(10-04-2019 06:35 PM)Go College Sports Wrote:  

(10-04-2019 04:12 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(10-04-2019 03:23 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(10-04-2019 03:13 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  

(10-04-2019 01:44 PM)HawaiiMongoose Wrote:  Is that what should determine competitiveness in college athletics? Whichever school can line up the most sugar daddies wins?

How is this different than today's system? The only difference is that today's systems funnels the money either (a) indirectly toward higher coaching staff salaries and more expensive facilities or (b) directly to the athletes under the table. The California law (and inevitably other states and the federal government) allows for direct, above the board payments to athletes.

Quote:I see so many arguments for and against the California law when in the end the whole issue boils down to just one simple question: Is it a good thing to eliminate all restrictions on people with money being able to buy championships for their favorite school by paying "market rate" for the best athletes?

Once again, how is this different than today's system? Please see reasoning above.

Quote:Anyone who thinks this debate is about doing what's best for the kids is fooling themselves. If the restrictions come off then the top 10% of players (possibly fewer) will reap almost all of the financial benefits. The rest will play for schools that are invariably outmatched competitively and in unending danger of losing their fan support. And in the long run many kids will not even have that opportunity as schools lacking a sufficient number of deep-pocket boosters to stock rosters at market rates decide it's not worth competing against semi-pros and choose instead to just eliminate scholarship athletics.

Ah yes, the horror of "semi-pros!" [sarcasm font]

Nick Saban's salary as the head of Alabama is over $8.3 million per year. My own alma mater (Illinois) is paying over $5 million per year for Lovie Smith and we'll consider ourselves lucky to get 5 wins this season, much less be bowl eligible.

No one is paying millions of dollars per year for the coach of an "amateur" operation no matter what fiction people tell themselves to make them sleep well at night.

Your point about only the top 10% of the players benefiting from this would seem to be a feature instead of a bug. If this is going to be a true free market, then it would stand to reason that only the very best and marketable athletes would be receiving endorsement, so that 10% level would indicate that things are actually being done above board and logically consistent with the free market.

Look - if people want to argue that schools should stop entering into TV contracts, start paying head coaches the equivalent of a normal professor's salary, eliminate all sponsorships for sports, and give away tickets for free, then all of this wailing about student compensation would have a little more validity. I'd personally disagree that all of the foregoing would be a positive thing, but it would least be consistent and not hypocritical, which I can respect.

I just can't wrap my head around this artificial delineation of so many fans between "amateurs" and "semi-pros," though.

WTF is an "amateur" system that pays Nick Saban $8.3 million per year... which is more than all but two coaches in the NFL (one of which is the Jon Gruden contract that the Raiders agreed to with the insane Mark Davis at the helm)?

WTF is an "amateur" system that tells athletes that they can't make money off of their own names and likenesses, which under virtually any other walk of life is something that only an employer can really tell you to do... yet they're somehow *not* employees?

WTF are we scared of the "big bad boosters from rich schools" supposedly dominating this new system when we have had essentially the *exact* same list of elite football programs for the past 50 years or more (with essentially only the Florida-based schools being added on over the past few decades)? Do we really think those elite programs have stayed on top for the past 50 years simply through good old fashioned clean competition devoid of money?

Believing that today's college sports system is anything other than a straight up professional system (much less "semi-pro") is the sports fan equivalent of still believing that Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny are real. "Amateur" college sports is a fiction of people's imaginations supported by a willful blindness to how things actually are today.

Agree, seriously nothing is going to change in the big scheme of things.

Players are still going to want to go to the teams that have the best coaches, facilities, and visibility. (Alabama, USC, Ohio State, Texas, Michigan, ND, etc.).

You may have a few more situations where guys like Ed Oliver choose to go to Houston. But is that really the end of the world? Ed Oliver still got an NFL contract. Who really cares of some rich dude in Houston bought him a car?

I just explained how this is patently FALSE. Not only will the money influence how recruiting goes for the 85 scholarship players on every roster---it will also undermine the 85 scholarship limit itself. Effectively, if there is unlimited booster money sloshing around, a school can offer 105 kids a free ride--not just 85. It wouldnt be an "official" scholarship---but its still a free education. There is no way to argue that is not a DRASTIC change in the current system.

And of course this is a trivial problem to solve. Hard cap roster size at 85 (or pick your favorite number). Next.

Why not just pay the players in a way that maintains the current competitive balance? Right now, everyone gets "0". Pick a percentage of revenue and have the players split it evenly. This third party mess is just a bad idea. If you want to avoid the employee relationship, maybe the money can be run through the NCAA.