The world of collegiate athletics used to be a great thing.
For some, Saturday’s are even better than Sunday’s and for those same fans there’s nothing better than watching your favorite school make a run through the NCAA Tournament.
However all of that could one day change and it could change very soon as the world of amateurism could be dying a slow and painful death.
We have already seen members of the Northwestern football program attempt to unionize, but the NCAA is facing a battle for their lives as they are currently in court with former UCLA forward Ed O’Bannon.
Some call it the sports trial of the century as the battle to give top football and basketball players a cut of the billions of dollars flowing into college athletics will resume next week for its second week of trial.
Whether or not you believe that collegiate athletes should be paid really isn’t the issue here, it is more of an issue of how the NCAA can survive if all of this goes against them.
Hours before the O’Bannon trial began on Monday, the NCAA announced that it had reached a $20 million settlement to settle another suit, this one filed by former Arizona State and Nebraska quarterback Sam Keller.
That was set to go to trial next March.
That settlement came a little more than a week after Electronic Arts agreed to a $40 million settlement of similar allegations.
Now this all seems like a simple solution of the NCCA not allowing athlete’s likeness to appear on video games, but their problems run much deeper than that.
More lawsuits will pop up. You can count on that.
The playing field has changed and the NCAA is on the wrong side of things.
CBS and Turner are paying the NCAA an average of more than $770 million per year to televise the men’s basketball tournament, some schools are making millions more per year from their own television deals and the BCS has paid out in excess of $175 million per year.
Past and present collegiate athletes see this, see themselves on television, and they are going to continue to want a bigger piece of the pie.
The O’Bannon trial is different as he is seeking fundamental change to NCAA amateurism rules so that current and former Division I football and men’s basketball players can negotiate deals for their names, images and likenesses to appear on television, video games, etc.
If things don’t go the way of the NCAA here, amateurism could soon be a thing of the past.
As much as I love collegiate sports, I always thought of the NCAA as a corrupt organization.
For the last decade plus, the NCAA’s reputation has been at an all-time low and now they find themselves under siege.
Those people pushing for NCAA athletes to either be paid, basically treated as employees, or receive a bigger piece of the pie can look no further than Dr. Mark A. Emmert, the president of the NCAA.
Those can point to the fact that he makes nearly $2 million a year, has a private jet and a Porsche.
That could simply be jealousy for some, but those who hate the NCAA look at a guy like Emmert as a guy who has prospered off the backs of free labor. Emmert isn’t the only one as almost NCAA executive and coach can be looked at it the same light.
Dr. Emmert is tasked with leading the defense against the attacks on the NCAA’s amateurism model, efforts that Dr. Emmert said could lead to the “end of college sports as we know it.”
Whether or not O’Bannon wins his lawsuit or not, eventually things are going to change and the NCAA will have to pay their athletes for simply having them on television.
That won’t happen anytime soon as if the NCAA loses you can bet things will end up in Supreme Court. But eventually things will change and amateurism will sadly die.
The day is coming, it is just a matter of how long it takes to get there.
The popularity of college sports would suffer if athletes receive money to play because most fans enjoy the concept of young people playing sports for the love of the game.
If things come to a pay-for-play model, things will also go south as conferences and schools will try and spend whatever is needed to attract the best football and basketball players.
That is something that the NCAA won’t be able to control.
If the NCAA loses this battle, there very well could be no more NCAA.
There is too much money involved for college sports to be eliminated completely but this decision will be a determining factor in whether college sports will ever continue to be organized the way they are now.
For an organization that preys on institutions and hands out death penalties while turning a blind eye to other major infractions at other programs across the nation, the NCAA very well could be handing itself its own death penalty.
Photo Credit: ESPN
