by
Gary N. Gray

THE PRO DRAFT
NCAA on the hot seat again

-The Grayline-

Well it’s another year, and the pro football and basketball drafts are now upon us. Once again many more kids will be moving from the college to a pro career, giving these talented young people their first chance to make money. While other students on campus can get a job and earn wages attending school, these student athletes cannot do so. Are we sending the wrong messages to these talented young adults? 

Acquiring an education should be on the top of the list for these young people. America, instead, has given them all the signs that making money is important. So many of these young adults leave school early and a few don’t even go to college. 

How can the NCAA allow this drop out of college and enter into sports to continue? The NCAA allows coaches to make and acquire contracts with shoe companies, hat companies, and uniform companies; millions are given to these coaches, but not one dime goes to the people doing most of the work on the field, on the floor, or in the pool. 

Schools have their names in lights and on TV; Colleges across this land make millions on these TV contracts, but college athletes do not see a dime of that money. In the meantime, most of these college student athletes put themselves on the line for the schools.  

Many colleges across this land recruit kids from all over America--poor kids, rich kids, black kids, and white to play for their school colors. Not getting anything in return but the pride and joy of playing the game they love may not be enough. 

These schools get two million dollars per weekend while the kids get nothing but the possibility of a pro career--possible. For every ten student athletes, only one will make it to pro status. Only one of these fine men and women ever makes the grade in the pros. The average life of any professional is about five years, depending on the sport. 

Some of these schools get multiple TV contracts, multiple free stuff, and money from companies in lieu of advertising at their games. Do they share this with their student athletes? Most schools will continue making money long after these student athletes leave their college homes. Most of these college coaches will retire rich, no matter how good or bad their teams may be. Is this fair? 

In the meantime, these college campuses build new arenas, new baseball parks, new track, and field stadiums, and new swimming pools. They make their many sports programs better year by year.

Is this fair; is this equal treatment of all students on college campuses? This creates certain problems for the student athlete and the school. 

A classic example of this happened in my school years ago. A very famous player wanted to work and needed to work because he had a wife and a child. He found a job a few miles off campus so he needed a car to get to his job. The coach gave him a car to travel to work and to get to practice on time from work. The NCAA rules committee slapped a three-year probation on my school, and they could not participate in the league championship for three years after they found out the coach gave the athlete the car. The coach wanted to help this student athlete and wanted to keep his best player safe and in good health. 

The school suffered through three very bad years of basketball, but the program continued. The fans watched very bad players and lose interest in the team. The school lost revenue and the ability to attract high school athletes in the immediate area.

Many players transferred out of the program to go to other schools--schools that would be eligible for the NCAA tourney at the end of the year. The school recovered, but the student athletes that played during that troubled time lost much of their abilities.  None of them made the professional level, none of them made the conference all-star team. Most of that team will never be remembered. Is that fair for those players who played as hard as the other players before them? These players paid the penalty for something others had done years earlier. Is this fair?

Another example could be raised in the SF Bay Area a few years ago. A certain player wanted the coach fired; the player got his wishes, and the assistant became the coach with one stipulation--you must put this program back on the national map no matter what the cost. This coach followed the school's instructions. The school got its wishes and everybody across the land knew about this program and wanted to come to sunny Northern California. The coach started recruiting players like never get before. Some promises were attached to the new recruits; promises that were against the NCAA’s rules. The school’s winning percentages went up, people started attending games that they had never attended before.

Once, again, the NCAA rules committee got wind of this, and the coach was let go. The school, to avoid any other misconduct charges, policed itself, and the school’s program was put on probation for three years. As in my school’s case, the rule breakers never went through three years of bad basketball, and, like my school, many players transferred out of the program to play at other schools that could go to the NCAA tourney.  

Most of these student athletes have only three or four years to show off their God-given talents. So why do the public and the press get upset when these kids leave college early for a pro career? Why do we criticize them for leaving early? Hey, the school is getting all the benefits while the student athletes are working hard, playing their sport and studying their major.

If the (NCAA) truly wanted to stop alumni and sports agents giving under the table money while in school, and if the NCAA truly wanted schools to stop trying to undermined the current rules, the NCAA would modify its own rules, and the NCAA and the schools will have to assist student athletes make it through four years of college. 

This year there will be four high school boys in the National Basketball Association draft, seven freshmen from college, 11 second-year students, and 12 third-year students. This number has almost doubled since last year’s draft. This number will grow each year because of the outdated rules of the NCAA. These student athletes no longer want to play for free, and they no longer want to wait until their senior year to go to the pros.

So I asked the NCAA, what are they going to do to make the student in athletes mean something? []

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