Will paying college football and basketball players mean the end to college XC and track?

runn wrote:

It will mean the end of major college sports as we know it. You can't pay athletes if you're losing millions every year.

Colleges are not making money off of football.

Maybe ALL colleges should just be D III.

Let football and basketball have a minor league like baseball if it's so financially lucrative.

Sort of.

The big schools: SEC, PAC 10, Big 10, and ACC will be able to pay players in football and basketball. You know - the ones that actually make money.

Gone will be scheduling a 1-AA school just to have another game. Rosters will likely be limited to 60 athletes, like the NFL limits rosters.

Gone will be your fatass walk-on dudes who stand on the sideline in khakis, a jersey, and get a ring at the end of the season for being in a shitty bowl game.

Big schools with big donors and big sponsors will still pay big time money. Some car dealer in Tuscaloosa wants to give money to pay players so that Alabama beats Auburn? Why not?

Let him spend his money.

Everyone else will resort to a D3 type system. You can still run, or wrestle, or play tennis, but no scholarships unless they are for...surprise! need based or academics. Or schools could adopt the Ivy League model - seems to work fairly well.

I say take the $100 million that OSU brings in, subtract facility costs, equipment, travel, coaches salaries, etc. and divide the $12 million that's left by 600 (all the athletes on campus...a union has to be fair, you know). That'd be about $20,000 for each athlete. Then, cut all scholarships and send a $25,000 tuition, room, and board bill the parents. I think that would be appropriate.[quote]

[quote]d2xccoach wrote:

On the surface this would seem to make sense, but the potential for abuse is huge. Let's say the NCAA allowed college players to sign autographs for money or get paid to make appearances. Let's say "State U" really wants a certain player. What would stop a booster from paying that player $1M for an autograph or to appear at their restaurant, just to get around the system?[/quote

So what's the problem with this?

Whats the problem with a booster paying a player?

What system are they getting around? Oh, right the system that says the player can't sell your autograph...but the school can!

There's no abuse.

If there's a market for Johnny Football's autograph, Johnny Football should be able to sell his autograph. There's nothing dishonest, corrupt, or illegal about it. He breaks no laws. He commits no crimes. He does nothing...except make money that the school is not making.

If some retard with a decked out Tennessee RV and an orange clad family wants to spend his money to prove the the Vols are better than UK by paying Billy Joe Bob a few bucks, why should the NCAA care? Why should a school care?

There is nothing honorable or rational about the "amateur" rule in college sports. It is arbitrary and capricious, and exists only so that high priced administrators can keep more of the money for themselves.

Tim Bits wrote:

I say take the $100 million that OSU brings in, subtract facility costs, equipment, travel, coaches salaries, etc. and divide the $12 million that's left by 600 (all the athletes on campus...a union has to be fair, you know). That'd be about $20,000 for each athlete. Then, cut all scholarships and send a $25,000 tuition, room, and board bill the parents. I think that would be appropriate.

First of all, the union doesn't have to be fair. The union represents its members. People who are not in the union may not be entitled to the benefits.

Second, if you take the $100 million that tOSU brings in and subtract all the other stuff, you're left with more than $12 million. OSU isn't losing money on it's sports teams.

The U of Maryland - a school with a crappy sports program, just released their finances for 2012-13. They made a paltry $500,000. They had no major bowl game, no NCAA men's basketball tourney invite, AND lost payments from the ACC because they are moving to the Big 10. Yet they still made money.

How much did they spend on scholarships? 12.8 million

How much did they spend on coaches? 13.6 million

How much did they spend on administration? 11.6 million

There is PLENTY of money to pay athletes at big money schools.

At mid-major schools, there is none, and those schools will revert to D3 status. But let's not kid ourselves, it's not like the Villanova football team was going to be competitive against LSU if they ever matched up.

runn wrote:

Let football and basketball have a minor league like baseball if it's so financially lucrative.

That would be the real solution BUT the NBA and NFL have a free feeder program that they are not going to stop milking.

Baseball is the only sport that really has this thing done correctly.

So you have made my point. Only a handful of schools even bring in over $100 million let alone make much on these athletes. The majority of schools take funds out of the general fund to pay for all the things these spoiled brat kids get. Instead of complaining, they should be grateful they are receiving fair compensation for their "work". Students at Northwestern, of all places, should know they are on the receiving end of the current scholarship deal.

So, you'll have 7 or 8 schools able to pay their kiddos. The rest will keep things as is. And Northwestern is not one of the schools that can afford to pay.

Tim Bits wrote:

So, you'll have 7 or 8 schools able to pay their kiddos. The rest will keep things as is. And Northwestern is not one of the schools that can afford to pay.

Northwestern certainly is one of those schools. NW made $235 million over a 10 year period from their football team.

"We can't afford to pay" is because they are currently spending tons of money on administrators and coaches who don't deserve it.

How much do you think an NFL GM makes? They make around 1-3 million a year.

Yet the Ohio State AD makes more than most NFL GMs? How does that work again?

The women's basketball coach at Maryland makes over a million dollars a year. More than an NFL gm?

The NCAA is creating a phony market for administrators whose sole job is to enforce rules about signing autographs. They pay them big salaries and benefits, while claiming "we don't make any money."

It's complete BS.

The NCAA football schools just signed a TVcontract for half a billion dollars a year...just for the playoff system. That doesn't include ticket sales, advertising, merchandise, or even regular season games (TV deals, tickets, etc.)

If you wanted to spread it equally could have 50 football programs that would make $10 million dollars a year...and that's for 3 games - just the TV revenue alone for those 3 games.

If a school is "losing" money on this kind of deal, then they are doing something completely wrong.

It's only private schools so far. This could be a can of worms.

Maybe if it transfers to track and field, Stanford would return to powerhouse status in track and XC, while Northwestern and Vanderbelt would rise.

Why do track athletes think they should be given scholarship dollars to an academic institution simply because they posses the ability to run faster than some people in the general public?

I can see how a school like OR, Stan. or UCLA might spring for scholarship money since they are training the next group of Olympians, but be honest; the rest of the schools participate out of the goodness of their heart.

We can't be picky.

What are you talking about? Maryland is a school that was so desperate for money they left the ACC - a conference they founded for the Big 10.

They recently had cut men's track.

Your own numbers show a profit of $500,000 for the year. So they are going to pay the athletes how much? $500 per football player.

That being said, I have little sympathy for these schools.

The power schools have no one to blame but themselves. They have sent the message over the last 20 years that the only that matters is money. Instead of taking the higher road and saying, our role is to educate, they have gone to a money grab. The players have picked up on this and what their own.

Basketball players fly all over the country to play Tuesday/Thursday games. The Ivy League is the only one who does it right with only Fri/Saturday games.

I agree with this person. Yes, a few big programs and people would make some cash but these guys that want to be paid need to be real careful. Minor league sports aren't populat and aren't glamorous.

But here's a thought. What if the union is all college athletes? What if the track and football players are in the same union. Then the football players might get less:

Leave it up to self-entitled knuckleheads to think that getting a full ride to college isn't payment enough. This is BS. I hope this somehow finds its way to the supreme court. If they unionize and want money, well hell, then do away with college sports, or let the washed up pros come back to college and take their spots so they have to pay for college or go back home and pump gas.

"There is PLENTY of money to pay athletes at big money schools."

You are not thinking of this correctly. Why would the schools only pay them 1000s of dollars?

In no time, the starting 25 will make a million per year and the top players will make more than the top coaches.

nvija-9-8UBQ394877 wrote:

"There is PLENTY of money to pay athletes at big money schools."

You are not thinking of this correctly. Why would the schools only pay them 1000s of dollars?

In no time, the starting 25 will make a million per year and the top players will make more than the top coaches.

And what would be the problem with that?

The top players make more than the top coaches in the pros, right?

I have no sympathy for the schools either. First, I think the salaries are completely skewed, and paying the players would immediately correct those issues. The FB coach at Texas AM makes $5 million/yr. There is simply now way he's been more valuable to that team than their star players. Does the coach of the Miami Heat make more than Lebron James? College coach/admin salaries would drop immediately if the school had to negotiate with the next potential Heisman winner. They'd pay the real talent instead of the coaches and administrators. I bet a fat contract would recruit much better than Nick Saban (who wasn't so hot in the NFL when he didn't have a huge talent advantage).

The schools are also overvaluing their educations. It's not like adding 100 students to a campus of 30,000 scales their costs up linearly. And on the value of the free educations, go look up the recent North Carolina athletic scandal. The educations the coaches and administration are supposedly encouraging the players to get are literally not worth the paper they're printed on.

Unionization will lead to the end to NCAA football and will herald the era of minor league football. XC and track programs will either survive on the benevolence of the universities or they will be cut.

It will be a great day when universities return to being places of education, rather than being football teams with universities attached.

nvija-9-8UBQ394877 wrote:

"There is PLENTY of money to pay athletes at big money schools."

You are not thinking of this correctly. Why would the schools only pay them 1000s of dollars?

In no time, the starting 25 will make a million per year and the top players will make more than the top coaches.

Heaven forbid that someone get paid what the market dictates. jeeze

gghghhjhjggkffgk wrote:

been a joke for 30 years wrote:

The coach at The Pompous Ohio State University makes 5 million dollars a year. If you took 3 million of that and divided it between 80 players, each would get $37,500.

Besides that, if they need more money, they can just raise your cable bill a couple extra bucks a month for the BTN and ESPN.

Take 3 million of that and you lose 10s of millions more in revenue.

BULLLLSHIT

mother clucker wrote:

Unionization will lead to the end to NCAA football and will herald the era of minor league football. XC and track programs will either survive on the benevolence of the universities or they will be cut.

It will be a great day when universities return to being places of education, rather than being football teams with universities attached.

I agree. Stop this charade..

Also look at this:

"The broader point of Ohr’s ruling is that Northwestern’s scholarship football players really do work for pay. They are recruited largely for their football abilities; they spend an inordinate amount of time on their sport; they’re rewarded with valuable scholarships, which can be canceled; they’re subject to special rules other students aren’t; and their labor is clearly valuable to the school, which brings in millions of dollars in football-related profits."

XC, Track, volleyball etc.. don't meet all of those criteria so they may NOT be considered employees.

aquafina wrote:

That would be the real solution BUT the NBA and NFL have a free feeder program that they are not going to stop milking.

Baseball is the only sport that really has this thing done correctly.

Yes because the NCAA and NFL/NBA have been in collusion for years to keep the system as it is.

The real problem is athletes who have NO interest in a college scholarship being forced to go by this collusion.

While some may say how great that scholarship is, it means ABSOLUTELY NOTHING because these athletes will never complete it and would never want to.

Rather than pay the athletes at the college level, baseball and football should do EXACTLY as baseball has done and let the athlete have a choice of going pro immediately or having to spend 3 years in college before they can be drafted. Notice that track doesn't have any limitations.

It's beyond ludicrous that the NBA essentially forces a player to go to college one year knowing they will quit after that. They are now trying to force 2 years to waste even more scholarships just so the NCAA and NBA can make more money.