NCAA Players Need to be Paid to Play an Editorial

This week, Todd Gurley, a Junior running back and possible Heisman trophy winner in 2014,  of the Georgia Bulldogs was suspended from the football team and is under investigation by the NCAA for selling his autograph. Gurley faces the real possibility that he will not play the remainder of the year for Georgia and could lose his scholarship.

The University of Georgia, as is required by NCAA rules, suspended Gurley when they became aware of the allegations.

Gurley is accused of being paid $400 to sign 80 items for Bryan Allen an Atlanta sports memorabilia dealer, on campus, in early spring. Doing the math, that works out to $5 per item. Supposedly there are photos and video of the signings, although none have surfaced yet.

Rules are rules and Gurley should have known better, if what is alledged is true, but this problem did not start with Todd Gurley nor will this be the end of it.

It is time that the NCAA realizes that athletes at big time universities are treated like chattel.

The arguments that the schools, and the NCAA, use to justify this indentured servitude are simple. They feel that a 4 year scholarship to a university, worth in the neighborhood of $200,000, over 4 years is sufficient payment for services. The second argument is that, starting this year, the athlete can earn up to $2,000 per academic year at employment on or off campus not associated with the athletic department. A final argument is that schools can't afford to pay their athletes.

To counter those arguments I would argue that sports scholarships are not guaranteed, by most universities, for 4 years but are on a yearly basis and can be revoked for many reasons both academic and non-academic. There are some universities that have started to guarantee those scholarships but not nearly enough. Given that the academic year, in most cases, runs from September through May, a 9 month period, that $2,000 earned works out to $222 a month.

These are the arguments put forth by the colleges/universities and the NCAA as to why they can't afford any changes to the current rules and regulations put forth by the NCAA and approved by the Deans of member colleges/universities.

Here are the reasons I have for a change in idea at the NCAA level.

Schools make millions of dollars off of these athletes. Here is a list of ways in which the schools and the NCAA make that money:

1.  Ticket sales to athletic events
2.  Concessions and Parking at those events
3.  Visiting team remuneration packages (The University of Idaho was to be paid $900,000 dolllars for their trip to play the University of Florida)
4.  Conference TV money (ESPN paid the SEC 2.25 billion dollars to broadcast their games through the 2026-2027 seasons. That's $150,000,000 per year for the SEC which works out to $10,700,000 per year/per school)
5. Local TV/Radio Money (considerably less than TV money, but income none the less)
6. Stadium advertising money
7. Bowl game revenue (if selected for bowl games, all revenue generated by teams in the conferenece is divided among all conference teams)
8. Jersey and sports memorabilia sales (University and the NCAA split this revenue)
9. Alumni giving to sports departments
10. Video game revenue (note lawsuits by former players over lost revenue)
11. Nike Sponsorship

Students who receive non sports scholarships are not limited as to the amount of time they can spend at employment. They can earn as much as they need to in order to pay for incidentals while attending college.

What Todd Gurley did was against the NCAA rules. He knew, or should have known, that what he was doing was against those rules. His suspension by the University of Georgia was done in accordance with those same rules governing universities and self reporting.

But Georgia will play football this weekend. They will travel to Columbia, Missouri to take on the Tigers in a game with SEC West Division implications. Todd Gurley will remain in Georgia while the University of Georgia and the NCAA decide his fate.

The NCAA must rethink it's rules on paying players to play. I remember when Title IX was going to absolutely ruin college sports. Has that happened? No. The universities were required to rethink their positions and make college athletics fair to all. Coming up with a fair way to pay players so that they don't feel the need to break the rules will not ruin college sports either.

There are now allegations (10/13/14) that 2014 Heisnan Trophy winner Jameis Winston has had over 100 signatures authenticated by the same firm that authenticated those signatures of Todd Gurley. When asked, Florida State Head Coach, Jimbo Fisher had this to say, "I asked Jameis if he took money for signing those autographs...he told me no."

There you have it folks, in the SEC the player is suspended right away. In the ACC, and the #2 Seminoles, the player said he didn't get any money so...nothing to see here...move along.