McMullen
Thesis
10/17/13
NCAA vs. Student Athletes:
A change to come
Here we go again; a stand-out high school athletic star has a choice that will determine the rest of his life. This is what happened to Koby Clemens son of baseball star pitcher Roger Clemens. He intended to play baseball on full scholarship at the University of Texas a NCAA college baseball power house. After graduating high school he was drafted into the MLB, an eighth round pick by the team his father played for. Now for the hard part, to go to college for free, or forgo is commitment to play at Texas and go pro. The decision came pretty easy for him as described by Harvey Araton a New York Times Journalist “Koby Clemens deliberated for …show more content…
Sheryl Nance-Nash’s “NCAA Rules Trap many College Athletes in Poverty” for dailyfinance.com she talks about a study conducted by National College Players Association and Drexel University 's department of sport management. In this study they found that most college athletes are living under the poverty line. “The study looked at football and basketball teams from Football Bowl Subdivision colleges and calculated athletes ' out-of-pocket education-related expenses (over and above their "full" scholarships), and compared the room-and-board portion of players ' scholarships to the federal poverty line -- as well as to coaches ' and athletic administrators ' salaries. It then used NFL and NBA collecting bargaining agreements to estimate the fair market value of FBS football and basketball players” (Nance-Nash). The result of the study shows that the scholarships given still leave 85% of athletes living on campus and 86% living off campus living under the poverty line. It also shows that colleges are making multi millions off their athletic programs but their athletes are barley getting thru. College player are allowed to use food stamps and receive welfare. Having taxpayers pay for the athletes well being which if the NCAA wasn’t acting like a rich greedy business man and changed some of its rules the players could benefit from their athletic ability. In …show more content…
These students usually end up with huge amounts of debt when they graduate and for athletes they have none. In an article Paul Daugherty wrote for sports illustrated he writes about how college athletes should be thankful for the opportunity to play. College athletes are some of the best athletes around the world and knowing they will get noticed they have no need to get a resume together like the students around them their resume is their ability on the court. With this resume they are often treated like kings staying in first class hotels, charted jets, and playing in championship games receiving items from the games sponsor. For the academic part players are assigned tutors, have study tables and have other benefits a regular student would not receive. Athletes have very good built in connections in the workforce. Once an athlete graduates most will be set up with a job. Unlike a regular student where the job hunts is one the hardest parts (Daugherty). Some people call college athletes slaves but they are hardly that they choose to play and on most college campuses a highly privileged class. He also said “Bob Knight once said the best argument against paying players is that it diminishes the value of an education. That 's as true now as it has ever been. For every athlete demanding a paycheck, there are 10