College sports are a hell of a lot of fun. The intensity and electricity that packs arenas, stadiums and ballparks nationwide is virtually unmatched. It mounts competition between 18-23 year old kids whom showcase their talent, skills and hard work at the highest level an amateur can compete at.
There is nothing quite like it. They are only playing because they absolutely love what they are playing. If they did not love it, it would not be worth it, because about 90 percent of what college athletes have to deal with is complete garbage in my opinion I really cannot stand it at all. The garbage I speak of, sparks a hot conversation of debate, should college athletes be paid? A simple question, without a simple answer.
The main argument (that I have heard) as to why student-athletes should not be paid is because said kids are receiving education from high-end universities (Here is the kicker) for free. And not only for free, but many times with perks that most students could not dream of as the school helps out with meal plans, mopeds, iPads, Brand name gear whether it be Nike, adidas or Under Armour and other related things. These athletes also get the opportunity to travel around and see many parts of the country on university dime. As a person that has been mainly planted in the Midwest, I would kill for the opportunity to get to fly around and see other parts of the country. Much less have someone else pay for it.
In some situations, these people are treated like immortals, and receive notoriety that most 20-something-years-olds could never imagine. At schools like Alabama, Texas, Duke and Ohio State, co-eds and grown men and women will bend over backwards for opportunities to help these guys and girls. All the enabling creates an environment that kids, who are no longer the “typical college student," can easily take advantage of certain normal things. This, of course, leads to the other stereotype that most student-athletes are not going to class or doing any schoolwork whatsoever. It is my opinion that they put in more of a school effort than what is perceived, but you hear rumors of Morris Claiborne showing up for class, day one of the semester at LSU, and then never returning to class again, yet like clockwork, he passed for nothing.
Whatever the case, I still feel like these kids are getting cheated. And I mean cheated big time.
First, simply paying for school is not enough because of the massive time commitment these kids are giving on a daily basis. They are supposed to be student-athletes. Emphasis on student. But in reality, a lot of these kids are giving 50-60 hours per week to sports alone. This leaves little time for the students to complete schoolwork that they are required to be passing in order to keep competing. On a conservative scale, it is said that college students should spend an average of two hours per credit outside of class studying. So a 12-credit semester would result in 12-in-class hours, plus another 24-hours out of class, devoted to studies per week.So the average student will dedicate 36-hours per week on school. But then the athlete will have to do that, plus an additional 50 hours (give or take some either way) on activities related to their sports. At this point, we are talking 86 hours or 3.5 days out of their week that are already being completely spoken for already without considering simple things like eating, driving and sleeping.
Considering I get tired after a day of school and my retail job which involves usually no physical activity at all, I cannot imagine how tired these guys are after school, the mental tutoring of their sport, practice and occasionally their workout. I know I would be wiped, and because of this I am going to go out on a limb and say some of these kids are getting decent sleep therefore I am giving these men and women an average of five hours of sleep per night. We are now (factoring sleep time in) up to five days of their schedule completely spoken for already.
I mean, maybe I am crazy[1], but I think that the college years are hugely influential when trying to figure out who the hell you are and what you want to be. In my experience, people need time to figure out what is going to matter to them in life. And if you only have 47 hours, spread out sporadically in between the intense day-to-day activities that are intertwined with major cutthroat athletics, it becomes hard for these kids to find themselves.
In my opinion, the lack of free time makes a lot of these people one-dimensional. They are being systematically trained to behave a certain way, and often times the behavior that is being exemplified is not necessarily something that is going to help out these student-athletes long-term. What good does knowing how to systematically break down a “cover-3” do for someone who is now trying to tell you how to manage your money? Or how does knowing the ins and outs of perfect diving techniques do for someone that is now trying to sell real estate? Does this person even really care about real estate?
What I mean is that, most of these people will not go on to be professional athletes, but until they officially do not make the next league, all they have known their whole lives is that sport. To have that label stripped of them so suddenly, I think is somewhat of a culture shock. If they are lucky they graduate with a degree in something, but is that even what they really love? Do they want to be that? Or did they use it as a placeholder when they were still chasing their real dreams of athletics. Once again, my point is while normal college kids have the time to tinker around and try out different routes and gain real world experiences that help shape who they are, college athletes have a route that is already semi-paved for them, and it it starts and ends on the playing field.
But then things really get crazy. As if the sacrifice of 86 mental and physical taxing hours were not enough, they also have to endure the pressure of making sure their coach keeps his or her job… and in some cases, their boat too.
After Johnny Manziel went OVO on everyone last year and won the Heisman trophy, his coach, Kevin Sumlin, received a 1.1 million dollar raise (he now makes 3.1 million per year). Meanwhile, Johnny got in trouble for signing his name on some footballs. Alabama's Nick Saban is now getting paid an absurd seven million dollars per year to coach amateur football. Tom Izzo is making 3.5 million per season to man the pine at Michigan State and Carol Hutchins, the women’s softball coach at the University of Michigan, makes $200,000 per year. These coaches do not only thoroughly enjoy their jobs and the high paying perks that they sometimes carry, but also to show the competitiveness that college athletics produces among non-athletes.
College athletics are actually a job for thousands of people. A high paying job at that. And yet the moneymakers themselves (the athletes), get nothing but the pressures the coaches apply on them to keep winning. And if they do not keep win, the coach will only make matters more intense. When a college program starts failing, it gets awkward for the players. When losing, the media scrutiny heightens, thus putting more pressure on the coach to succeed. If he continues to fail, then the players, who put all their good faith in the coach when they picked the school in the first place, are subjected to feeling the guilt of a grown man losing his livelihood. That kind of mental stress should be compensated in my opinion. Especially considering the universities are making so much on these kids. According to a Time Magazine article written in September about college athletics, Michigan Wolverine Football team made the university 85.2 million dollars in 2012 Longhorns of Texas brought in 103.8 million. In basketball, Duke brought in 25 million for the university, while the Louisville Cardinals made 42.4 million for their school.
If College Football created a revenue share that was weighted like the NFL each player on the Texas A&M football team could be making 225,000 dollars per season of college football. Instead, not one player is allowed to make money off the skills that they are working so hard to craft. I think it is all-together absurd that a football team is out there generating 103 million dollars and players are risking their heads, knees and time and not getting paid through the whole process.
So what can be done?
A couple different ideas need to be put in motion. The first one being letting these young athletes market themselves. While a small percentage of college athletes go on to the pros, most of them have to figure out how to do other things, but all of them are receiving notoriety in college, and by and large they deserve to cash in on it.The fact that some big wig somewhere says Johnny Football cannot go up to a car dealer in Texas, make a deal with him to be spokesman and boost this dudes car sales for a price is stupid. If I came up with some brilliant marketing ploy to boost the sales of someone’s car lot (Which is what I would have to do, because I’ m clearly not as much of a certified bad-ass like Johnny Football), I could reap the benefits and it would be awesome.
But a popular college athlete, who only got to his/her position through hard work, cannot do the same thing, is insane.This is stupid and bad for business especially considering restaurants, bars and area business use these guys all the time for local popularity. It is honestly sickening to me.Aside from simply letting these guys market themselves and sign autographs, I think that some sort of payout system could be made. And then does not mean that they have to pay them immediately.
Why not set up a system that is more or less a trust fund. Depending on how much each sport makes for a school, an allotted percentage can be divvied out to their players in the form of a trust fund. But they can only ever receive the money if they complete a set of guidelines and stipulations. Something like:
A. Player must graduate. (This rule would ensure that they put in time at the university and were actually part of the campus community. No love for the “one and done”.)
B. Player maintained a clean criminal record. (We can all agree that there is far too much media that only covers players that are messing up with the law. So this would make sure that if they want to go to school and get paid afterward, they cannot be acting like hooligans.)
C. Player must serve as school ambassador for 1 year. ( A way to give back to the school.)
D. Player needs to pass all his or her classes (You could bump it up to a C average, but I'm okay where it is).
You get the picture. This set up, or something similar to it, would solve my issues. It would set expectations for player behavior, and because of the need to graduate, it bring their focus back to school first. This option also gives monetary value to the hard work that a long distance runner or swimmer, or tennis player put in, in his/her 4-years at University X. It gives monetary glory to the un-glorified athletes.
What I want to see is for these opportunities for these people to cash in on the talents and skills they put so much time in crafting. They had a full-time sports job, while the normal college student drinks beer with their friends and finds out what their values are. I want them to be able to sit back after four years of hard work and have some free time to then figure out what they actually want to do, and have some money in their pocket for all the work that they have already done.
What I want to see is for these opportunities for these people to cash in on the talents and skills they put so much time in crafting. They had a full-time sports job, while the normal college student drinks beer with their friends and finds out what their values are. I want them to be able to sit back after four years of hard work and have some free time to then figure out what they actually want to do, and have some money in their pocket for all the work that they have already done.
We will all keep watching if something happens or it doesn’t. But I don’t think I will ever fully enjoy it, until I see this corrupt system undressed.
So pay the kids. So they can enjoy their work as much as we do.
~Andrew
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