$ NCAA Greed $

A few weeks ago reports surfaced about the NCAA looking to expand the men’s basketball tournament from 65 teams to 96 teams. Many of the coaches and administrators believe that this wouldn’t be a bad idea. The expansion would probably add only one more weekend to the tournament, which wouldn’t be taxing on the students. The fans, bar and restaurant owners would love it because it’s another weekend of March Madness to enjoy and make money from. But if you look closely, the making money part is the only part that the NCAA is concerned with as well. Don’t get me wrong, the NCAA is a business and they have every right to explore different avenue streams to bring more money into their business. Right now the NCAA has an 11-year, $6 billion contract with CBS to carry the tournament games, but they can opt out after this season. This is a huge contract, but if they find a network, say ESPN, who is willing to shell out more money and could accommodate showing an expanded 96-team tournament, then the NCAA will take that deal in a heartbeat. The problem I have though, is what about the STUDENT athletes? The NCAA has taken the student out of student athletes. If the NCAA wants to do that, then fine with me. But you need to pay them.


One of the major issues that the coaches and the university presidents are concerned with, is the fact that they have so many one and done athletes. Look at Kentucky standout John Wall. Everyone knows that he is leaving after this year and headed to the NBA. I don’t know his situation, but many of the student athletes leave early because they come from a poor background and need to leave to support their families. Many of those players leave and make millions of dollars. For some, it turns out to be the wrong decision and now they have no degree to fall back on (i.e. Marcus Taylor PG from Michigan State). I believe that with the $6 billion that the NCAA is receiving from CBS, they can afford to give these student athletes just a little bit of that money. Expanding the tournament will put even more money into the pot and ask the students to sacrifice more, but yet they get nothing from the NCAA.

Last May there was a lawsuit filed by former Arizona State QB Sam Keller against the NCAA and EA Sports regarding the NCAA’s use of student athletes’ likenesses in EA Sports video games. (Here’s the link to that story). In this lawsuit the NCAA is being accused of violating their own rules of amateurism, selling the rights to the players that they're supposed to protect. The NCAA makes millions every year from these games. They make money from showing player highlights and using those highlights to promote March Madness, the BCS, the College World Series, and all other major championship tournaments. The NCAA is making big time dollars from these students but the students are not seeing a dime of that money.

When a player stays, then everyone is surprised because of all the money their giving up by staying in college. Just last year, we were all surprised when highly touted QB Sam Bradford decided to stay in college, giving up $40 million in guaranteed money. It was great for college football but bad for him, he got hurt this season. On the otherhand, once a highly touted highly recruited freshman leaves to go pro, then the debate starts up again about the one and done rule. Just last year Pete Carroll got upset because QB Mark Sanchez chose to make money and leave for the NFL. Then Carroll turned around the next year and leaves his students behind because he wanted to make more money. There’s a double standard. A player might not have to leave 2 years early if the NCAA wasn’t so greedy. Give these students just a little bit of that $6 billion and I guarantee you that the number of student atheletes leaving early would drop and the number of university violations would go down as well. I dare the NCAA to try it and see.