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Topic: To quote REM :

Topic: To quote REM :

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rpbobcat
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To quote REM :

Posted: 5/3/2022 9:22:10 AM

"Its the end of the world as we know it".

There's an interesting article on SI.com about changes the NCAA "Transformation Committee" is considering in the post Emmert era.

Little to no restrictions on full scholarships for sports that now only offer partial scholarships.
No limit on coaches per team.
Changing the rules for schools making direct payment to athletes.
Overhauling the Transfer Portal.

http:/si.com/college/2022/04/27/ncaa-new-transformation-c...

Last Edited: 5/3/2022 9:32:47 AM by rpbobcat

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/3/2022 10:16:12 AM

This is long overdue.

The NCAA stuck their head in the sand for 20 years and ignored obvious legislative tailwinds. They could have pre-empted a lot of what's occurring now by controlling the concessions made, offering money directly to players, and instead insisted on their outdated notion of amateurism.

They made their bed here and now they're scrambling to understand the landscape their own inaction created.

BillyTheCat
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/3/2022 10:24:04 AM

Good article and timeline. Some will disagree, but anytime politicians get involved!

https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/31086019/e...

OhioCatFan
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/3/2022 1:28:20 PM

Though this is from several years ago, I think the concerns raised toward the end of the article about the possibility of athletic departments losing their tax-exempt status is probably even more of a concern now, if what rpbobcat has posted becomes reality. As I've said, we are falling down a rabbit hole. The only question is where is the bottom.

https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2018/02/12/impact-co...

Last Edited: 5/3/2022 1:29:24 PM by OhioCatFan

The only BLSS Certified Hypocrite on BA

"It is better to be an optimist and be proven a fool than to be a pessimist and be proven right."

Note: My avatar is the national colors of the 78th Ohio Veteran Volunteer Infantry, which are now preserved in a climate controlled vault at the Ohio History Connection. Learn more about the old 78th at: http://www.78ohio.org

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/3/2022 4:45:21 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

I don't follow the logic here regarding tax-exempt status being at risk.

There are hundreds of thousands of charitable institutions in the United States that pay employees salaries while still maintaining that status. It seems like a super simple solution to blend compensation to athletes between cash and tuition.

I think a better question is how the NCAA managed to get that designation to begin with. The notion that providing an athlete with an education is a charitable donation seems like a stretch to me. Are there a lot of charities that require the recipients of their donation to provide an unrelated service in exchange for said donation?

I mean, imagine if Goodwill started to insist that recipients of job training needed to play on their basketball team. Seems weird, right?

OhioCatFan
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/4/2022 12:14:03 AM

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

OhioCatFan wrote:

I see the analogy you are trying to make, but I don't think its probative. Goodwill has not traditionally fielded athletic teams, to my knowledge. Colleges have fielded athletic teams since at least the late 19th century. Historically these teams have been made up of students who were enrolled in the college. At some point colleges started to provide scholarships for these students to play their sport just the way they had previously provided scholarships for outstanding academic performance. This was not a pay-for-play proposition, but a general recognition of the value of athletics to personal development and to the advancement of the college's image, and potentially, as a recruitment tool for other non-athlete students. This appears to me to be a far cry from paying students directly for their level of athletic performance. Providing tuition, books, etc., for an athlete's education is completely different in scope and magnitude from the developing pay-for-play paradigm; it's simply providing the resources necessary to successfully complete a bachelor's degree.

I realize you have a completely different perspective on this issue and see what's now taking place as simply a continuum along an evolution to a more just distribution of wealth in the academy. I see it as a marked departure from what has previously transpired, and a movement that is filled with unintended consequences and that will prove very harmful to the future of higher education. Time will tell who is right and who is wrong.

Last Edited: 5/4/2022 12:24:01 PM by OhioCatFan

BSC 91
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/4/2022 12:33:40 PM

How did I forget our AD is co-chairperson of the Transformation Committee?

Pataskala
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/4/2022 1:57:34 PM

California has proposed legislation that would help athletics departments grudgingly keep their non-profit status. The bill would require that schools share a program's profits among the program's scholarship athletes. So if a football program makes $50 million and has $25 million in expenses, the 85 or so scholarship athletes in the program would share the other $25 million (about $300,000 per player). This would likely hurt the other programs that are money-losers because the football program profits are being used to prop them up, but it would force the athletics department to be a non-profit entity.

We will get by.
We will get by.
We will get by.
We will survive.

BillyTheCat
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/5/2022 9:33:22 AM

Pataskala wrote:

Would also more than likely violate Title IX of the 1972 Education Act, solely based on the fact that 99% of Athletic Departments receive some sort of federal funds in some manner (only 23 in the entire nation do not receive federal funds).

Last Edited: 5/5/2022 9:35:35 AM by BillyTheCat

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/7/2022 6:47:43 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

You say "time will tell who is right and who is wrong" as if our views here are somehow opposite. They aren't. Because I support changes to the NCAA doesn't mean I think those changes will necessarily be good for the NCAA. I don't care about the NCAA at all. They're a tier below the Olympics and FIFA in terms of terrible governing bodies, and I don't care much about what's in their best interest.

I suspect the NIL, new transfer rules, and player pay will ultimately be bad for the product the NCAA puts on the field/court. I just don't care, because I don't think it's the relevant concern when the status quo involves what I think are pretty obvious restrictions on basic freedoms. I like free markets, I think talented people should be able to earn money on their talents, and think it's patently absurd that an adult in America doesn't get to choose where they play basketball without incurring a penalty that no other student would incur.

I favor the NIL and new transfer rules because they seem like the right thing to do, and I care about that more than I care about the quality of the on-court/on-field product the NCAA puts out.

The NCAA had decades to address this. They failed to and instead insisted on trying to maintain a system that was implemented when college sports wasn't a business well after college sports became a business that generated billions in revenue. Hard for me to muster up much sympathy for an organization so poorly run.

As for the Goodwill bit, that was, admittedly, a throwaway comparison. But I think there's more to it than you realize. Goodwill offers job training services at its core; that's the "charitable donation" they make. They have employees that they pay, some of whom even participate in the job training. It doesn't strike me as any different if Ohio State pays a basketball player wages and "donates" an education. Universities have thousands of employees, many of whom have no connection to the core mission of the university, but who are still, as a perk of employment, given access to a free education. If an OU employee -- say a Director of Basketball Operations, or a Controller -- roles that are not academic in any way, wanted to take graduate courses nights, there's a very high probability chance they'd be able to do so free of charge.

Why is it different if the employee in question is playing basketball?

OhioCatFan
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/7/2022 11:49:51 PM

BLSS, I also don't care what happens to the NCAA. I gave a very short history of college atheltics in my previous reply, much of that occured way before anyone conceived of the NCAA. I wouldn't be upset if a whole new intercollegiate organizaiton sprung up in the ashes of the NCAA. Or, if all college teams switched to the NAIA, or if there ended up being no recognized collegiate sports ogranization. What bothers me, and not you, as best I can tell, is that ecucational pursuits are becoming even more secondary to athletics at the college level. If this professionalization of college athletics continues at the current pace, I for one will have less interest in following college sports. I'll just concentrate on the NFL and MLB (never could stand what passes for basketball at the NBA level). If I want pro sports, I want real pros, not pros who are making a pretence of being semi-amateurs in an educational institution. I suspect I'm not alone in these feelings. Are there enough folks who agree to make the whole system collapse? Probably not immediately, but over time, I would not be surprised.

BillyTheCat
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/8/2022 8:03:51 AM

You guys spend a lot of time commenting on something you do not care about.

And I find it personally amusing that you feel any replacement body of an organization that is governed by its members, will be replaced by something better that is still governed by it's members and forced to follow the same federal and state laws!

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/8/2022 8:52:43 AM

BillyTheCat wrote:

Where did I say I think a new governing body would be better?

You're assuming intent here. My intent isn't what's best for college athletics. As I stated, I think that's secondary to individual rights. I don't think a new governing body will be better. Maybe it will be, maybe it won't be. It's irrelevant to what I think here.

And I didn't say "I don't care about any of this" -- i said I don't care about the repurcussions on the NCAA given what I think is necessary here.

BillyTheCat
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/8/2022 10:08:35 AM

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

BillyTheCat wrote:

Where did I specifically attribute that to you BLSS? Don�t think I did, did I?

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/8/2022 11:28:40 AM

I assumed your saying "you guys" in reply to OCF and I's discussion implied the two of us. Especially given that we both, in our posts, stated that we don't care about the NCAA and your post started with a response to that idea.

BillyTheCat
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/8/2022 12:13:12 PM

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

Well that�s what happens when you assume. There are quite a few opinions on the NCAA and what they need to do. Yours is not unique. But again, was not directed to you individually

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/8/2022 4:09:12 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

What bothers me, and not you, as best I can tell, is that ecucational pursuits are becoming even more secondary to athletics at the college level.

I'm unbothered by it largely because "even more secondary" just reads as a degree of difference to me. The NCAA and Universities let that cat out of the bag a long time ago, and there's no putting it back in now. The 2019 College Admissions Scandal underscored just how much corruption there is. Academic requirements were waived for the rowing and sailing teams. Imagine how much weight they carry for basketball and football.

OhioCatFan wrote:

If this professionalization of college athletics continues at the current pace, I for one will have less interest in following college sports.

NCAA revenue exceeded $1 billion in 2021. Why is this the line in the sand for you, out of curiosity?

OhioCatFan wrote:

I'll just concentrate on the NFL and MLB (never could stand what passes for basketball at the NBA level). If I want pro sports, I want real pros, not pros who are making a pretence of being semi-amateurs in an educational institution. I suspect I'm not alone in these feelings. Are there enough folks who agree to make the whole system collapse? Probably not immediately, but over time, I would not be surprised.

I believe you think this -- but I also don't think that there's anything at all to suggest that it's "amateurism" that attracts people to Ohio sports. If it were, there's an easy solution: drop OU to D2 or D3. But fans of OU sports -- at least those on this board -- are almost universally opposed to that idea. Why? My sense of it is that what actually attracts people to college sports is pride in their alma mater, and sports provides a very clear expression of that pride, and people are inclined to want that to happen at the highest level possible.

The market just doesn't bear out that people care that much about the amateurism component of college sports. The best players nationally have skipped out on degrees in the NCAA's two biggest draw sports for decades now, and in that time NCAA revenue has increased consistently. The one and done era didn't put a dent in NCAA basketball interest.

But I'm supposed to believe that the line in the sand for consumers of college sports is money going directly to players? What's the rational explanation for why?

OhioCatFan
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/11/2022 10:38:07 AM

Here's a fairly balanced article about NIL It briefly touches on the aspect of fan interest, and how that might wane over time as a result of the repercussions of the new paradigm. I, personally, think that this issue is being undervalued currently in the NIL discussion, but it is being mentioned here and there.

https://tinyurl.com/ye26tpcv

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/11/2022 10:52:58 AM

OhioCatFan wrote:

It's really odd to see so many people make the argument that money and passion can't intersect. In what other realm of American society are so many people so insistent that earning money is morally impure? If Kirby Smart -- who makes $7.1 million dollars this year -- thinks players may lose their passion for the University of Georgia because of NIL money, isn't the logical conclusion to draw that Smart himself has no passion for the University of Georgia?

Or, and I'm just spitballing here, maybe participating in capitalism isn't fundamentally immoral and people are complex enough creatures that they can simultaneously weigh their financial interests against their passions? You know, like the entire labor market does every single day?

Just truly moralizing nonsense. The NCAA's propaganda has broken so many brains it's baffling.

Last Edited: 5/11/2022 10:55:47 AM by Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame

bobcatsquared
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/11/2022 11:52:05 AM

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

Just truly moralizing nonsense. The NCAA's propaganda has broken so many brains it's baffling.

And we're all grateful you have remained sane and capable of pointing out the errors of the rest of us ad nauseam.

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/11/2022 12:00:37 PM

bobcatsquared wrote:

And we're all grateful you have remained sane and capable of pointing out the errors of the rest of us ad nauseam.

Sorry that my post that wasn't directed to you and wasn't about you felt like a personal slight. I wonder what that means.

bobcatsquared
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/11/2022 12:52:25 PM

ad nauseam:

adverb

referring to something that has been done or repeated so often that it has become annoying or tiresome.

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/11/2022 1:06:47 PM

bobcatsquared wrote:

ad nauseam:

adverb

referring to something that has been done or repeated so often that it has become annoying or tiresome.

Anytime you want to engage on the substance, that's cool. But you're also welcome to just keep making little snide comments to avoid the fact that you can't actually argue with my logic.

Whatever you prefer. Either way, I'm very sorry for forcing you to interact with ideas you don't like. I know it's scary and emotional for you. Sorry, man!

Last Edited: 5/11/2022 1:09:02 PM by Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame

OhioCatFan
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/12/2022 10:46:48 AM

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

. . . If Kirby Smart -- who makes $7.1 million dollars this year -- thinks players may lose their passion for the University of Georgia because of NIL money, isn't the logical conclusion to draw that Smart himself has no passion for the University of Georgia?

I think most fans have come to accept the fact most head coaches and ADs are in it solely for the money and will jump to the next job for a raise of a million or two. So, Kirby Smart is probably only as loyal to Georgia as the money he makes. He'd probably go to rival Alabama, were a vacancy to occur, for a mere $9 million. What's new and upsetting to some of us who are not Adam Smith capitalists is that now the same seems to apply to what was once known as the student-athlete. I know you'll say that the evil NCAA invented that term, but it was at one time a fairly accurate description. It's now been replaced by the mercenary, semi-pro, athlete who has the same level of allegiance to his or her school as the head coach or AD. You see all of this as great progress and as a leveling of the playing field to a more equitable distribution of wealth. l see it as a further indication that our institutions of higher learning are taking on even more of a corporate versus an educational paradigm. To me this is not a healthy direction for our educational system.

[BTW: While I'm a social conservative, I'm probably an economic moderate. I just read a biography of Salmon P. Chase, and very much admire the clever way he financed the Civil War in part by printing money, the first legal tender in US history, and in part by war bonds. A true free market capitalist would have been appalled, as many were at the time, the way SPC purposely managed a level of inflation that was tolerable to the general public but at the same time allowed for a enough of an increase in the money supply to enhance the ability of the government to buy war supplies. He also proposed and got passed by Congress the first income tax.]

Last Edited: 5/12/2022 11:16:09 AM by OhioCatFan

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: To quote REM :

Posted: 5/12/2022 12:04:48 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

Agree completely here. In the context of you and I's conversation here, you posted an article that "briefly touches on the aspect of fan interest, and how that might wane over time as a result of the repercussions of the new paradigm."

To the extent the article did so, it was Kirby Smart flagging this concern. This, to me, is a good illustration of how the Supreme Court that can't agree on anything unanimously came down 9-0 on the NCAA. There's no other business model in the world that insists that a segment of it's "workforce" not earning wages is central to the business model itself.

People like Kirby Smart and yourself may well be right that fans will lose interest going forward. But that doesn't make the Supreme Court's assessment any less right, and it doesn't make the NCAA's model any less illegal. Given that, it's not really an option to just view this through lens of the impact on the "product" of college sports and consider the fan's perspective first.

OhioCatFan wrote:

What's new and upsetting to some of us who are not Adam Smith capitalists is that now the same seems to apply to what was once known as the student-athlete. I know you'll say that the evil NCAA invented that term, but it was at one time a fairly accurate description. It's now been replaced by the mercenary, semi-pro, athlete who has the same level of allegiance to his or her school as the head coach or AD.
You see all of this as great progress and as a leveling of the playing field to a more equitable distribution of wealth.

That's not exactly what I see. It's a small part of it.

I also see the weighted, biased language of "mercenary" with a lack of allegiance and it's very unclear to me how accurate that description is for a huge percentage of college athletes. It's also very unclear to me why that's bad and why there's so much negativity associated with a person who is doing what they think is necessary for them to be most successful. If a Physics major whose lifelong dream was to work for NASA felt like School A's Physics department wasn't up-to-snuff decided to transfer, would anybody hold it against them? I think NCAA athletes and decades of NCAA marketing has resulted in people applying a moral standard to athletes that nobody else really has to meet.

My sense of it is that this is almost purely an emotional issue for most folks and they're pretty irrational about it. I think people have (for obvious, valid reason) fond feelings for their alma mater, and project their own fond feelings for college onto athletes as a necessary standard they have to meet. They've created a convenient narrative around their own fandom that I think's quite detached from the reality of the last couple of decades, and seem to focus their ire on athletes when the narrative's not maintained. Despite a system that has been inconsistent with that narrative for a long, long time.

Practically speaking, all that's changed is that players have gained more freedom in the last couple of years due to transfer rule changes and the NIL. It's convenient to think that those things fundamentally changed athletes and turned them into "mercenaries", but the much more logical explanation is that nothing about the players' attitudes have changed, and the only change is to the system itself.

From a moral standpoint, I just don't see how one supports a system that's so restrictive. That 50% of scholarship basketball players are exploring the option of a transfer indicates that the demand was there, but the old system was too prohibitive. And that the old system only applies to scholarship athletes -- and not scholarship students -- just lays bare that academics never actually factored into the policy. It was a policy that existed to ensure the product of college sports remained strong because men's basketball/football are a cash cow for the NCAA.

OhioCatFan wrote:

l see it as a further indication that our institutions of higher learning are taking on even more of a corporate versus an educational paradigm. To me this is not a healthy direction for our educational system.

I share the concern. But I don't actually see the connection between a basketball player getting sponsorhip money, and what you're suggesting. The line was crossed long ago, by the institutions of higher learning themselves, and the behavior of college athletes seems such a minor consideration in the scheme of that concern that it doesn't even really register for me.

Last Edited: 5/12/2022 12:57:20 PM by Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame

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