Should College Athletes Get Paid?

The question of whether or not college athletes should get paid is of heated debate in todays times. While many believe that student athletes are entitled to income, It remains undougtibly a concern of moral interest to universities across the country. This paper is going to explain the pros and cons that come with allowing student athletes the right to receive a salary. Should college athletes be paid? Let’s take a quick glance at the pros and cons of each perspective. For starters, in my opinion, yes, college athletes should get paid. What deserves debate, is the conversation of how to get this done.From my experience, in America, you get paid in proportion to the value you bring to the marketplace. College sports is one, if not the only, place where this isn’t the case. it’s only a matter of time before players start getting more than â€Å"a free education. † There are plenty of cons that come with paying students to play sports. According to Title IX, a federally-mandated law, if conferences and schools decide to increase the value of student-athlete scholarships to cover living expenses, they have to do it for women’s programs as well.This means that schools would have to, for example, increase the value of womens volleyball and softball scholarships as well. Schools have to stay in-accordance with Title IX, otherwise they’re risking their federal funding. And you know they’re not trying to lose out on any money. Another argument as to why schools should not allow student athletes to get paid is the fact that small schools would be at a disadvantage. How would the smaller schools and conferences afford this? The bigger conferences make way more money than the smaller conferences through their huge tv deals.So unless the Big Ten’s, and SEC’s of the world agree to donate revenue to conferences that make afraction of what they make, (think MAC and Mountain West conferences), wouldn’t this create an even wider gap recruiting-wise between the powerhouse conferences and the smaller conferences? ask yourself; if you were to choose between playing football for a small school, and a big school that’s legally giving you $5,000 in living expenses, which would you choose? Most college athletic programs are already losing money, so how could they afford to all male and female athletic programs, to cover for the athlete’s living expenses?Another concern to paying student athletes is the question of whether to pay athletes of all sports? Let’s be real here; men’s football and basketball teams are usually the programs that make the most money for universities, so if football players and basketball players got paid, does that mean that the men’s lacrosse and baseball players would get paid too? Most schools would not have the findings to financially pay athletes of the fur major sports in the united states. Finally players are still going to take under the table money.In my opinion, increasing scholarship amounts to cover living expenses may keep some of the kids from accepting money, but it’s not going to keep them all from doing it. I don’t think kids getting an extra $5,000 or so from their Universities wouldn’t keep the agents, boosters, etc. , from offering them cash and benefits. But I must admit, it’s definitely a step that I believe would at least keep some of the kids from accepting benefits; those that only take the money because of their circumstances or lack of cash for living expenses.There are plenty of beliefs, which justify paying student athletes. Jim Tressel gets paid close to $1 million a year for trying to win as many football games as possible. His players, however, earn no salary for doing the same thing. Although college athletes do get rewarded with scholarship money, there is a debate around the country as to whether that amount is enough compensation for all the work req uired of student athletes each year. Several Ohio State coaches were recently asked if they thought college athletes should be paid a salary, and their responses varied. I believe there is a big difference between paper money and real money, and the scholarships these kids get are only paper money,† said basketball coach Jim O’Brien. â€Å"They need to have some real money to walk around with that they can live off of. † Student athletes are not allowed to work much under NCAA regulations, and those who are in favor of paying them often point to that rule as a reason college athletes need money. But that reason isn’t enough for all coaches to share O’Brien’s views toward paying student athletes.Wrestling coach Russ Hellickson answered the same question: Should student athletes be paid? He came up with a very different response. â€Å"No, but they should be able to get what, say, a Presidential Scholar gets,† he said in an e-mail. †Å"This should be an educational experience. † Presidential Scholars receive full in-state tuition, room and board, book allowances and miscellaneous expenses — a total that OSU media relations estimates to be $12,483 per year for in-state students. That is nearly $2,000 more than an in-state athlete receives, even if they are awarded a full scholarship.Most of that $2,000 falls under the category of miscellaneous expenses, something athletes do not receive money for. The extra scholarship money is to be used for â€Å"athletic tickets, book costs, bus passes; anything that students need for living,† said Amy Murray, OSU spokeswoman. Some coaches are in favor of keeping things exactly as they are, without raising scholarship levels. Softball coach Linda Kalafatis said she did not feel well versed enough in the topic to know an answer to the question for sure, but she weighed in with her opinion on whether or not college athletes should get more for what they do.So ftball coach Linda Kalafatis said she did not feel well versed enough in the topic to know an answer to the question for sure, but she weighed in with her opinion on whether or not college athletes should get more for what they do. â€Å"There are some good arguments out there for it, but I am against it,† she said. â€Å"The fact that our kids get scholarship opportunities and good exposure makes the experience good. One of the issues that may be a problem with paying college athletes is the difference in revenue that each sport brings in through television contracts and other sources.At OSU, football and basketball both bring in a large amount of money for the university every year, so some may argue that they deserve a percentage of that. But do football and basketball players deserve more than athletes who participate in non-revenue sports? Some coaches chose not to comment on the issue because it is a delicate subject. Those who did respond felt strongly towards equalit y. â€Å"If money is given, all tendered athletes should be the same,† Hellickson said. â€Å"This isn’t and shouldn’t be the pros. We have more class. Athletics Director Andy Geiger agreed, saying if a compensation plan ever went into effect, it would have to be equal for everybody. That’s the only way it works,† he said. â€Å"It would not work, for instance, if only football and basketball players were paid. † Title IX calls for scholarship equality in college athletics, so if pay ever was given to student athletes, all sports would probably receive the same amount. The plan that is the most likely to take place in the next few years is the one Geiger mentioned during his recent interview.I wouldn’t mind seeing a liberalization of the financial aid rules to allow athletic grants and aid to move closer to the cost of education,† he said. â€Å"As far as players actually getting salaries — no. † Staying away from salaries for college athletes was the consensus of all coaches who chose to comment on the issue. â€Å"I’m not in favor of salaries, but some sort of stipend would be beneficial,† O’Brien said. When asked how much of a stipend he would like to see, O’Brien said that was something he did not know the answer to yet.He said it would have to be discussed at great length before he reached a decision. Another topic that is worth considering when deciding whether or not to pay student athletes is the fact that not all university sports programs earn as much as OSU’s. Equality is the key factor in this issue as well. Should a college with high-revenue programs, like OSU, be able to pay more than smaller Division I colleges? Under Title IX, the answer has to be no. â€Å"Since athletic budgets around the country aren’t all in as good shape as ours, I don’t really know how realistic a plan this is,† Kalafatis said.O’Brien said he agreed. â€Å"When you start talking about every sport at every college across the country, that’s a lot of money. Every sport would need to receive the same amount, so right now this is not too realistic of an option. † Hellickson thinks differently about the realism of the plan. Unfortunately, it will probably be driven through in the next five years by those who believe athletics is more important than education, With the popularity of sports nowadays, leagues are making more money than ever before.The universities are raking in the dough from these humongous television contracts, and the coaches and everybody else are seeing their fair share. † he said. Everybody waits in line for their piece of the pie, yet, the ones who make the system work are the ones who don't even get to taste the crumbs that have fallen onto the table. In fact, while everyone is going up for seconds, the athletes don't even get invited to the dinner table. I think we can all agree tha t collegiate sports is no longer an amateur enterprise, and I am not going to argue that fact with you.We can save that for a different time and different day of the week. Like everything in life, paying collegiate athletes has its pros and cons, but it would certainly save the sport of college basketball if some type of payment plan was installed. College basketball is by far a smaller market than college football is. I would say that more than half of the people that fill out the March Madness brackets don't even pay attention to the season until the month of February rolls around. And there are certainly reasons for that.One is that the sport has to compete with college football and the NFL until late January, and another is that the sport is slowly but surely suffering a slow death. I can't tell you how many times I have watched the â€Å"Fab Five† documentary on ESPN. I have watched it more than Seinfeld reruns, not because of everything they did for the game or because it was a great piece to keep you occupied when you have two hours to kill, but because I am wondering when or if we will ever see a team like that again.That squad was put together during the 1991 season, and all five of those players played at least two seasons. Four of the five stayed till their junior years, while two of the Fab Five played out their entire years of eligibility in a Michigan uniform. Nowadays, teams do land several of the most talented players in the country, but they end up leaving after one season. Even if the player is still raw at the position, needs to add on weight or could use another year to tweak his game, he is still off to the next level the second he hears he is first-round material and is guaranteed an NBA contract.Having players stay for more than one year would help create greater teams, as those programs would be able to add to the current talent rather than just replacing it. When you think of the greatest teams in college basketball, you think o f teams that were likely formed before you were even born. That's because the NBA wasn't handing out ridiculously large sums of money to these athletes and making it such an easy choice to leave college. It would also help even out the recruiting process, giving some of these other teams a better shot at competing for a national championship.The players that are going to be one-and-done only want to play for the best of the best schools, so they choose Duke, Kentucky, Syracuse and North Carolina because it gives them the best chance to win a title in the one season they are on campus. Well, if players were being paid, it would certainly help create a little more of an even playing field. If that player was going to stay in school a little bit longer, why wouldn't he think about staying close to home or joining a school with a little less talent where he can become the star rather than joining a team already stacked with 5-star recruits?Wouldn't college basketball be a lot more inter esting if it had many of the same players every year rather than having to get to know an entire roster every season? You thought Kentucky was good last season? Imagine if Brandon Knight and DeAndre Liggins had decided to stay for another season and had been a part of that championship roster. There is a reason that teams such as Harvard, Wichita State and Murray State are making noise lately, and it has a lot to do with experience on the roster.