Ackerman 1

Kevin Ackerman

Mrs. Cramer

Comp Pd. 8

16 November 2018

Billion Dollar Industry – Athletes Get Zip

What if someone said that college athletics is a billion-dollar industry and the athletes

receive no compensation? The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a college

sports organization that rules and regulates all college athletics. Similar to all other

organizations, they have a set of rules and regulations for universities to follow when talking

about athletics. One major regulation that universities must follow is the payment of college

athletes, or lack thereof. Many elements of paying college athletes should be considered, such as

the historical significance, the pros and cons, and how they could be paid if the law changed.

To begin, college athletics have been around for multiple years, dating all the way back

to the 1800s. Over time, certain elements have changed and will continue to change, which

eventually paves the way for where college athletics are today. College athletics began in the

mid-1850’s when universities began to create sports programs. Other universities began to see

how successful this became in earning money, so the globalization of college athletics began.

Colleges would begin to pay their athletes in the 1870s, which would go on for a decent amount

of time until the NCAA was officially formed and revised their rules and regulations (Miller). As

college athletics advance in the 1900s, a first in college athletics appeared. Throughout the early

to mid-1900s, athletes were recruited and paid to play for the university. This was not as big of a

deal at the time because there was not much concern about education as compared to athletics
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back then. These incidents began to occur where the athlete was not even enrolled as a student at

the university, and was just getting paid to play in their sport. A specific example is at

Midwestern University where athletes included, “the town blacksmith, a lawyer, a livery man,

and four railroad employees.” These events within college athletics would soon see changes with

how the universities are using their athletes. The NCAA formed a document called the Sanity

Code, which forced the athlete to be enrolled as a student at the university and they could only

receive tuition and fees through financial aid (Johnson and Acquaviva). In just that short period

of time in the first half of the 1900s, several changes took place in regard to paying college

athletes; from being totally legal and nobody batting an eye at it, to new rules and regulations

coming into effect in 1948. Changes are continuing even today in attempt to improve these same

problems which is showing how history has gotten college athletics to where they are today.

Now that the history of college athletics and paying college athletes has been viewed,

further examination of both the pros and cons from both sides of the argument of paying college

athletes can be proposed. First, arguments from the proponents of paying college athletes. The

proponents argue that college athletes bring in a substantial amount of revenue not to pay them.

For example, an ESPN analyst, Michael Wilbon, states that the NCAA March Madness

basketball tournament is bringing in nearly eleven billion dollars over a twelve-year span along

with the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) bringing in five hundred million dollars over a four-

year deal with ESPN (Wilbon). Therefore, with all the income that the National Collegiate

Athletic Association generates, people will argue that a portion of this revenue should be given

to the universities to split up among the team's athletes. On the other hand, those who oppose

paying college athletes say that there are several reasons as to why the athletes do not deserve to

be paid. Madisen Martinez states, one of these reasons being that the scholarships they receive to
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play sports are clearly enough (Martinez). These scholarships cover everything including, tuition

and room and board. Another reason is that if the athletes were to be paid and earn a salary, there

could be serious financial damage to these student-athletes. Depending on how much that salary

is for the individual, the taxes could put them even further into debt in addition to their student

loans. The opponents of paying college athletes are arguing this to show how scholarships are

enough for the athletes, and that a salary could actually hurt them even more.

Now that the history of the NCAA and the supporters and opponents of paying college

athletes have been viewed, there can be an examination of the ways to pay these athletes if it

were legal. One of these ways would be to use the ‘Olympic model’ to pay the players in their

sport. This includes “guaranteed income from the athlete’s endorsement signings, autographs,

jobs outside of athletics, and control of their own image and likeness of the fans” (Nocera). This

could include any purchases made by fans with the player’s name and number on the jersey; they

could get some of that profit as well. Transitioning back to the salary cap idea; and those who are

supporters of the idea, Nocera reports in The New York Times that each university athletic

program would have a salary cap just like the pros and no matter how much an athlete plays or

not, there will be a minimum salary for every single player on the team. He also says while

explaining this idea that the number of athletes the team can hold decreases by a large margin

due to the money being given out now in salaries. If the NCAA were to legalize payment of

college athletes and this method were to go into use, the athletes would now be getting paid with

more than just their scholarship money. Also, they would not need to get a job to earn money

while in college. There have also been ideas thrown out stating the colleges in the major, well

known, conferences already make enough money through deals such as television rights,

meaning they can afford to pay the athletes. The question of if every school will be able to pay
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these athletes comes into play. The solution that was proposed was, the NCAA could create “a

revenue sharing program” that would give money equally to all schools (Karaim 5). Therefore,

making it a possible solution for all schools to be given the same equal opportunity. There are

numerous solutions as to how this could happen, now the question is, will the “solution” take

place?

The history of college athletics and how they got to where they are today, the pros and

cons of paying college athletes, and how these athletes could be paid have all been taken into

consideration. The “Pay for Play” model has been huge in college sports for several years.

However, there has yet to be any drastic changes up to this point. There has been a long-lasting

history on the topic of college sports and the changes that occur. The ongoing debate of the pros

and cons of paying college athletes has been going on for as long as anybody can remember.

Different ways have been thought of on how to pay college athletes if it was legal. Now that both

sides of the argument have been presented and facts about the topic, which path would be the

best to take? Pay them or not?

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Works Cited

Johnson, Dennis A., and John Acquaviva. "Point/counterpoint: Paying College Athletes." The

Sport Journal, vol. 15, no. 1, 2012. Academic OneFile,

link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A322563607/AONE?u=pl1949&sid=AONE&xid=16f31f2f

. Accessed 20 Sept. 2018.

Karaim, Reed. "Paying College Athletes." Are Players School Employees?,

rampages.us/patelss28/wp-content/uploads/sites/3455/2015/10/Paying-College-Athletes-

CQR.pdf. Accessed 19 Sept. 2018.

Martinez, Madisen. "Should College Athletes Be Paid? Both Sides of the Debate."

CollegeXpress, 20 Mar. 2017, www.collegexpress.com/articles-and-

advice/athletics/blog/should-college-student-athletes-be-paid-both-sides-debate/.

Accessed 20 Sept. 2018.

Miller, Anthony W. "NCAA Division I Athletics: Amateurism and Exploitation." The Sport

Journal, vol. 14, no. 1, 2011. Academic OneFile,

link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A284323917/AONE?u=pl1949&sid=AONE&xid=4584490

5. Accessed 20 Sept. 2018.

Nocera, Joe. "A Way to Start Paying College Athletes." The New York Times, 8 Jan. 2016,

www.nytimes.com/2016/01/09/sports/a-way-to-start-paying-college-athletes.html.

Accessed 19 Sept. 2018.

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Wilbon, Michael. "College Athletes Deserve to Be Paid." ESPN Sports Illustrated, 18 July 2011,

www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/6778847/college-athletes-deserve-paid.

Accessed 19 Sept. 2018.