Dushawn Benjamin Professor Cameron Fundamentals of Speech

The NCAA Brothel
The NCAA Brothel

For many years, the NCAA college athlete organization has been a huge success with fans all over America. Millions of people attend big tournaments and exhibition games on the regular basis. Sports are no longer fun and games; it’s a business. Universities make an ample amount of money due to the praise college sports receive. Yes, some players on the team do go to school with a free scholarship, but is that it? People would be truly grateful to obtain a scholarship for an expensive university, but the situation that college athletes are in has to be examined closely. You can even compare the college athletes to your local prostitute. They are using their bodies for the income growth of huge universities, which will be the pimp. The school receives money from ticket sales, television contracts, sport-related merchandise, and many other sport-related revenue builders. The income that the universities obtain compared to what the athletes earn is nothing, a ratio of 1:0. Student athletes should be paid because they risk their health, it’s not fair financially, and it leads to students doing illegal acts. During the act of playing a competitive and physical sport, there are health risks that each player takes. Basketball players become injured all the time during playing their sport. Whether it’s an ACL tear, meniscus tear, broken ankle, there are all critical injuries that may jeopardize one’s career or pockets. The National Collegiate Athletic Association is very straight forward in terms of injury policies for athletes. According to Ramogi Huma, the head of the NCAA, “If you don’t lose a limb, or motion in one of your limbs, you wouldn’t be considered catastrophically injured.” This indicates that the NCAA has something to lose if they are this specific about covering injuries that occurs, which explains why the policy is so blunt and unreasonable. It does not take the lost of a limb for someone to physically be injured enough to not play games. Furthermore, the NCAA has its own injury insurance policy that consists of up to $20 million dollars for a individual athlete, but the majority of cases that occurs doesn’t make the cut. There can only be one reason for the NCAA’s harsh meaning of a injury: greed. The NCAA has a bunch of methods and loop holes to make sure they are a big business with the least amount of spending as possible. March Madness is a huge tournament that occurs every spring in which the NCAA upholds. There are more sales and viewers than ever that embrace the excitement of these great basketball games. The NCAA exceeds one billion dollars in profit this time around due to all the viewers, ticket buyers, and television contracts. Last spring, during March Madness 2013, Kevin Ware completely broke his leg in half in attempt to block a shot. It was devastating and everyone was worried. Kevin Ware played for Louisville, the most money contributive team in NCAA. They considered his injury catastrophic, so medical bills were covered. Kevin Ware’s injury may lead to him losing his sports scholarship. Because of his injury, he will not be able to play basketball in 18 months. That’s a year and a half, which exceeds NCAA season. If the coach can’t use him, will his scholarship be revoked? After all student athletes do for the university, I don’t think this option should exist. Students that are athletes should be paid already. They are exploited too much to not have enough money from the university in case they lose their scholarship. College students contribute to the university’s finance in so many ways. The students are the university’s weapon to gain finance for the most part. According to Penn State’s article discussing the issue, it states, “Every year, the NCAA makes millions of dollars off their student athletes. They sell their jerseys, their likeness, and their autographs with none of that money going to the players who are selling the product that is their college team’s position.” Colleges make millions and billions off of the exploitation of the students. People love to watch young adults strut their athletic talent, and watch them possibly grow into the professional league. It’s fascinating, but what about those student athletes who don’t make the very small cut amongst all the contenders. Not everyone that enters division 1 sports gets drafted into the NBA or other professional organizations overseas. A back up plan is essential, but it’s hard when you have to dedicate your life to the game; hence most people who obtain athletic scholarship plan on becoming a professional athlete. Those who don’t make it, do not end up in a good predicament most of the time. They don’t have money for the same level of education. This occurs while the NCAA makes $6 billion dollars annually. The organization is too wealthy to not pay the students who are practically putting their body on the line to feed themselves and the college, at least some money. The athletes are on national television putting them out there. Not only that, but students are even exposed on these NCAA video games. Before doing my research on this topic, I initially assumed that college athletes only get paid for school, and a portion of the money made from video games are evenly split. Learning that students don’t get paid is terrible. If students aren’t going to be paid for such exploitation, the college should not be as strict as they are when it comes to policies and money distribution. Most college athletes are broke, and they help the university gain a bunch of money. How college athletes are suppose to survive financially? College athletes will search for any way to gain finance they should’ve earned any way possible. This leads to gambling and game altering. According to NFL agent John Luchs, “70% of college athletes take bribes.” The college students being exploited are obviously famous. There are college sport fans and agents that contact, and bribe them. People would give an athlete a certain amount of money to help win, or possibly lose a game for money in return. There are games that occurred which was very close, but due to a $200,000 check from a agent or fans in a bet, an athlete is influenced to miss his free throws along with a game lost to obtain money. This only happens because the college athletes aren’t obtaining the money they deserve. If that wasn’t the case, none of these illegal acts would’ve happened. When students are caught doing such activity, it should be a wake-up call for the NCAA. In conclusion, student athletes should be paid. It’s not fair that people are breaking their bones, putting their education on the line, and their future all for free. It’s free and the university makes billions off of them. Students don’t have to be millionaires, but they should at least earn a sufficient amount of money to the point where tuition having to be paid in full isn’t a issue. In the end, student athletes deserve it.

SOURCES: http://www.usnews.com/debate-club/should-ncaa-athletes-be-paid http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2013/08/29/pay-college-athletes-theyre-already-paid-up-to-125000year/ http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1588301-theres-no-crying-in-college-the-case-against-paying-college-athletes http://blog.pennlive.com/pennstatefootball/2013/07/should_student_athletes_get_pa.html