MARCH Madness, the NCAA basketball tournament, has many sounds associated with it: Dick Vitale's incessant yapping; coaches' shouting; fans' obscene cheers. The tournament also generates the sound of money changing hands. Ticket sales, television contracts and licensing fees give schools and the NCAA vast sums of money. Despite these organizations' success, one athletic group perennially has failed to benefit: athletes. Provided the NCAA toughens its academic standards somewhat, it should allow schools to pay athletes a stipend specifically for their work as athletes.
Two NCAA sports, football and men's basketball, are gold mines. CBS has paid $6 billion to the NCAA for an eleven-year contract to broadcast the men's basketball tournament. ABC and ESPN pay $100 million annually to broadcast the Bowl Championship Series, an attempt to find a football national champion. Other networks pay the conferences and schools for their broadcasting rights. Ignoring the broadcast jackpot, schools with mildly successful programs or interesting athletic nicknames make money by licensing the school's logo and its well-known players' numbers.
Those millions of dollars, generated by the passion and work of the athletes, go to various places. Some of them pay for improved facilities and arenas. Some pay the salaries of teams' coaches. Some support the staff of the teams and conferences. They also pay for additional scholarships at the schools. Beyond those scholarships, however, they are not allowed to support the athletes.
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Currently, the NCAA allows its colleges and universities to compensate athletes via the full-ride scholarship. It also grants a per diem travel expense for athletes to pay for food and lodging.
In the interests of ensuring some kind of competitive baseline, setting a ceiling on giving players "benefits" like per diems makes sense for NCAA schools. Otherwise, well-heeled schools would be able to officially offer potential recruits nicer "benefits" like Jaguars. Making sure that no school has an unfair advantage in recruiting does not mean that all schools cannot pay their athletes a stipend, beyond the basic scholarship.
Some people would say something like, "Athletes get a free education! Some of them wouldn't even get into these schools, absent their abilities." This is true. The difference, however, between these athletes and other students at most NCAA schools is this: Non-scholarship students may get other jobs to increase their income. Smart ones who study up-and-coming fields may make obscene amounts of money by interning with established companies. By increasing the value of a company - what athletes do for the NCAA - these students have the chance to make a reasonable living while working hard in school. Athletes, in contrast, may not.
Technically, scholarship athletes are allowed to secure part-time employment. In reality, however, most scholarship athletes barely have enough time to study, let alone search for a job at Dairy Queen. Most coaches hold numerous "voluntary" practices in their off-seasons that are, in reality, mandatory.
Admittedly, figuring out how to pay the athletes would not be an easy task. The NCAA could pay all athletes the same or could create some kind of two-tier system, with revenue sports receiving more money than others. The stipend also would have to be modest - say, $500 a semester. This would be in addition to any kind of "book" or "college expense" stipend. The money would simply recognize the athletes' value to the overall NCAA community.
There is a caveat for this system to work. Academic standards must be strengthened to make the two jobs the student athletes have actually be equal in their difficulty and importance. For example, a current pending NCAA proposal would require that athletes complete 40 percent of their required coursework by the end of their second year in school. The current standard requires a paltry 25 percent be completed. If an athlete cannot meet a remote academic standard, he should pursue a professional athletic career outside of the NCAA.
In choosing to work for a particular athletic program, scholarship athletes take on two seemingly full-time jobs: working as a student and working as an athlete. The latter takes up more time than most individuals' part or full-time positions. It gives the university or college the right to make thousands of dollars from their names and likenesses. It, indirectly, gives coaches the ability to sign lucrative endorsement contracts as well. This entire system arises out of these athletes' efforts. Those students should receive some form of basic compensation.
(Seth Wood's column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at swood@cavalierdaily.com.)
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