“What you can’t have is a couple athletes on campus driving around in Ferraris while everybody else is basically having a hard time making ends meet.” That’s republican United States senator Mitt Romney decrying a free market economic model for college athletes. If “rich elitists in our suburbs” was substituted for “a couple of athletes […]
There is an old rule in the U.S. Senate – “Every reasonable thought must be answered by an idea inversely idiotic.” Senator Richard Burr (North Carolina) proves that axiom true with the tweet below: If college athletes are going to make money off their likenesses while in school, their scholarships should be treated like income. I’ll […]
Is Jim Harbaugh’s seat going to get hot as Michigan’s head coach if the Wolverines lose to Notre Dame tomorrow night at the Big House? Given the strange ideas kooky Michiganders have about their football program, it probably will, If the bigwigs in Ann Arbor are thinking clearly, they will realize Harbaugh has the program operating […]
The NCAA is getting some heat for not extending its rules and authority to include penalties for academic fraud. There is a good reason for this. Schools like North Carolina funneled athletes into classes that existed on paper only. Others have tutors complete assignments for athletes who excel on the court or field but struggle […]
University presidents screwed up as they refused to adjust to what is good and right in dealing with their athletes and the right to monetize their image. Now states like California are eager to force their hand. California’s SB 206, signed into law yesterday, seeks to correct the arrogance so pervasive in academia, where old and learned men […]
Universities making up the membership of the NCAA do not like change – especially when that change doesn’t stuff their coffers with cash. They turn downright petulant when the idea of athletes earning money is advanced. When bureaucrats and administrators get angry, they dash offs letters filled with cleverly worded threats and at least a dozen […]
Because the Old Oaken Bucket Game between Indiana and Purdue is played on the Saturday following Thanksgiving, both IU and Purdue students are home for the long weekend rather than in Bloomington and West Lafayette. That’s the argument for moving the Bucket Game from a rotating home and home series to Lucas Oil Stadium. If […]
Cleaning up college basketball is easy. But it requires a difficult decision, so it will never get done. As we learned (again) last week as Michael Avenatti’s lawyers filed briefs detailing Nike’s authorization to pay Zion Williamson $35,000 or more and $20,000 to Romeo Langford, shoe companies routinely pay families of athletes in an effort […]
College athletes should be allowed to transfer without penalty, but only at the end of a semester and season. If a student-athlete believes his or her needs are better served elsewhere regardless of rationale, there should be no impediment toward studying and competing at that university. I believe that because collegiate athletics should exist solely […]
Ohio State head football coach Urban Meyer was suspended yesterday for the first three games of the season as the result of a university investigation into his handling of a 2015 domestic violence complaint by the wife of an assistant coach. I get it. Domestic violence is a societal scourge, and its victims deserve our […]
