Leave it to the NCAA to Unite the Country

[Belsnickel]

(06-21-2021, 04:19 PM)Wes Mantooth Wrote: I have mixed feelings about this.  

On one hand, I do think these players deserve to be compensated.  I've also never understood what prevented them from making outside income while in school (Ex: A student athlete should be able to take a job doing a commerical in the same way that a regular student can earn income in any way they choose.)

On the other hand, this is just going to make college athletics more top heavy.  Mid-level and smaller programs will fall further and further from being able to compete while larger programs will only further cement themselves as being so far ahead of everyone else.

I'd feel a LOT better about this if they did away with Title IX, or reworked it where it makes some actual sense.  I don't think people realize that just because some of these sports and some of the teams generate so much income that doesn't mean the university is walking away with tons of profits.  All of these dollars are used to subsidize all of the other programs that lose money, which is pretty much every that isn't men's basketball, football, and some baseball teams.  

It's absolutely crazy when you look at some of these athletic department budgets.  Most of them are lucky to even break even, and that's goes for the big guys too.  It's really easy to say that because the football program generates millions and millions of dollars that those players deserve some money.  That makes sense up until you realize that income is used to fund women's basketball, womens soccer, women softball, women's track, women's tennis, women's golf, etc.  When it's all said and done, there's not much money left.

I worry about what this really means if no changes are made.  A school like Cincinnati could definitely afford to compete a little bit if they weren't force to fund an equal number of scholarships and everything that comes with them (coaching and training staffs, transportation costs, medical, training equipment, etc.)  But the fact of the matter is no matter how much their football and baskeball teams make they just don't have that much money.  It goes to all of this stuff, stuff like paying for the women's basketball team to play 15 road games all around the country.  Larger programs can work around this but I'm afraid schools like UC can't.

Fwiw, I think the solution to this is tear up Title IX.  Make any sport that isn't profitable a "club sport" or offering partial scholarships.  Make the leagues for these regional to reduce costs.  Then let the players that actually earning the money share in the spoils.  That way you can have some more parity.

Just my 2 cents...

So, I provide to you a wrench in this. Yes, men's sports tend to bring in more revenue because people, stupidly I might add, are not as interested in women's sports. However, what it you have an athletics program where the men are more profitable, but the women's teams are more successful? What if your men's basketball team brings in the money but the women's team is the one that makes it to the dance? What if your football team brings in money, but your softball team makes it to the WCWS and the football team doesn't sniff the playoffs/a bowl game?

This highlights my problem with college athletics, in general. The purpose of college athletics is to attract students through publicity and to help provide opportunities for students that otherwise may not have them. If you recognize that as the purpose, then Title IX is necessary because, as we saw prior to its enactment, there was a gap in those opportunities for men and women. Truthfully, there still is a gap. Go to any school with a decent athletics program and do an analysis of their spending on student athletes and I would wager in 90% of those programs the spending was weighted more heavily towards the men's sports because of the ways around these rules that exist (I used to help prepare the yearly NCAA report for a D1 school from the financials side, I know the numbers and how they get massaged).

What really needs to happen? We need to stop treating college athletics as the recruiting grounds for pros. That's it. Period. The amount of attention athletics gets it heightened tremendously by the fact that the country is watching to see who is going to end up in the NFL, NBA, or MLB. What's the draft class going to look like? Who will be picked up in free agency? Remove all of that and suddenly college sports isn't as big. Guys trying to make the NFL go to CFL out of high school, or some Euro league, instead. Now a scholarship can go to someone who wants to play football and study something meaningful rather than something that the other guy would've never used.

Anyway, that's just my opinion on all of this.