OT: It's time to pay college athletes.

[prototoast]

Originally Posted by ripvanrando

I am sure SCOTUS has nothing better to do and will show me wrong, I am just giving my opinion. College Athletes should be students first and foremost. Most of these kids will never play professionally. Maybe the issue is with the NFL, maybe they are colluding with NCAA.

The legal question isn't "should colleges pay players?" The legal question is "should colleges be allowed to collude to stop players from being paid?"

[Mark McM]

Originally Posted by ripvanrando

Aren't they still drafting high school players into the NHL? Kid down the street from me went in the first round back in the day.

Football and basketball is where the money is in college sports. But unlike the NBA and the NFL, the NHL and MLB have a minor league farm team system, so they don't need to rely on colluding with colleges.

Originally Posted by ripvanrando

College Athletes should be students first and foremost.

Sadly, many athletes on scholarship aren't allowed to be students first. The demands of their sports, both in training schedules and travel, mean that they can't attend regular classes. Instead, many schools develop "parallel" education programs specifically for athletes. And sadly, many of these programs are scholastically deficient compared to the schools regular education programs. These programs are primarily aimed at keeping the athlete's academically eligible to play (by awarding good grades), with little effort payed to actual learning.

As an example, a class action lawsuit was brought against the University of North Caroline for fraud, with the student athletes charging they at they were not given the top quality college education there were promised:

https://www.cbssports.com/college-fo...demic-scandal/

[ripvanrando]

Originally Posted by prototoast

The legal question isn't "should colleges pay players?" The legal question is "should colleges be allowed to collude to stop players from being paid?"

So, you agree with me.

[el cheapo]

College athletes (primarily football and basketball) need to form a union like player associations in the NFL and NBA. Profit sharing and lifetime medical coverage for serious injuries would be a start. These kids that play college sports don't realize how much power they have over the NCAA if they get together as a group and STRIKE until they get what they want. Probably won't happen because most of these kids are still dreaming of being a PRO and they don't want to rock the boat.

[Mark McM]

Originally Posted by el cheapo

College athletes (primarily football and basketball) need to form a union like player associations in the NFL and NBA. Profit sharing and lifetime medical coverage for serious injuries would be a start. These kids that play college sports don't realize how much power they have over the NCAA if they get together as a group and STRIKE until they get what they want. Probably won't happen because most of these kids are still dreaming of being a PRO and they don't want to rock the boat.

In 2015, an attempt was tried and failed to unionize the Northeastern University football team. However, just last month federal bills were introduced to the US House and Senate that would declare any student that receives compensation to play to be employees of the school, and would be allowed to collectively bargain.

https://www.espn.com/college-sports/...come-employees

Decades ago the Olympics let go of the myth of the "Amateur Athlete". It's time for colleges to give up on that myth, too. If players are compensated to play a sport (whether that's in cash or scholarships), they are by definition professional athletes.

[unterhausen]

The only reason college athletes are amateurs is to give the entire enterprise a thin veneer of legitimacy. That's gone if it ever existed.

[ojingoh]

Originally Posted by unterhausen

The only reason college athletes are amateurs is to give the entire enterprise a thin veneer of legitimacy. That's gone if it ever existed.

I wrote a really long winded reply to the question but this sums it up right here.

It's always going to be about the money for colleges and athletics. College administrators are ruthlessly exploiting players and the fan base by owning teams thinly disguised as 'college teams' when the only reason they exist is to make more money for the athletic department. Not the university - the university athletic department.

Case in point - UT at Austin made $144M in revenue in 2018 from just the football team, and 1/3 of that was 'donations' from alums, roughly a third from ads and commercial use, and another third from ticket sales. https://www.houstonchronicle.com/tex...8-13588340.php Where did they spend all that money? On UT athletics!

I think it's deeply troubling one sport 'pays' for the other 34 sports https://www.businessinsider.com/coll...evenue-2017-10 in order for fans not to demand the football teams be divested from the university and pay the players. I'd want nothing more than the players to get paid and the other teams earn their own money. Colleges shouldn't even be in the sport game at all besides club sports - what does the university do besides educate people? Teach them how to putt? Work on their backstroke?

[Marvinlungwitz]

X=x

[ripvanrando]

The thrust of this thread wasn't the legal question but a moral one.

It seems there is a cabal of conspiracy and collusion where the coaches and admins make millions and are probably in bed with overseeing organizations. Probably some sort of antitrust issue.

Should students be paid to play sports in college? Not in my opinion as stated and briefly explained earlier. Students should be at University to learn, period. My opinion has nothing to do with the law.

[ripvanrando]

Why should academic students pay for athletic programs? The campus fee is quite large at Rutgers, something like $1400. Some of this fee supports football and other losing endeavors.

Compared with other Big Ten schools and similar peer institutions, a far larger share of Rutgers revenue for athletics is generated not by the athletics program itself but through the university’s own revenue sources, including student fees. Such non-athletic revenue sources contributed $33 million to the Rutgers athletic budget, including $12 million in student fees, which the report says “significantly exceeded that of both Big Ten and peer institutions.”

https://www.northjersey.com/story/ne...es/2748374002/

[vespasianus]

Originally Posted by bicycletricycle

I would go the other way, ban college sports. Let club sports fill in as the professional farm leagues, they can pay athletes if they want.

The sentiment by many is that places like Duke exploit poor black kids that play in college but never make it to the pro's and end up broke. That might be the case, I don't know but honestly, I think you need to look at the outcome data as a whole and see the benefit/harm that is occurring.

You could make the argument that college athletics has helped bring many people out of poverty by giving them an education.

[ripvanrando]

It is time that non-athletes to stop subsidizing sports, not the time to pay college athletes. Why should a working mom or anyone else attending school be forced to pay $1400 activities fees, much of which goes to the sports programs....?

The NCAA reported in 2016 that the average Division I school lost $12.6m annually on athletics if they don’t have a football team, and $14.4m if they do. In Division II, the annual loss per school as of 2014 was $5.1m if they had a football team and $4.1m if they did not. For Division III, football schools lost $3.1m on athletics while those without football experienced a $1.6m loss.

Largely, student fees and hiked tuition subsidize these costs at smaller private universities, although taxpayers contribute at state government-operated public colleges. Even so, a 2010 Washington Post report revealed that nine public colleges in Virginia charged each student more than $1,000 annually in fees to fund their athletic department.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/20...rams-academics

[peanutgallery]

Alabama and Clemson (and many other schools) are basically football plantations with admin and coaches making a mint while the players are on a year to year deal without any real compensation. There's an entire economy based on the players performing and the haves cashing the checks

One injury, you're out. Don't buy into the crazy evangelical church that Dabo likes (look it up), you're out. Refuse to cut Saban's grass in his requested way, you're out

Just so happens that the folks running the show down South happen the be generally one color and those providing the talent another. I find it a little weird

Pay 'em

[bicycletricycle]

I think you probably could make that argument, however, if that is your goal, why only do it for kids that can play sports? University is for education, if they could keep sports small it would be fine but when they dominate the students experience, heck, when they dominate the schools budget, the priorities are upside down.

Originally Posted by vespasianus

The sentiment by many is that places like Duke exploit poor black kids that play in college but never make it to the pro's and end up broke. That might be the case, I don't know but honestly, I think you need to look at the outcome data as a whole and see the benefit/harm that is occurring.

You could make the argument that college athletics has helped bring many people out of poverty by giving them an education.

[ripvanrando]

Originally Posted by peanutgallery

Alabama and Clemson (and many other schools) are basically football plantations with admin and coaches making a mint while the players are on a year to year deal without any real compensation. There's an entire economy based on the players performing and the haves cashing the checks

One injury, you're out. Don't buy into the crazy evangelical church that Dabo likes (look it up), you're out. Refuse to cut Saban's grass in his requested way, you're out

Just so happens that the folks running the show down South happen the be generally one color and those providing the talent another. I find it a little weird

Pay 'em

Who pays? They already lose money (over 30 million per year) that ostensibly is taken from the academic students in one way or another.

Clemson's athletic programs cost the school $122 million against revenue of $85 million.

The male coaches make a mint.....millions.....while the average female coach is in the $200K range.

https://clemsontigers.com/wp-content...ADA-Survey.pdf