The whole NCAA issue

You are too smart to be posting on this board.

I wish there was an edit button.

Please ignore the first post and see my corrections below:

We know that we have major problems with the NCAA, but no one wants to fix them. Ideas like paying athletes or unionizing athletes are crazy. The only reason that these ideas get any attention is that they continue to allow grown men to profit (behind the scenes) on amateur athletes.

These are some ideas that I have. I'd love to know why they are terrible.

1. Coach Salary Caps - Cap an NCAA coach's salary at $250k. That is plenty of money. There will continue to be huge demand for jobs and we will keep great coaches. No college employee needs to be making $10 Million to coach a game.

2. Ban all advertising/licensing outside of TV commercials. This "Dr. Pepper BCS Championship" crap is just embarrassing. It should be in strict violation of amateur rules.

3. Make all conferences local. No more switching around due to TV contracts and backroom deals. This would also cut down on the amount of travel for revenue sports. The ACC should not span from South Florida to Indiana to Upstate New York. Come on.

4. Offer a college major in Professional Sports (BA). I know this sounds stupid, but think about it. The courses could be existing courses based on skills an athlete might need to succeed post graduation (Financial Management, Marketing, PR, Legal). I also think it would interest the players in a real way. If you don't go pro, it is still a great major for any business-related job. Remember, these would be existing classes; no need for a new department.

5. NCAA becomes a "real" regulatory department, not a marketing clearinghouse. These would be either State or Federal employees who have very transparent roles as regulators of amateur athletes.

6. Scholarship athletes are given extended time to finish their degree (if needed). This could be one or two more years. No more fake classes. They take real classes and if they can only shoulder 12 hours a semester, they have more time to graduate after their eligibility has expired.

I think there are serious remedies for the current problems, but no one wants to hear them. It is like Wall Street: Instead of stopping the corruption, they just let more people profit from it so they'll shut up.

Anyway, I'd love to hear some other ideas or arguments.

This is all terrible.

I am for a lot of liberal ideas but you can't just cap a salary and say $250K is plenty of money because you think it is.

Ban advertising? Who are you asking to create this ban?

You are asking a lot of people to just stop trying to make money. But there is a demand there. People like watching these competitions as they are.

I am thinking the opposite of everything you said.

You need an opposing organization, like the NAIA or something, to step up and openly pay student-athletes.

Get a few top notch athletes, pay them and see if people start watching them.

If that creates a buzz, NCAA schools may leave the NCAA for this.

Then the market forces will force the NCAA to step up and spread the wealth a little better. Pay the players that are generating the revenue.

L L, the problem with your argument is that universities are not "the market." We aren't talking about business here. We are talking about college sports. Just because people like watching them doesn't mean it is open season on exploitation.

FWIW, I am a big fan of free market capitalism in the marketplace.

You talk about "spreading the wealth." There should be no wealth in this arena. This is school sports.

College coaches are primarily state employees. If they want higher salaries, let them compete for professional jobs. If private universities want to compete in the league, they need to abide by the rules.

You are suggesting convoluted work-arounds to support a broken and corrupt system.

Interesting that you think this way. To me it sounds like, "fvck everything up to make a buck."

The fix to all of this is for the NFL and NBA to allow high school athletes to enter the league right out of high school.

That's it.

This problem doesn't exist in baseball, soccer or hockey that have minor league options.

What needs to happen will not wrote:

We aren't talking about business here. We are talking about college sports.

Really?

College sports is not a business?

I guess you are saying that it should not be a business.

But you can't stop that.

L L wrote:

Really?

College sports is not a business?

I guess you are saying that it should not be a business.

But you can't stop that.

I want to be clear about something: I think we would agree on a lot of things outside of this issue. I take issue with your opinion on college sports, though.

Currently, it is a HUGE business. That is not right, ethical or fair. You are correct in your assertion that I believe it should not be a business (outside of ticket sales and reasonable licensing). I am not saying that money should not be made, but the amount of outside money being made is ludicrous. It needs to be put in check.

You can stop it. We should at least try to stop it. Illegal things will continue to happen, but we should not sanction them in broad daylight.

Just look at the NCAA tournament in Cowboys Stadium. Someone made millions of dollars off of that game. Hint: it wasn't anyone on the team and it wasn't anyone at the schools. That is wrong. That creates major ethical issues (it was also a stupid venue for a basketball game). I guess I am saying that college sports should not be about the biggest profit margin for all the hangers-on. It should be about the college athletes. That game would have been a hell of a lot better if it had been played at Rupp Arena. You know it. But I digress...

If a coach is making 10 million dollars of of college students, there is substantial incentive for corruption. His team is expected to win at all costs or people are out HUGE sums of money. I am not against people making money, but I am against certain conflicts of interest. This creates a conflict of interest in an amateur league. I don't want Senators making millions of dollars, either. It breeds corruption. I view this the same way. Our Representatives in Washington shouldn't be ruled by free market policies. I think I am articulating this well, but I might be doing a poor job.

I didn't read your whole post because it was long and rambling. But it seems to me that your preferred solution to schools profiting from unpaid labor is to get rid of the profits, instead of, you know, just paying the labor.

The challenge is that you have one governing body, the NCAA, who is trying to administer a system to 1000+ schools in 3 divisions, schools with massive difference in size, philosophy regarding athletics, and goals. When you talk about "FIX"ing the problems you are talking about issues that it's hard to get consensus that there is a problem by all parties involved. It all comes down to point of view. If you're a top DI football player or men's basketball player primarily interested in being a part of college athletics either as a pseudo minor league for your personal athletic development or because you've been forced into the system due to the rules related to the pro draft in those sports, then you're going to see the problem as a lot different than the AD at a small DIII school that sees college athletics as having the main goal to educate students.

40 years ago the NCAA voted to go from the University Division/College Division setup to the DI, DII, DIII system. In the ensuing 40 years a lot of school have either joined the NCAA from other college athletic groups like the NAIA or have started varsity programs. I don't have the stats in front of me, but I think over 350 schools have joined the NCAA over the last 40 years. Whatever the number is, if would be hard to argue that the increase in schools hasn't put a strain on the DI, DII, DIII system in many ways, including access to championships as well as how do you set fair rules that apply to not only all schools in any given division but to all schools in all divisions. To me, it is time to rework the DI, DII, DIII system, perhaps go to as many as 5 or 6 divisions (since DI currently has a football bowl division and a football championship division we already have more than 3 working divisions). Do that and you can align schools more closely based on their philosophies and goals.

As for your 6 ideas, I'm not a fan of 1-2-3, I like 4, and I like 5-6 with some caveats.

--Coach salary caps...not unless you also agree to cap the salaries of college presidents, ADs, professors, etc. A college should be able to value their employees the same as any other business does. If they see value in giving a coach X million per year, so be it. A lot of schools value their head football or basketball coach as part of the marketing program of the school.

--Advertising/licensing...we are way past the point of rolling that back. What we should be looking at is how to expand the money college sports can make through advertising and how to utilize that money in meaningful ways. If a college could make an extra $10M/year through advertising/licensing and that $10M went towards scholarships (not necessarily athletics) or enriching the student experience how is that a bad thing?

--"Local" conferences...while cutting back on the amount of travel student-athletes have to do seems like a good thing it sort of depends on how a school sees the main reason for their athletics to exist. If a school sees the main reason to have an athletic department is to market the school then you're going to want your teams playing all over the country. This can run counter to the idea that the best education you can get is by being in class. But is that still the way it works in 2014 with all the technological means to become educated?

--College major in Professional Sports...this is something I've said for a long time. We educate people in the arts, music, painting, drama, etc, why are sports seen differently? Take 2 students who enroll at the same college, 1 is good at football, 1 is good at painting, neither are good at math or science. As it stands, we don't look poorly on the artist who gets a BA by concentrating on their talent whereas the athlete in the same position is seen differently.

--NCAA as a regulatory department...in a lot of ways this needs to happen, and those in charge might be better off being less closely aligned to schools. Pros and cons on both sides of this.

--Scholarships athletes getting extra time to finish a degree...I'd be on board with this if the student-athletes had to sit out years in the middle of their eligibility rather than just flat out got extra time at the end. I think that would be a better incentive to insure they finish their degrees. My feeling is that the current system for redshirts and continuing eligibility isn't too bad.

The Guru Matt James wrote:

I didn't read your whole post because it was long and rambling. But it seems to me that your preferred solution to schools profiting from unpaid labor is to get rid of the profits, instead of, you know, just paying the labor.

Read the post, it makes a lot of sense. Your idea of athletes being unpaid labor is the crux of the problem.

Former D1 Athlete wrote:

The Guru Matt James wrote:

I didn't read your whole post because it was long and rambling. But it seems to me that your preferred solution to schools profiting from unpaid labor is to get rid of the profits, instead of, you know, just paying the labor.

Read the post, it makes a lot of sense. Your idea of athletes being unpaid labor is the crux of the problem.

Okay, I read his post. Why is the idea of college football players being unpaid labor the "crux" of the problem. I thought the problem was the exploitation of athletes by the NCAA. What problem are you talking about.

Manzanoist wrote:

[quote]L L wrote:[/

. To me it sounds like, "fvck everything up to make a buck."

Have you been paying attention? That's the course college athletes has been on for at least the past quarter century, and probably a lot longer than that.

The Guru Matt James wrote:

Okay, I read his post. Why is the idea of college football players being unpaid labor the "crux" of the problem. I thought the problem was the exploitation of athletes by the NCAA. What problem are you talking about.

You may be trolling, but if you're serious:

I think it goes hand-in-hand. Viewing athletes as being exploited means that someone is doing the exploiting. Rather than address how to un-exploit the players, we should be figuring out who is exploiting them. I think viewing them as unpaid labor implies that they are indeed laborers, which they are not. They are students who happen to play ball for the school. Keep in mind I am speaking philosophically.

In paying them, we are just adding to the mess. Band-Aiding on a fix to a screwed up situation.

Eliminate the NCAA and their nazi regulations. Colleges and athletes should be free to decide what to do. It's the free enterprise system that made America great.

I just bought the NCAA and I am going to make the blacks compete together in a separate league.

OP's posts make a lot of sense. One more thing I'd add would be

7. travel restrictions. Teams don't need to be flying across the continent every other weekend for a game. Besides postseason competition, they shouldn't be allowed to compete more than 500 miles away, with exemptions given to alaska and hawaii schools. IE stanford shouldn't have a home game against virginia. Texas shouldn't be running at paul short. Kentucky basketball shouldn't be competing in a tournament in hawaii. This is college sports, not pros.

I have some issues with salary caps, but not due to the fact that I think coaches should be paid millions of dollars. I just think capping wages is dangerous. Still, I think that it is absurd that almost every state's highest paid public employee is a college basketball or football coach.

I think there is a way to make that happen without going down the "cap" road... I just don't know what it is.

Jessie Blueman wrote:

I think there is a way to make that happen without going down the "cap" road... I just don't know what it is.

Pay the players. Then there won't be so much money left to overpay the coaches.

The OP's idea is to tell everyone involved to just stop trying to make money.

Ain't gonna happen.