a curious violation of individual rights and unless a Congress with Stone Age conceptions about college athletics intervenes, it’s gonna get shot down by one of the numerous lawsuits currently working its way through the system.
To clarify, yes. The schools.
The answer I want wasn’t an option.
My answer is “No, and colleges shouldn’t be operating huge sports programs in the first place. Let the NFL and the NBA operate their own farm teams at their own expense.”
This is what I should have said instead of what I did. Shut 'em down.
I didn’t get paid when I played in the band, they shouldn’t get paid when they play on the team.
Too bad this poll didn’t allow multiple responses. I’d have checked all three of the ‘yes’ boxes, because they’re all true. The current system IS indentured servitude, the current rules against players realizing any monetary gain before going pro ARE unreasonable, and it’s especially true because there’s more than enough to go around.
And while in theory, the athletes get paid with an education, the NCAA schools make it challenging for scholarship athletes in the money sports to realize anything like the full value of that education.
How much did your school charge people to hear you play? Were you allowed to accept gifts?
I repeat, I am opposed to schools paying their athletes. I just don’t think they should be prohibited from doing so.
When the college band can fill a stadium with paying customers six or seven times a season, and have those performances widely televised regionally if not nationally, let me know.
No they shouldn’t because they are paid with their education.
The problem with the “pay the players” is for every Jamious Winston who is making millions of dollars for their school, there is the Women’s Volleyball player who libero’s for her 3-22 season who doesn’t “do” anything for her school, but is just as much an athlete. She’s getting ignored in this whole debate
If you pay one, you gotta pay em all. I’m not saying a system could be worked out, but what I’m saying is that’s the biggest hurdle
What is Alabama gonna do when LSU starts offering 5-star football recruits a $25,000 stipend and the NCAA can’t stop them from doing it? I think Alabama will pony up and go to court when the other athletes at the school (or just regular students) sue them for it.
The volleyball player isn’t getting ignored, she’s just a victim of market reality.
The “they already get paid with an education” argument has been clearly debunked in recent years by the fact that so many others wish to give the athletes so much more and are prevented from doing so only by the current disingenuous rules.
What do you mean by “clearly debunked?”
Not arguing, just curious
Gonna change my answer:
Yes they should be paid a stipend of “living money” as a part of their scholarship.
That money should come from some sort of “general athletic fund” and everyone’s pay, Winston and my Volleyball player, get the same amount.
I think the major problem is that the NCAA is afraid that the paying of athletes will create a system of have and have-nots
And the major conferences had contracts with the major bowls which meant a ton of money for facilities. And although not run by the NCAA, the BCS system was condoned by them in which mid-majors hardly ever got in and did not make the same amount of money. Even discounting that, think of the exposure the majors got. Would you rather play for USC or UCLA and maybe be showcased in the Rose Bowl or San Diego State and best case get in the Las Vegas Bowl.
And now the “Big 5” can offer a theoretically unlimited stipend to athletes. So completely not-hypocritical right? Why don’t they just be honest and have the Big-5 be their own league.
In my typical awkward fashion, I am trying to say that their market value has been clearly established as well above the cost of tuition. And that their “pay” has been artificially restrained. If neither of these observations were true, there would be no examples of athletes receiving “improper” benefits; instead we have so much evidence to the contrary that incidents are barely being hidden any more.
So, while their education may indeed be their pay, it is clearly an inadequate one for some (many?) of them.
The whole scholarship system is a little weird IMO and would make for an interesting thread in itself.
And they can - the teams just happen to be (a) located at major universities, and (b) independent of any specific major league teams. You could also add an unwritten rule that players on a particular team attend the associated university, but it couldn’t really be enforced without establishing a true link between the team and the university.
The leagues/pro teams pay the universities for the use of their stadiums and training facilities. The teams pay the athletes as they would any other players; any restrictions would be up to the appropriate players’ union.
Added benefit: since the teams are not part of the university, things like Title IX don’t really figure into it. (This is why the link between the team and the university has to be very limited.) If a school wants to support just football and men’s basketball, they can pull out of the NCAA entirely. (“Who wouldn’t?” Well, schools with strong programs in other sports - for example, LSU (baseball), North Carolina (women’s soccer), and Stanford (pretty much anything except ice hockey, wrestling, and men’s lacrosse).)
In exchange for this, the NFL and NBA pay the NCAA enough to run things more or less they way they do now for all sports except “big time” football and men’s basketball (the smaller Division I schools remain in the NCAA, which will still have Division I football and men’s basketball championships); after all, somebody has to make sure some Division III women’s tennis player doesn’t make one too many phone calls.
See post #7.
Playing a major sport for a Division I team is a more-than-full-time job, and a physically exhausting one at that. It doesn’t leave much time and energy for players to switch gears and focus on taking advantage of their education.
As Exhibit A, I would introduce pp.5-9 of the NLRB decision in the Northwestern case, a section titled, “Football Players’ Time Commitment to Their Sport.”
The NLRB’s findings of fact included 50-60 hour weeks of football activities throughout the month of August, then settling down to 40-50 hours a week through the end of November (if no bowl game) or December (if a bowl game), including practices and meetings from 7:50am to 11:50am Tuesday through Thursday.
(That would have shredded my class schedule pretty much any semester during my academic career.)
And while during the winter, the time demands wane somewhat (down to 12-15 hours per week), spring football practice is required, taking 20-25 hours a week from late February through mid-April. So it’s not like they can fully concentrate on academics during the spring semester either. But even if they could, it’s not the norm at colleges and universities for every class to be offered every semester: some courses are always offered only in the fall, and some are always offered only in the spring. So if your fall is all chewed up by football, it’s not like you can even make two years’ progress towards graduation in the spring semesters.
Maybe if they let the players take four years of classes for free after their playing eligibility was used up, you could say they were getting an education in exchange for their time on the football field.
Al Maguire once put it very well in a discussion:
“Say a boy from Louisiana accepts a basketball scholarship at Cenral Miichigan. He can’t even accept a donated overcoat from an alumni or local car dealer. His mama, back home in a housing project with six other kids to feed has to buy him one.”
Some basic minimum, say the amount of a full-time minimum wage job, should be exempt from any amount that anyone wants to pay or donate a college athlete. Sure, they get a free education and meals and lodging, but they don’t even have bus fare to town or a phone card to call home, withoutvfiolating NCAA rules. No, the college should not pay them, but they should certainly be allowed to accept the basic cost of dignity from whomever wants to give it to them.
This. When I was in college I was paid to shelve books at the library as a work-study gig. My recollection is that I got about twice the minimum wage. If athletes were paid that rate for all the time they spend playing, practicing and traveling, they would certainly have enough spending money to be able to afford their own crab legs, but the total amount of money paid out would still be tiny relative to big time athletic department budgets. For those very few athletes who are popular enough to make money selling jersies and autographs, I don’t see any reason why they shouldn’t get a fair cut.