Let me start this post by saying that I am a former NCAA lower division football player, and I am well aware of the time commitment that it takes to be successful as a student athlete. In no way am I against student athletes getting their piece of the pie for the billion dollar industry that college athletics has become. However, the Northwestern Football Union ruling will change not only BCS college football, but every sport at every level will change.
Why?
The argument has long been that Division I football and basketball players need to earn a chunk of the millions of dollars that they are bringing in for their schools. But if National Labor Relations Board regional director Peter Sung Ohr's statement that Northwestern football players are employees of the university turns out to be upheld and the players begin collective bargaining process, it will set a precedent that will be the end of a lot of small school programs and less popular sports at the collegiate level.
Ohr cited that the student athletes' time commitment and compensation tied to their on field performance qualified them as employees. This designation will require more considerations from universities to provide all of the benefits that employees are guaranteed by law.
Compensation
The previous incentives for students to participate in college athletics were scholarships, exposure, and the general love of the game. There are many athletes on every level that do not even get the benefit of scholarships due to their walk-on status or non scholarship schools. The scholarship is compared by many to an unpaid internship that many students will use to get valuable experience and networking options. Major college athletics can do a lot for an athlete's networking and exposure. There is a reason why many of the one and done college basketball players choose to take that one year internship in college instead of going to the NBA's D-League or overseas to play professionally. Brandon Jennings chose to go overseas instead of to college, but while it may not have hurt his draft status, I don't think that any fans were nearly as familiar with this game as they were with Blake Griffin or James Harden who chose the college basketball route in the same draft.
It is very easy to look at the University of Texas who, according to Forbes.com, brought in over $100 million in football revenue in 2013 and say that some of that money needs to go to the players. I agree that these major football and basketball programs should be able to share that in some way beyond a nice weight room and living arrangements. However, the precedent set citing time and performance based compensation would be factors that apply to every sport at every level. Could a tennis player at Division II Grand Valley State University put in the same amount of hours that a football player at the University of Texas does? Sure they could, they could put in more hours. Will Grand Valley State be able to offer the same level of compensation to their student athletes that the University of Texas can? No, but based on the ruling they will have equal status because of time spent and performance based scholarship making them employees of their universities. That is what will lead to problems for the smaller schools and smaller revenue sports. I do not see how a non-scholarship school would be able to fund the employee status of their athletes and many students would miss out on the college athletics experience that is fueled mainly by the love of the sport that they compete in. A walk on would also end up with more pay coming their way over the scholarship athletes because they are putting in the same amount of time and effort that scholarship athletes are. On a side note, the least that the NCAA could do is up the amount of scholarships for the major sports programs to spread the wealth in to those athletes.
Recruiting Advantages
Let's say that a compensation package is agreed upon and the total value of the compensation package for each athlete is 60k based on their time put into their sport. The traditional compensation of tuition along with room and board still need to be factored in. Let's say that tuition at the private Boston College University is 40k, while tuition at the public University of Florida is 7k. What kind of recruiting advantage would they gain from the 33k compensation difference from tuition differences? It would also lead to more students staying in their home state due to the tuition difference between in state and out of state. I am aware that their are advantages in facilities at every level of college athletics, but a nice dorm room or soaking pools are not quite the same as 30k in cash.
Solution
If major sports programs that bring in big bucks create their own association away from the NCAA that allows them to play by a different set of rules, I am completely fine with that. The non revenue generating sports and other divisions could maintain their current umbrella and keep the scholarships that are extremely valuable to many college students to help them pay for the education these schools provide. Believe it or not, even though they do not have the billion dollar television contracts that major conference football and basketball can potentially bring in, the other sports and lower divisions provide something very valuable to a majority of the NCAA student athletes and university stakeholders. Like the commercials say, a majority of the college athletes will go pro in something other than their college sport and the "employee" status designated for the Northwestern football players could bring an end to that opportunity for a majority of these athletes.
No comments:
Post a Comment