Another season, another college program under investigation by the Gestapo, I mean the NCAA.  Kelvin Sampson, who has been coach at Indiana for two years now, was caught with high school recruits inappropriately and now the Hoosier program could be facing serious penalties.  Sampson and the athletic director could also be facing dismissal for their actions.  This is nothing new to Sampson, while being very successful everywhere he has been, going to the final four and making the NCAA tournament 10 of 11 years at Oklahoma and helped a basketball doormat Washington State make it to the NCAA tournament, is also someone who has been under scrutiny for the same infractions while at Oklahoma.  NCAA imposed sanctions against Oklahoma including barring them for making outgoing phone calls to recruits during his tenure.  This is probably one of the reasons he took the job at Indiana, besides the Hoosier's rich basketball tradition but whatever changes stays the same.

 

So, you can ask yourself the harm in calling recruits, at least they are not bribing them to come to their school?  Its the NCAA trying to be fair to all programs large and small, but they forget that they are a multi-billion dollar business with huge TV contracts and plenty of corporate sponsorship.  All of this money (mainly men's basketball and football) have made most schools in division I a ton of money for academics scholarships and buldings and subsidizing other sports to be compliance to Title IX that wouldn't be possible without this influx of cash.  Its not about amateur athletics anymore, friendly competition between schools and building character in the student athletes, its all about winning, bringing prestige to the school ( more schools are known for their sports programs than what they excel at academically) and about the greenbacks.  Coaches and Athletic Directors are not only chosen for their Xs and Os but how they recruit players and  schmooze with alumni and fans for fundraising.  A lot of coaches make much more money than their pro counterparts and in a lot more cases under more pressure to win.  No wonder why they try to stretch or even circumvent the rules risking their jobs. It's a high risk, high reward job.  I don't envy any college coaches their rule book must be like reading and deciphering the U.S. tax code.

 

To schools, highly recruited athletes are just pieces of meat, treated as an employee to make the school athletic program successful and in return make them money.  The sad part of this is that these athletics are not paid a dime.  They however do receive a free ride (tuition, books, room and board) but if you look at the big picture the real cost of supplying this is just a drop in the bucket in how much money most division I programs brings in.  Most of these athletics, again I am talking about men's basketball and football, have been exploited since a young aged, even being recruited to go to certain middle and high schools bringing these schools money and prestige.  These are inner city youths that sports is a way out the ghetto and will hitch to any opportunity that appears.  These schools never seems to do what's best for the student.  Although most of these high school programs that recruit students have better academic facilities than the schools they come from, they still are pushing sports over learning.  Most of the parents don't help the situation because they see the dollar signs too.    Education is always put on the back burner, their hopes are hanging on the slight chance that hit it big in the pros.  We need to reinforce to the athletes and parents that only a fraction of one percent actually becomes successful.  There are many athletes that either have skipped college altogether or left college early because they have been told they have what it takes to be successful in the pros, flame out and are now uneducated, working in dead end jobs or on the streets committing crimes.  

 

My perfect situation is that all athletes go to a college for four years work on their game while getting a quality education, but we all know that is unrealistic for some athletes.  Look at Lebron James he was successful right out of high school but he is one in a million but kids think they can be like him.  I bet there statistics out there correlating the amount of time spend in college, degree earned and success in their sport.   The result will probably be more education more success.  NBA is trying by requiring players to go to college at least one year but that is just passing the buck to the schools.  Players should either go to school and get a degree if they receive a scholarship (no matter how easy the degree) or go straight  to a developmental league to hoan their game before they reach the pros.  In this league they would be getting paid and part of it could be some sort of internship teaching athletes something to fall back on.  If the players choose college they should also receive a stipend as spending money, most of these athletes come from low income households without the resources most students have.  Giving them a stipend also will keep them out of trouble by not having to worry about getting money to even go out to eat.  These athletes I believe can't have jobs during the school year and is under watch on jobs they have during the summer that they are not getting paid by boosters for no work.  This stipend will help share the wealth these schools make on the back of these players.  Also, the NCAA should set up a fund to help the smaller schools give their athletes the same stipends it would be like revenue sharing where the bigger schools will give to the fund and the smaller one will be the recipient of the funds.  Its not a true free market because without competition the NCAA and pro leagues will cease to exist.  The competition is what makes people comes to the games and get corporations to sponsor these events.  Its like what pro baseball and football does with revenue sharing. 

 

I have been on both sides on the fence on this subject but the free market side of me has come to the forefront. We need to start changing the system from elementary school forward.  Its a hard thing to accomplish because of how we perceive athletes in our society, glorifying them and their lifestyle.  I agree that being a pro athlete is a goal we can strive for, just like kids wanting to be a doctor or an astronaut, not everyone's dream comes true for one reason or another, mostly because they don't have the talent.  As for what is going on currently, what ever happens to Kelvin Sampson and other coaches who cheat the rules deserve whatever punishment they get because they know the rules and most coaches in the NCAA follows them to the letter of the law but the system is definitely flawed.  The rules are very onesided catering to the greed of the schools and treat these athletes as a piece of meat.  They might say that they care about graduating their student athletes but most of them could care less, because there are thousand of potential athletes waiting in line with goals of making it big.