The NCAA made the sports headlines on Tuesday in the only manner that it knows how. Another scandal. To be fair and accurate, the NCAA is not the one being charged by Joon H. Kim, the U.S. Attorney for the southern District of New York. The federal corruption charges are against four assistant basketball coaches from Auburn, Oklahoma State, Arizona, and USC along with sponsor executive, agents, and others. Ten personal at the moment are the ones facing the charges. There could be more given that the public conference that was held on Tuesday gave out a number for any one with additional information to call for this ongoing investigation. The NCAA may not be facing charges at the moment, but it doesn't exonerate the organization at all. It should not be a surprise to anyone that the NCAA is once again intertwined in a scandal. Most of the time the NCAA is the one that creates the scandals by coming out to state a punishment for a student or a school's athletic team for violating a NCAA rule. Which then causes a controversy in itself as no one seems to grasp whether the sports college governing body was punishing a school or student for actually breaking the rules or they were simply covering up for themselves. That isn't to say one doesn't have an accurate sense on what the NCAA does, but one should give credit to the NCAA for its ambiguity and complexity shields it from being struck down by anyone with authority. Yet, there is hope. This time the feds are involved and the NCAA may not be formally charged, but the organization is going to be forced into restructuring the college sports landscape if it wants to survive.
Andy Staples who writes for Sports Illustrated composed a plan on rewriting the NCAA rulebook. Which I agree with so much that if he were campaigning to be the next NCAA president (no one can run, it's not a democracy) I would wholeheartedly endorse Mr. Staples. However, as brilliant as that new rulebook may be, I find it difficult for the NCAA to ever move into a direction where it legislates themselves be that honest and transparent. I am not going to mock or expose the NCAA on their silly, laughable and ridiculous comments like "student-athlete" or their take on "amateurism." I will save that for a more opportunistic time later. In fact, I want to help the NCAA today. My heart is very generous on this lovely Friday.
My plan is simple. Extend athlete scholarships beyond their playing years. One of the many excuses the NCAA gives to the media is that these "student-athletes" don't get paid with money due to the fact that they are being paid in the best possible currency in America. The athlete will receive a quality college education. A college education is a valuable and instrumental tool to have in this country. Statistics show that those who have gone on to earn a college degree do a lot better than those who don't. A college education isn't cheap and extremely competitive to get in most schools. So being able to attend a prestigious college with an athletic scholarship seems upfront a great offer. However, college sports such as football and basketball have a very busy schedule that involves a lot of traveling across the nation to participate in their sport. This becomes a problem because football and basketball college teams tend to replicate professional sports teams when it comes to travel and game schedules. The NCAA brags about how most of their college athletes graduate at a high percentage rate, which is true. But, football and basketball players have very low graduation rates. One could argue that one of the factors for a low graduation rate in those two sports is effected by declaring for the draft. In football an athlete has to play a minimal of 3 years before declaring for the NFL draft in contrast to those in basketball, who only need to play in one year of college basketball to be eligible for the NBA draft. Yet, declaring for the draft shouldn't have an effect, if any at all, due to the very, very, very, low numbers on how many college athletes get drafted in their respected sport.
The extension for athletic scholarships should apply to all college athletes. Based on NCAA statistics the only athletes that would benefit the most from this new rule would be basketball and football athletes. For example, lets take player A, who plays football in college D1 school program. Player A played 4 years for the school, he declared for the draft his third and fourth year, but was not selected in either year. Player A will have the option to activate a clause that will be on his fourth year scholarship contract -since scholarships are year to year not "full rides"- to extend his scholarship for an extra school year in which the player will no longer be eligible to play, but have an entire academic school year to earn their college degree. I understand that some of the backlash will be that why should a scholarship be given to an athlete who can't play and technically isn't that an academic scholarship? To answer the first part, the scholarship is from playing their fourth year that has a clause to extend it for academic purposes. That way it won't count against the amount of scholarships a school has to offer new recruits and the player has an advantageous opportunity to earn their degree. And no, technically it will not be an academic scholarship because the money to support the college athlete will come from the school's college athletic department. I would add that any person who still have an issue and state something along the lines of "Why would a school or an athletic department support an athlete for a whole academic year?" Well mister (most likely an older white male who enjoys the way things are and doesn't want them to change), college sports collects millions, if not billions, of dollars due to T.V. broadcasting contract with giant television networks. Schools and athletic departments have the money to offer to help out the "student-athletes" they publicizing enjoy announcing that they help them receive a college education. The NCAA can finally have some merit when they state "student-athlete" and offer a valuable college education if they implement this new rule.
I am aware that this one new rule may not be enough to change the scandalous atmosphere that surrounds the NCAA and I agree. I really prefer Staple's idea. However, this is a rule that could be implemented ,with a few regulation changes, by the NCAA and Universities in the following year. This rule is for the benefit of the college athlete. The intended target of this new rule is to eliminate those "paper-weight" courses and allow for the college athlete to experience the student aspect of there "student-athlete" life.
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