Emmanuel Twum

Argument Essay

In today’s sports world many professional athletes are paid large sums of money to pursue a career in a sport that they have played since they were kids. The annual salary of each athlete depends on his or her performance in past seasons. Also, many athletes going from college to professional leagues are paid large amounts of money based on their potential to become a superstar in the near future. Besides what professional athletes get paid by their teams, many elite professional athletes are paid millions of dollars in endorsement deals. Today’s college athletes are out in the hot summers and cold winters every season to try and sharpen their ability in their sport to hopefully one day become an athlete that is paid millions of dollars. College athletes must attend every training session, be at practice everyday and on time, they must respect their coaches, and they have classes they must attend. Besides scholarships that college athletes receive for their hard work in high school, they do not reap any monetary rewards for their hard work season in and season out. Also college athletes do not see any of the money the universities receive from them playing their sport. Many sports journalist have said that college athletes work twice as hard as professional athletes who are already reaping the reward for their hard work. College athletes should be compensated for their hard work on the field by being paid a small salary. Also, college athletes should be allowed to have endorsement deals with corporate companies. It is also not ethical for the colleges and the National Collegiate Athletic Association to make money off of these athletes if they are not willing to pay these athletes a small salary or allow them to make money off of their talents.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is the governing body over all college athletes who intend to play in college or are already playing college sports for a university. The National College Athletic Association makes rules that college athletes must follow in order to stay eligible to play their sport. Among these rules, there are rules about amateurism, financial aid, and employment earnings (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p.2-3). College athletes are not allowed to have ever taken money for playing in their sport (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p.2). Also, college athletes must not ever agree verbally to compete in a professional sport in the sport they play (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p.2). College athletes also are not allowed to use their skills in their sport for pay (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p. 2). Meaning they can not receive money from boosters who donate money to college teams because they are doing well in their sport. Athletes should be allowed to make money off of something that they are good at and have a talent in, just as a musician or NASCAR driver makes money off of a talent that they have perfected and love to do. College athletes are allowed to have gotten money for their athletic ability before college (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p. 2) An example would be if an athlete entered into a contest that pertained to their sport in high school and won money for doing well in that contest. It seems unfair how an athlete can make money off of their talent in high school but once they are in college athletes are not allowed to receive any payment for their talents even though college is where these students athletes will need money the most. Also in order to stay amateurs and be eligible to play their sport in college, the athletes must not have ever accepted money, transportation, or other aid from an agent who sells their athletic ability or notoriety in their sport (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p.2). Letting college athletes have their own personal agents would allow them to have someone who advises them on financial and life situations just like any parent or counselor. College athletes should be able to gain recognition for their talents not just by awards they receive but also by receiving payment for their hard work on the field of play. If a booster, someone who donates money to a school, wants to pay an athlete for their hard work they should be allowed to if it is coming out of their own pockets. The NCAA is holding back athletes from receiving profits that could help their futures especially if athletes are able to use the money they receive as a way to save for their future just in case sports is not their job in the future when they leave their universities. Also under NCAA regulations a student-athlete must not promote a commercial brand or service, in which they get payment for (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p. 2). Endorsement deals would allow college athletes to have extra money and save for their future whether it be in sports or not. Other rules that athletes must follow deal with the financial aid they receive. Athletes are not allowed to receive financial aid from anyone besides the money they receive from a college or other scholarships that are nonathletic (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p.2). Athletes must report to the NCAA any financial aid that they receive outside of their institution (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” p.2). Basically the National Collegiate Athletic Association controls what money athletes can and cannot not get.

The NCAA’s revenue has increased 8000 percent in the past 23 years (McGraw 2). The NCAA has a one point seven billion dollar television deal, which is bigger than any professional league’s deal with any television network (McGraw 2). Like a lot of professional sports the NCAA has its own licensed apparel (McGraw 2). The NCAA was founded on the fact that it would keep college athletics at an amateur level and keep athletics secondary to an athlete getting a good education (McGraw 2). The NCAA was not made to make money off the athletes (McGraw 2). As an educational, nonprofit organization the NCAA does not pay state or federal taxes on the billions in television contracts and the millions in sponsorship money, the millions of dollars it makes in bowl games and playoff tickets (McGraw 2). The members of this organization are not professional teams but nine hundred and thirty three universities (McGraw 2).

The NCAA has strayed away from their educational purposes and now is an organization devoted to making money off of the athletic talent of student athletes. Money is why top NCAA officials have benefits that expand the limits of tax law and their own rules on ethics (McGraw 3). Athletes are allowed to take such easy classes as sports leadership, which allows schools to play their best athletes, so they can make money (McGraw 3). Taking these classes does not help athletes towards a professional career besides sports (McGraw 3). The student athletes are being hurt by the NCAA which was formed in order to protect them in the first place (McGraw 3). The National Collegiate Athletic Association’s mission statement is “looking out for the welfare of the student athletes and making sure they are really students first” (McGraw 4-5). The NCAA is not looking out for student athletes by exploiting their talents by making a profit off of them.

The NCAA has now started to change the flow of college games to make more money also (McGraw 10). During big NCAA tournaments, timeouts can last much longer than regular season games, which is to help NCAA sponsors get their money’s worth out of their deals with the NCAA. Dale Kelley, coordinator of men’s basketball officials for the Big 12, Conference USA, and Sun Belt conferences says, “The delays are detrimental to the game. Obviously, money and television dictate” (qtd in McGraw 11).

In today’s sports world, sports are no longer fun and games, but they are a business and college sports are no different from professional leagues (Wimmer 1). Colleges take in money from ticket sales, televison contracts, and merchandise that they sell through the performance of their athletes, but the athletes get their scholarship and nothing else. College athletes scholarships range from about seven thousand dollars to the high twenty thousand range depending upon which school they go to and whether they are in-state or out-of-state student athletes (Wimmer 1). Colleges generate a lot more money off of the athletes they bring to the school . A major division college can sign a television contract worth upwards of thirty-eight million dollars for five seasons, and this number does not even take in account the ticket revenue, the championship or bowl game profits, and fan apparel sold because of the athletes who work hard on the fields (Wimmer 1; Wulf 94). During the 1995-1996 school year, the top most profitable schools for football were University of Washington, University of Florida, Auburn University, Penn State, University of Georgia, University of Michigan, Alabama, Notre Dame, University of Tennessee, and Texas A&M. Each of these schools made a profit of at least ten million dollars off of their football programs alone (McGraw 13). Also during the 1995-1996 basketball season the top most profitable basketball programs took in at least three million dollars from their programs (McGraw 13). These numbers show that the universities are making a good amount of profit to give some of that money back to their athletes who are working hard to generate the vast amount of money they bring in to the schools. Division I school sports generate almost two billion dollars annually in revenue and in Division I-A the average college makes more than four million dollars annually from just their football and basketball teams alone (McGraw 5). A lot of the bigger division one football college teams are worth more than some of the professional football teams (McGraw 5). University of Michigan, University of Florida, and University of Notre Dame are all worth more than the Detroit Lions, according to research done by Notre Dame economist Richard G. Sheehan (qtd in McGraw 5). Each of these teams had an average gross revenue of eighteen point two million dollars a few years ago and more than fourteen million dollars in profits.

College teams act as professional teams as well (McGraw 5). Many colleges and universities expand and build new sports arenas and stadiums to house their sports teams (McGraw 6). These new stadiums and arenas cost millions of dollars to build, which could be going towards compensating their athletes (McGraw 6). In a quote by Deloss Dodds, athletic director of Texas, he says, “We have the most and the best” (McGraw 6). He is referring to the high class arenas and equipment the university has. The fact that colleges are making millions of dollars off of their athletes means that they are exploiting them and the NCAA laws proves this (Wimmer 1). The NCAA constitution states that, “student athletes shall be amateurs…and should be protected from exploitation by professional and commercial enterprises” (qtd in Wimmer 1). The problem is that it fails to accept that university athletic programs are commercial enterprises, but the basis of college athletic programs is to generate money for the universities (Wimmer 2; Murphy and Pace 168). If college athletic programs were to be recognized as commercial enterprises then they would be violating NCAA rules (Wimmer 2). Walter Byers, former executive director of the NCAA, states that, “The coaches own the athletes’ feet, the college own the athletes’ bodies, and the supervisors retain the large rewards. That reflects a neoplantation mentality on the campuses that is not appropriate at this time of high dollars” (qtd in Wimmer 2; qtd in Wulf 94). Byer is saying that the universities are using their student athletes as a form of slave labor (Wimmer 2). The universities are the big businesses who are making a lot of money and the student athletes are the ones making it all possible, and they are not seeing any of the money that they are generating.

Colleges try to deny the fact that they are exploiting these student athletes by minimizing the amount of money that athletes bring into their universities (Wimmer 2). Reverend E. Williams, executive vice president at the University of Notre Dame , explains his view of college athletes being paid:

and all the athlete gets is a measly scholarship-or so the argument goes. What gets lost in this equation is that those scholarships add up. At Notre Dame, for example, grants-in-aid to student-athletes are worth about five million dollars annually. Add to that the millions spent on travel, housing, equipment, health care and other costs and pretty soon, in the words of Everett Dirksen, you’re talking real money.” (Beauchamp 1)

“College athletes should, must and will be entitled to as much money as they can latch onto. Just like real students” (Looney 1). Universities estimate that the cost of student athletes to attend a university beyond the money that they get for room, board, books, tuition and fees is somewhere from fifteen hundred dollars to two thousand dollars a year (Looney 1). Athletic scholarships do not cover the extra cost that athletes have such as trips that they must take back home, food athletes may want to get during the middle of the night, clothes, and other miscellaneous things (Looney 1). Regular students are allowed to receive money and other benefits from anybody they want, but for student athletes to receive money from someone besides a family member or university would be a NCAA violation (Looney 1). That would cause the athlete to lose eligibility in their sport. For student athletes it would be called special benefits (Looney 1). Regular university students are allowed to make money however they want as long as it is legal (Looney 1). Student athletes, however, can work only mainly during major school vacations, but really for student athletes it is impossible nowadays in year round sports (Looney 1). If a basketball player was to take the summer off and work that athlete most likely would not be playing come the winter time when it was time for his season to begin (Looney 1). These days athletes must practice their sport all the time to make sure that they are in shape when it comes time for their season. So really there is no off season for college athletes.

The best way for universities to avoid paying college athletes would be allow them to have endorsement deals and allow the athletes to receive money from boosters or whoever was willing to give athletes money for their great performances (Looney 3). Dick DeVenzio, a former Duke basketball player says, “Athletes should simply be free to make whatever money they can; and there is no reason whatever that educational institutions should be permitted to suppress the earning power of the athletes” (qtd in Looney 3). “We know from all the rules [sic] violations that there are lots of wealthy alums and boosters of various schools eager to give athletes cash and cars and stuff. They clearly care about athletic success. There’s nothing wrong with that” (Looney 4). If boosters and wealthy alumni were allowed to pay athletes there would be no worry whether or not colleges should pay student athletes. “Free enterprise also would force universities to properly focus on their business, which is education not sport” (Looney 4). Marvin Johnson, a former star basketball player at University of New Mexico says, “There is no salary cap on the coach, the AD., the president [sic] America is the land of opportunity. So if the

current rules aren’t changed, America isn’t what it says. Capitalism makes everything fair. What is more basic in our system than getting paid for your sweat and creativity?” As long as college athletes are working hard to become professional athletes making millions there will always be the question of whether or not they should be paid and the answer to that question is that they should be paid. As long as universities are taking in money and the NCAA profits off of college athletics, college athletes should receive some compensation.

Works Cited

Beauchamp, Rev. E. William. “College Athletes Already Are Fairly Compensated.”

Notre Dame Fighting Irish, The Official Athletic Site. 10 Mar 1997. University of Notre Dame. 15 Sept. 2005. <http://und.collegesports.com/genrel/nd-genreleases06.html>.

Looney, Douglas S. “Cash, check, or charge?-paying college athletes.” The Sporting News. 1 July, 1996. Find Articles. 15 Sept. 2005. <http://www.findarticles.com /p/articles/mi_m1208/is_n27_v220/ai_18433313>.

McGraw, Mike, Steven Rock, and Karen Dillon. “Revenues dominate the college sports

sports world.” Money Games: Inside the NCAA. 5 Oct. 1997. Kansas City Star.

19 Sept. 2005. <http://www.kcstar.com/ncaa/part1.html>.

Murphy, Pace and Jonathan Pace. “A Plan for Compensating Student-Athletes.” Brigham Young University Education & Law Journal. 1994:167-186.

“Summary of NCAA Regulations.” Summary of NCAA Regulations. 2005.National Collegiate Athletic Association.

Wimmer, Joshua P. “Students Athletes or University Slaves.” Fresh Writing. 2001. University of Notre Dame. 19 Sept. 2005.<http://www.nd.edu/~frswrite/issues/2001-2002/Wimmer.shtml>.

Wulf, Steve. “Tote that Ball, Life That Revenue.” Time 148, 21 Oct. 1996: 94.

College Athletes Should Be Paid

In today’s sports world many professional athletes are paid large sums of money to pursue a career in a sport that they have played since they were kids. The annual salary of each athlete depends on his or her performance in past seasons. Also, many athletes going from college to professional leagues are paid large amounts of money based on their potential to become a superstar in the near future. Besides what professional athletes get paid by their teams, many elite professional athletes are paid millions of dollars in endorsement deals. Today’s college athletes are out in the hot summers and cold winters every season to try and sharpen their ability in their sport to hopefully one day become an athlete that is paid millions of dollars. College athletes must attend every training session, be at practice everyday and on time, they must respect their coaches, and they have classes they must attend. Besides scholarships that college athletes receive for their hard work in high school, they do not reap any monetary rewards for their hard work season in and season out. Also college athletes do not see any of the money the universities receive from them playing their sport. Many sports journalists have said that college athletes work twice as hard as professional athletes who are already reaping the reward for their hard work. College athletes should be compensated for their hard work on the field by being paid a small salary. Also, college athletes should be allowed to have endorsement deals with corporate companies. It is also not ethical for the colleges and the National Collegiate Athletic Association to make money off of these athletes if they are not willing to pay these athletes a small salary or allow them to make money off of their talents.

College athletes are allowed to have gotten money for their athletic ability before college (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” 2). An example would be if an athlete entered into a contest that pertained to his sport in high school and won money for doing well in that contest. It seems unfair how an athlete can make money off of his talent in high school, but once he is in the athlete is not allowed to receive any payment for his talents even though college is where these student athletes will need money the most. Also in order to stay amateurs and be eligible to play their sport in college, the athletes must not have ever accepted money, transportation, or other aid from an agent who sells their athletic ability or notoriety in their sport (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” 2). Also under NCAA regulations a student-athletes must not promote a commercial brand or service, in which they get payment for (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” 2). Other rules that athletes must follow deal with the financial aid they receive. Athletes are not allowed to receive financial aid from anyone besides the money they receive from a college or other scholarships that are nonathletic (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” 2). Athletes must report to the NCAA any financial aid that they receive outside of their institution (“Summary of NCAA Regulations” 2). Basically the rules by the NCAA controls what money athletes can and cannot not get.

Athletes should be allowed to make money off of something that they are good at and have a talent in, just as musicians or artists make money off of a talent they have and love to do. It seems unfair how an athlete can make money off of his talent in high school, but once they are in college athletes are not allowed to receive any payment for their talents even though college is where these student athletes will need money the most. Also, letting college athletes have their own personal agents would allow them to have someone who advises them on financial and life situations just like any parent or counselor. College athletes should also be able to gain recognition for their talents not just by awards they receive but also by receiving payment for their hard work in their field of play. If a booster, someone who donates money to a school, wants to pay an athlete for their hard work, they should be allowed to if it is coming out of the booster’s own pocket. The NCAA is holding back athletes from receiving profits that could help their futures especially if athletes are able to use the money they receive as a way to save for their future just in case sports is not the job the athlete has in the future when they leave their university. Another that the NCAA has taken away from athletes that would help them would be to allow athletes to have endorsement deals. Endorsement deals would allow college athletes to have extra money and save for their future whether it is in sports or not.

The NCAA’s revenue has increased 8000 percent in the past 23 years (McGraw 2). The NCAA has a one point seven billion dollar television deal, which is bigger than any professional league’s deal with any television network (McGraw 2). Like a lot of professional sports, the NCAA has its own licensed apparel (McGraw 2). The NCAA was founded on the fact that it would keep college athletics at an amateur level and keep athletics secondary to an athlete getting a good education (McGraw 2). The NCAA was not made to make money off the athletes (McGraw 2). As an educational nonprofit organization, the NCAA does not pay state or federal taxes on the billions in television contracts and the millions in sponsorship money, the millions of dollars it makes in bowl games and playoff tickets (McGraw 2). The members of this organization are not professional teams but nine hundred and thirty three universities (McGraw 2).

the NCAA which was formed in order to protect them in the first place (McGraw 3). The National Collegiate Athletic Association’s mission statement is “looking out for the welfare of the student athletes and making sure they are really students first” (McGraw 4-5). The NCAA is not looking out for student athletes by exploiting their talents by making a profit off of them.

In today’s sports world, sports are no longer fun and games, but they are a business and college sports are no different from professional leagues (Wimmer 1). Colleges take in money from ticket sales, television contracts, and merchandise that they sell through the performance of their athletes, but the athletes get their scholarship and nothing else. College athletes scholarships range from about seven thousand dollars to the high twenty thousand range depending upon which school they go to and whether they are in-state or out-of-state student athletes (Wimmer 1). Colleges generate a lot more money off of the athletes they bring to the school. A major division college can sign a television contract worth upwards of thirty-eight million dollars for five seasons, and this number does not even take in account the ticket revenue, the championship or bowl game profits, and fan apparel sold because of the athletes who work hard on the fields (Wimmer 1; Wulf 94). During the 1995-1996 school year, the top most profitable schools for football were University of Washington, University of Florida, Auburn University, Penn State, University of Georgia, University of Michigan, Alabama, Notre Dame, University of Tennessee, and Texas A&M. Each of these schools made a profit of at least ten million dollars off of their football programs alone (McGraw 13). Also during the 1995-1996 basketball season the top most profitable basketball programs took in at least three million dollars from their programs (McGraw 13). These numbers show that the universities are making a good amount of profit to give some of that money back to their athletes who are working hard to generate the vast amount of money they bring in to the schools. Division I school sports generate almost two billion dollars annually in revenue, and in Division I-A the average college makes more than four million dollars annually from just their football and basketball teams alone (McGraw 5). A lot of the bigger Division I football college teams are worth more than some of the professional football teams (McGraw 5). University of Michigan, University of Florida, and University of Notre Dame are all worth more than the Detroit Lions, according to research done by Notre Dame Economist Richard G. Sheehan (qtd in McGraw 5). Each of these teams had an average gross revenue of eighteen point two million dollars a few years ago and more than fourteen million dollars in profits.

College teams act as professional teams as well (McGraw 5). Many colleges and universities expand and build new sports arenas and stadiums to house their sports teams (McGraw 6). These new stadiums and arenas cost millions of dollars to build, which could be going towards compensating their athletes (McGraw 6). In a quote by Deloss Dodds, athletic director of Texas, he says, “We have the most and the best” (McGraw 6). He is referring to the high class arenas and equipment the university has. The fact that colleges are making millions of dollars off of their athletes means that they are exploiting them and the NCAA laws prove this (Wimmer 1). The NCAA constitution states that, “student athletes shall be amateurs…and should be protected from exploitation by professional and commercial enterprises” (qtd in Wimmer 1). The problem is that it fails to accept that university athletic programs are commercial enterprises, but the basis of college athletic programs is to generate money for the universities (Wimmer 2; Murphy and Pace 168). If college athletic programs were to be recognized as commercial enterprises then they would be violating NCAA rules (Wimmer 2). Walter Byers, former executive director of the NCAA, states that “The coaches own the athletes’ feet, the colleges own the athletes’ bodies, and the supervisors retain the large rewards. That reflects a neoplantation mentality on the campuses that is not appropriate at this time of high dollars” (qtd in Wimmer 2; qtd in Wulf 94). Byer is saying that the universities are using their student athletes as a form of slave labor (Wimmer 2). The universities are the big businesses who are making a lot of money and the student athletes are the ones making it all possible, and they are not seeing any of the money that they are generating.

Colleges try to deny the fact that they are exploiting these student athletes by minimizing the amount of money that athletes bring into their universities (Wimmer 2). Reverend E. Williams, executive vice president at the University of Notre Dame, explains his view of college athletes being paid:

“In brief, proponents of the play-for-pay concept believe that since major college athletic programs produce large sums of money through television rights fees, bowl games, ticket sales and other means, students-athletes deserve more than just a grant-in-aid for their efforts. This perspective would have us to believe the financial arrangement between universities and student-athletes is unfairly balanced in favor of the institution. A university realizes millions in revenue and all the athlete gets is a measly scholarship-or so the argument goes. What gets lost in this equation is that those scholarships add up. At Notre Dame, for example, grants-in-aid to student-athletes are worth about five million dollars annually. Add to that the millions spent on travel, housing, equipment, health care and other costs and pretty soon, in the words of Everett Dirksen, you’re talking real money” (Beauchamp 1).

Also, Beauchamp says, “So, in the end, the pay-for-play issue comes to this: Student-athletes entertain us with their special skills and, in compensation, receive, 1)All expenses paid [sic] competition in the sports they love; 2) Educations that are worth tens of thousands of real dollars with the promise of hundreds of thousands more in future earnings; and 3) the lifetime benefits of wisdom and character that come with being educated men and women. That’s a fair deal” (Beauchamp 1). Beauchamp says that an education and the scholarship are enough to compensate college athletes when in fact many college athletes are not staying in college to get education and many are not getting a proper education by taking classes that do not help them towards a professional career. Many of the representatives of colleges take the same view as Beauchamp that the student athletes should not be paid because they are getting a free education. Many athletes do not get a free education because schools are limited on the amount of scholarships that they are allowed to give out in each sport. For example, Division I men’s soccer is only allowed 9.9 full scholarships annually, so that number of scholarships must be split up among the number of players on the team, which is usually at least twenty players (“Summary of NCAA Regulations”).

Universities estimate that the cost of student athletes to attend a university beyond the money that they get for room, board, books, tuition and fees is somewhere from fifteen hundred dollars to two thousand dollars a year (Looney 1). Athletic scholarships do not cover the extra cost that athletes have such as trips that they must take back home, food athletes may want to get during the middle of the night, clothes, and other miscellaneous things (Looney 1). Regular students are allowed to receive money and other benefits from anybody they want, but for student athletes to receive money from someone besides a family member or university would be a NCAA violation (Looney 1). That would cause the athlete to lose eligibility in their sport. For student athletes it would be called special benefits (Looney 1). Regular university students are allowed to make money however they want as long as it is legal (Looney 1). Student athletes, however, can work only mainly during major school vacations, but really for student athletes it is impossible nowadays in year round sports (Looney 1). If a basketball player was to take the summer off and work, that athlete most likely would not be playing come the winter time when it was time for his season to begin (Looney 1). These days athletes must practice their sport all the time to make sure that they are in shape when it comes time for their season. So really there is no off season for college athletes.

The best way for universities to avoid paying college athletes would be allow them to have endorsement deals and allow the athletes to receive money from boosters or whoever was willing to give athletes money for their great performances (Looney 3). Dick DeVenzio, a former Duke basketball player says, “Athletes should simply be free to make whatever money they can; and there is no reason whatever that educational institutions should be permitted to suppress the earning power of the athletes” (qtd in Looney 3). If boosters and wealthy alumni were allowed to pay athletes there would be no worry whether or not colleges should pay student athletes. Marvin Johnson, a former star basketball player at University of New Mexico says, “There is no salary cap on the coach, the AD., the president [sic] America is the land of opportunity. So if the current rules aren’t changed, America isn’t what it says. Capitalism makes everything fair. What is more basic in our system than getting paid for your sweat and creativity?” As long as college athletes are working hard to become professional athletes making millions there will always be the question of whether or not they should be paid and the answer to that question is that they should be paid. As long as universities are taking in money and the NCAA profits off of college athletics, college athletes should receive some compensation.