Should College Athletes Be Paid?
At Ohio State, a case arose from football players selling their own memorabilia and awards for improper benefits. The NCAA came down upon the Buckeyes and found out that this activity was going on for about eight months before the initial investigation started. The NCAA proceeded to let the players to play the final game of the season and suspend them and coach Jim Tressel for the beginning of the season. After the game the Buckeyes players declared for the draft and left unharmed to leave coach Tressel to resign from the job (Bender). For Ohio State, North Carolina, and Southern Cal each school acted differently. Ohio State and Southern California went on to play their players regardless of knowing what they did, while North Carolina suspended players and fired coaches involved. North Carolina proceeded to lose post season privileges as well as scholarships losses. For Ohio State, the NCAA let the kids play in their final game on the condition they would be suspended for the first couple of games of the next season. After the game, the players proceeded to leave the school out to dry and declare for the NFL, Southern California was the same way.
After presenting a lot of evidence on the NCAA’s way of handling these cases, it harms the players and universities reputations, while the agents, boosters and sponsors get away clean. While the players can eventually just enter the NFL and leave, the school is what gets hit the hardest. With these punishments and sanctions, it proves difficult to recruit players to come and get educated in such an environment. Many coaches have been speaking up in this situation and supporting the movement to pay these kids. After all of the prices that schools have to pay the NCAA for the price of their coaches and players negligence, it would prove cheaper in the long run to pay the athletes now.
Works Cited
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Robinson, C.. “Renegade Miami football booster spells out illicit benefits to players.” sports.yahoo.com. YAHOO!SPORTS, 2011. Web. 26 Apr 2012. <http://sports.yahoo.com/investigations/news?slug=cr-renegade_miami_booster_details_illicit_benefits_081611>.
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Bender, B.. “Ohio state scandal timeline.” Aol. Sporting News, 2011. Web. 26 Apr 2012. <http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-football/story/2011-07-08/ohio-states-scandal-a-timeline>.
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