Television and money perverted college football and basketball a generation ago. Coaches and administrators are making millions. The athletes are being compensated in a currency (a shot at a compromised education in their spare time) many of them don’t respect and haven’t been properly prepared to use. The NCAA takes most of the money generated by football and men’s basketball and invests it in welfare sports that don’t generate a dollar and are played mostly by kids who have nothing in common with the football and basketball players who produced the revenue.
Add in that we now have a far better understanding of the long-term health risks associated with playing football and it’s even more clear why these young people can’t resist taking what’s offered to them.
Reggie Bush is Kunta Kinte.
Doc:
Love Whitlock. Don’t agree this time. College athletes arent slaves, no matter their color. They are getting paid.
They are given a free education. How they use that priceless gift is on them. They are given a large stage on which to express their talents to those who would hire them. I wish I had the sort of platform a college football/b-ball player gets. Unfortunately, ESPN/ABC/CBS/Fox etc. don’t have College Journalism Day.
They’re not paid? They’re slaves? Tell that to the kid who takes 18 hours of classes, waits tables all weekend and still leaves school with $20,000 in loans.
Tell it to any kid who doesnt fly charter jets, stay in first-class hotels, have on-demand tutoring, just because he isnt an athlete.
Love me some Whitlock. He couldnt be more wrong in this case.
