http://www.freep.com/sports/drewshar...5_20030805.htm

Good column,and something to think about.

But that doesn't make the situation equitable. There are so many restrictions for student athletes, such as trying to work a part time job that it's absolutely ridiculous. My son has academic scholarships but he can work anywhere he wants to.

Rick Majerus has his program put on probation for taking a player out to eat after his father passed away. That's absolutely ludicrous.

I don't have the answers but the system is broke and needs to be fixed.

Ok, time to throw out the statement that makes my kids want to hit me...Where is it written that life will be fair?

Sure there are inequities in the system. They are some in my workplace. In fact, come to think of it they exist in almost every aspect of my life. Bet some of you can even think of some you see in officiating.

Mr. Bloom seems to be a very bright young man, aside from being a gifted athlete. It sounds like he understands the NCAA rules fill volumes and are complicated. He never thought to ask if or how one sport would conflict with the other?

There are many major universities now that have "dirty" programs in various sports (you hear about them all the time). If you start relaxing the rules or making conditional exceptions does anyone think the "dirty" institutions are not going abuse them even further?

I can understand why your kids would feel that way, especially if that's the only answer you can offer them. Although there's some truth to the question, it's a great question to ask without being totalliy apathetic. It's like saying, "Why should I care if it's unfair?"

But we aren't talking about making life fair, are we? We're talking about changing an insitution that has inequities. There's a difference. But I guess most pacifists would rather just leave things they way they are, no matter how wrong things may be.

Hey, BasketballRef, I agree with you, the system is screwed up. I think the NCAA would like to fix it, but the problem is, how do you fix it without adding more regulation?

Using the job issue as an example, how would the NCAA make it possible for an athlete to hold a part-time job, but not set itself up for further booster abuse? Do you put a cap on the earnings? Do you control what kinds of jobs an athlete can apply for? Do you only allow on-campus jobs? If so, what about the non-scholarship students who need such jobs to stay in school? Do you set up a priority system?

I also agree with you that punishing Rick Majerus is ridiculous. Unfortunately, if the NCAA doesn't do something, there's a low-life coach or booster at Dirtbag U. that's going to treat a player to a steak dinner because he made a 'D' on a quiz. And, if that's okay, how about giving a player a night out on the town because his girlfriend ditched him? I mean, it just spirals out of control.

The sad thing is, the real culprit behind the broken system is not the NCAA. Its the unethical people who will use any means they can to gain an edge.

First, if you have children you should understand that when you spend 20 minutes explaining your reason behind the unfavorable answer and your child yells "THAT'S NOT FAIR.", it is the best and most appropriate answer.

Now, more importantly I must point out that not everyone thinks the rules are wrong! I'm sure you have heard the stories of athletes getting paid large sums of money to mow an artifical turf field.

These students are getting an opportunity at an education worth THOUSANDS of dollars. Now you want to propose taking on-campus jobs away from students who need them to survive and slightly minimize the huge debt they will be facing at graduation and give them to someone getting free tuition, free room and board and free books just so they can have spending money?

Ohhhh, they can work off campus. Now Mr. Highroller Allum will take a job away from a kid in the city and give it to the star QB and pay him an astronomical wage.

Ohhhh, you want to cap their earnings? How long before one of the jocks files a lawsuit against the NCAA for restraint of trade?

What if there are not enough "extra" jobs in the community for ALL the athletes (male and female)? Discrimination lawsuit begging to be filed!

If they need spending money that bad, let them sell that new Trans-Am and use public transportation. By the way, how does that single mom afford such a nice car? Shouldn't she have bought a Kia so she would have enough to send Junior $50 a week of party money?

I can honestly say that I've never had one of my children say that to me.

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Now, more importantly I must point out that not everyone thinks the rules are wrong! I'm sure you have heard the stories of athletes getting paid large sums of money to mow an artifical turf field.

Please reference the post where I said that this was right. It's not the point that I'm arguing.

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Now you want to propose taking on-campus jobs away from students who need them to survive and slightly minimize the huge debt they will be facing at graduation and give them to someone getting free tuition, free room and board and free books just so they can have spending money?

Wrong, wrong, wrong! How can you tell me what I want to do? Again, please reference the post where I made such a proposal.

Quote:

Ohhhh, they can work off campus. Now Mr. Highroller Allum will take a job away from a kid in the city and give it to the star QB and pay him an astronomical wage. Ohhhh, you want to cap their earnings? How long before one of the jocks files a lawsuit against the NCAA for restraint of trade? What if there are not enough "extra" jobs in the community for ALL the athletes (male and female)? Discrimination lawsuit begging to be filed! If they need spending money that bad, let them sell that new Trans-Am and use public transportation. By the way, how does that single mom afford such a nice car? Shouldn't she have bought a Kia so she would have enough to send Junior $50 a week of party money?

Sorry but the BS is getting entirely too deep. Yes, there are excesses and people who abuse the system. But it's a small minority, doing these things. You can't label all student athletes as being a party to these types of wrongdoings. The fact is that there are thousands of student athletes who are struggling to make ends meet, even though they're on an athletic scholarship. You're simply looking at a very small part of the picture.

My son attends a small D1 school, one without a football program. I can assure you that his roommate, a walk-on for the baseball team last year, was not making $30 an hour watching the automatic sprinkler system water the baseball field. And his vehicle was not given to him by a school booster.

Like I said coach, I don't have the answers. But there are people at the NCAA making thousands of dollars a year that could come up with a better system, if they wanted to. There's a compliance officier at everyone school. There are ways to handle such programs. But no one wants to tackle it.

Tony -- I'm trying to figure out what this means, and just not getting it. Help me out here.

The problem is not the mixing of athletics and education, but lies in educational institutions making money and often big money from athletics. The solution is quite simple. The universities in our country should revert to focusing their full energy on educating their students, and let the NCAA organization set up its own for-profit athletic system. The two should not have anything to do with each other. After all, college athletics did not start as a way for universities to make money, but as a way for the students to have some fun and compete for pride against their local peers.
Instead we have a system where instead of letting the students who are naturally at the school participate on the sports teams, the schools bring in people specifically for the sports team. This leaves the rank and file student body with only intramurals.

I know that I would have liked to play basketball against Yale, Duke, and Maryland during my time at Georgetown, but the school went out and got this kid named Iverson to play point guard because the team would make the NCAA tournament and the school would make a substantial sum of money.

In short, we have lost the purpose of college athletics. Our schools should be in the business of scholarly instruction, not of running semi-pro sports teams.

That would be a lovely solution if running a modern university didn't cost so much. Tuition, books, fees, etc. don't begin to cover the cost incurred by the university to educate the student. The rest of that money has to come from somewhere.

Tax dollars don't make up the rest. Grants, gifts, etc. don't cover it either. It's a quirky mix of state and private subisidy combined with free enterprise that allows our colleges and universities to carry on. As a Utah resident, I surely don't want to pay more in taxes to make up the difference for what Majerus' program brings in. So we taxpayers are happy to see the university helping fund itself.

Recruiting talented athletes obviously helps the university, not only bring in more sports generated revenue, but it improves the image of the school thus allowing it to attract a more talented student body and faculty. Which in turn translates into more revenue opportunities.

No, it isn't a perfect situation. But it isn't a simple problem either. I believe the cost of your simple solution is prohibitive.

BITS, while you make some excellent points, I would think that you would get a great deal of argument to the clip above. What can you tell me about UNLV, other than Tark and his long battle with the NCAA over numerous violations? Great image. I certainly didn't go to Georgetown because of Patrick Ewing. I went to study politics in DC.
Also, I understand exactly what I am proposing. I am saying take this substantial chunk of revenue away from the universities. Will they give it up without a fight? No. But we could force them to through state legislation. ie ban college sports on TV, forbid schools to make a profit from their athletic programs, etc. Not that these are perfect solutions, but the money incentive can be removed if we really try.
Lastly, since you are certainly older than I am you may be able to remember when NCAA sporting events did not generate big money. We had colleges back then, and they did just fine. We have only had big money athletics (generated by TV money) since around 1970. We have had prestigious schools for over 300 years.
My point is that the two enterprises in which the schools are currently engaged have nothing to do with each other, besides money, and they should be separated for the good of our higher educational system.

Did you see this week's SI? Rick Reilly's column moans and cries about the great injustices against Rick Majerus (who received no penalties for minor indiscretions, at best), and concludes the NCAA should go away. Yet, an article titled "College 101" (I think) spells out all kinds of major violations the NCAA has had to deal with in recent years. My guess is Rick Reilly whines when a police officer pulls him over for going 57 in a 55, and gives him a warning, saying as he pulls away, we have no need for police.

I read that column too. Did you notice how Reilly is writing about all these admittedly minor violations, then slips in a mention about practices going over the four hour daily limit, like that is comparable to him buying Keith Van Horn's breakfast the morning after his dad died? My experiences around D1 basketball teams is that these players would practice 14 hours a day instead of 4 if their coach told them too, NCAA rules be damned. None of them would even joke about reporting this, either. While there are a lot of regulations to protect the "integrity" of major college athletics, some of the regulations are there to protect the athlete.

Reilly is a slimeball who will always distort facts to make his story. Just ask Barry Bonds.

Reilly's column:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/ins...05/reilly0811/