The Hypocrisy of College Athletics

The new college football season is about to start. As the nation gathers around its TV sets for the start of the new season, we should also look at the major events of this past offseason and how it should tarnish our sense of the college game.

The major news of this offseason was of teams changing conferences. Was this done for ideal of competition, better rivalries or the idealism of sport? No, it was done for more TV money. Some of the traditional conferences face extinction or radical changes as their top teams leave for television gold. Idealism and tradition take a back seat to financial advantage.

The other major news story was that some disreputable agents are paying to transport student-athletes to parties and other events. Yes, these agents are trying to get their hooks into the athletes so they will become clients once their professional careers begin. Once again, financial advantage triumphing over idealism and tradition.

Of course when news of the agents' actions broke the same college administrators who chased the dollars to conference realignment were shocked. This was a stain on the tradition of college athletics. These agents were wooing innocent college athletes with money and money has no place in amateur sports. This stance shows the administrators to be pure hypocrites. With one hand they chase TV money and with the other they scold agents for spending it on their athletes.

Even more hypocritical are the sanctimonious coaches. These men make millions of dollars due to the television contracts and all have corporate logos on their teams' uniforms and their sport shirts. They are also enjoying the spoils of the money in college sports. To read that these coaches had a conference call to discuss the immoral behavior of these agents strained the limits of credibility.

All the coaches talk the good talk of college sports, about teaching the kids and instilling the right values and their friends in the media lap it up. The coaches are made out to be almost mythical figures, while the agents are sleazy figures on the fringes of the game. However, any reasonable analysis will show that both coaches and agents chase money through the exploits of student-athletes they just do it in different ways.

Now I am not saying that the business of college athletics is all wrong. College football and basketball must make money in order to help fund other sports. Coaches as leaders of these teams and the moneymakers for the universities deserve much of the money they make. However, to hear coaches and administrators become all holier than thou when discussing the exploits of agents is the definition of hypocrisy.

This also applies to the treatment of college athletes. With all the money in college athletics, the athletes are held to ridiculous codes of conduct. Many of them have little money but if they accept any assistance (let's say use of a car for a day), they can lose their amateur status. This seems outdated as the game as become more and more professional.

I am not advocating that athletes get paid to play, or that boosters have outsized influence but a regulated system that allows them some assistance in getting a job would help level the playing field. Most of the players are one injury away from losing their college eligibility and the overwhelming majority will not earn their living from sports.

In summation, there is an outdated double standard in college sports. Universities, administrators and coaches earn millions dollars due to the exploits of student athletes. They are under intense pressure to win, yet anything done to help the athletes is seen as an outrageous breach of the amateur code. The establishment needs to end this double standard and get real about the game otherwise they will continue to be hypocrites.

 

Comments

[thstone]

02:32 PM on 09/15/2010

Well, I am advocating that Division 1 college teams in football, basketball, and baseball, should be professional teams and pay the players appropropriately. What we have now is extreme EXPLOITATION. University's and coaches and staff should no longer be able to become rich at the expense of non-paid players. This is the greatest injustice left in America.

[bannorhill]

06:49 PM on 09/15/2010

Getting a $80,000 to a $ 200,000 education for free is explotation. I wish my kids were fast enough or big enough to be exploited like that.

[HazMat5]

06:33 AM on 09/15/2010

The business of college sports IS all wrong. The coaches making millions DON'T deserve all that money. Yes the situation you describe is hypocritical but the fact is that the mission of universities (especially public universities) doesn't revolve around sports - it is about education. Athletics in college has become grossly over inflated in importance given the educational mission. Here at Cal we're still dealing with the fact that the DIA isn't self sufficient and the administration has been diverting ~8 to 11 million per year from instruction and infrastructure and giving it to the DIA - and lying to the public all the while. You write a column supposedly from the moral high ground but you're totally ignoring the bigger picture - convenient for those who think that way.

[radicalcentrist44]

05:04 PM on 09/14/2010

Let me pose this question to you then: Should Mark Ingram (arguably the best player in college football) and star for the number 1 ranked Alabama receive a different benefit than that of the last player for the Alabama women's cross country team? Does Mark get more because revenue football pulls in and the number of jerseys with his number on them which are sold by 'bama before the game? Lets take it one step further, does Mark Ingram receive more benefits than the a special teams player for a Division III school? Or how about Jake Locker (UW QB) who will be the probable number 1 NFL pick next year versus the alternate on the UW rowing team?

[Rogo99]

04:35 PM on 09/14/2010

The NCAA is also a money-printing press. They negotiate many TV deals for megabucks-sometimes chasing major schools out of it (Notre Dame), and allowing images of the school kids on things like the video games. The football and basketball programs are little more than a farm system for the NFL and NBA.

[Hali Stark]

04:17 PM on 09/14/2010

Interesting article!

[booksnmoreforyou]

01:22 PM on 09/14/2010

The way to deal with this is for there to be a label, by law, attached to the price tag of each school.

Percent of tuition used to support sports: 22% and some such.

[Rj Johnson]

04:20 PM on 09/14/2010

Tuition does not support major colligate athletics, in fact in many cases Football, Basketball, and in some cases Hockey contribute more to the general funds than tuition. Not many engineering programs draw 50,000-100,000 students and alumni to the university 6 Saturdays a year. At a price tag of $25 and up per person. Many of those big buck seat holders DONATE thousands a year that ends up in the general fund.

[HazMat5]

06:40 AM on 09/15/2010

At Cal tuition (which we call fees) does support athletics to the tune of ~10 million per year. It's not supposed to be like that, it's blatant violation of university policy, they've been lying about this for at least 5 years, and when they got caught - well the situation has not been corrected, instead we've had two years of lies and disingenuous hair-splitting illogic and excuses from the administration with no end in sight. Who is to say that people wouldn't donate with significantly less focus on sports. Contrary to your insinuation, essentially none of that ticket price ends up in the general funds at any school. That's flat out false, all of the ticket money goes back into the athletic programs.

[Rj Johnson]

10:48 AM on 09/14/2010

This writter is over looking certian aspects of the recent conference switching, that relate beyond sports. Nebraska switching to the Big 10, had as much to do with football revenue as it did acedemic competition. The Big 10 has a far stronger acedemic competiiton than that of the Big 12. 8 of the 11 schools are top 20 research institutions, and 4 of them are top 20 engineering schools. Not to mention Nebraska is within the same geographical region as 5 of the 11 schools (7 if you include Purdue and Indiana). While only 3 of the big12 schools would fall into the same region as the Huskers. Nebraska alos has a much longer rivalry with Minnesota than it does Oklahoma, which only began with the inception of the big12. Which is a whopping 15 years old.

I am not as up to date on Pac 10 acedemics, so I can't really comment on Colorados switch. But attacking universitys due to a restructuring of a 15 year old conference, and calling it tradition is laughable.

[Robt G]

11:46 AM on 09/13/2010

Why is it necessarily a good thing that revenue sports subsidize non-revenue sports? Most revenue sports - men's basketball, football. and sometimes women's basketball - are disproportionately minority and/or economically disadvantaged. The only exception: hockey?
Most non-revenue sports -- think crew, boys' and girls' soccer, tennis, golf, field hockey, etc. are primarily white and middle-class at that.
In summary, poor kids are exploited to subsidize the rich. Its a great country!