Literature Review on "Reforms at Universities - Athletes Should Receive Compensation"

Literature Review 10 pages (3344 words) Sources: 10 Style: APA

[EXCERPT] . . . .

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That is a token approach to what the players truly want and believe they deserve. The players at Northwestern believe they should get paid for "…commercial sponsorships, jersey sales, and the use of their likeness in video games as well as financial coverage for sports-related medical expenses" (Geary, p. 1).

On the Subject of Coach's Paychecks and Potentially Paying Athletes

In a 2015 scholarly article published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives, the authors note that -- as mentioned earlier in this paper -- college coaches are reaping phenomenally lucrative contracts to lead student athletes in their games, and to lead universities to glory. It's a fact that higher institutes of learning are more apt to land huge sums of money from alumni -- and corporate sponsors -- if the schools' sports teams are big winners. Never mind the issue of paying athletes to bring glory to universities and bring untold riches to coaches.

Alabama football coach Nick Saban is mentioned in the first paragraph of the story titled "The Case for Paying College Athletes" (Sanderson, 2012). Saban earns "…over $7 million per year" at Alabama, the authors report, but there's another angle germane to the Saban story. The lure of big university money is at the heart of the reason that Saban left his NFL coaching job with the Miami Dolphins.

He waffled and lied repeatedly when journalists asked about rumors that he was quitting the NFL after one season with the Dolphins. "I'm not going to be the Alabama coach," Saban said several times in late 2006, before flying to Tuscaloosa, Alabama on January 2 to accept a $32 million dollar, eight-year contract, with huge bonuses built in for winning bowl games (Pasquarelli, p. 2).

Once he arrived in Tuscaloosa, in order to justify abandoning his contract in Miami, Saban said, "If I knew that my heart was someplace else in what I wanted to do, I don't think it would be fair to the [Dolphins] organization if I stayed" (Pasquarelli, p. 3). For Alabama Crimson Tide fans, Saban's a hero; for Miami Dolphin fans, he's a deserter.

Meantime, Sanderson and colleague explain that other college coaches are raking in enormous paychecks -- "the median head football coach among the 126 Football Bowl Subdivision institutions earned $1.9 million in 2013" -- but notwithstanding the avalanche of cash, the NCAA has "never been more vulnerable and on the defensive" regarding its policies, Sanderson writes (115). And among the key reasons the NCAA is indeed vulnerable is because it continues to rely on calling student athletes "amateurs"; the other glaring reason for the vulnerability of some colleges and universities is the scandals involving egregious violations of NCAA rules.

"Charges of illegal payments to players, academic fraud [fake courses and plagiarism as evidenced by the embarrassingly blatant 18-year scandal at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill] and gross improprieties involving faculty and university administrators, arguably in attempts to protect huge athletic revenue streams," have been seen recently at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Notre Dame, and Penn State, among others (Sanderson, 116). There has been a "growing unease" over what Sanderson calls the "distribution of largesse," due to the "recent explosion of revenues flowing to member institution" juxtaposed with what the writer calls "the pittance" that goes to the players (116).

Sanderson sites the huge jump in revenues that the NCAA has reaped from its annual "March Madness" basketball tournament. In 1984, CBS paid the NCAA $12 million to broadcast the games. In 2014, that figure skyrocketed to $800 million (Sanderson, 120). While large percentages of the public believe that the NCAA is a profitable organization, data presented by the NCAA however indicates "only 20 of the 126 Football Bowl Subdivision universities earned an operating surplus…" in 2013 (Sanderson, 120).

At the University of Texas, sports brought in $163 million (thanks to television contracts, ticket sales, merchandize) but the university only netted $20 million, Sanderson continues. One can wonder why a nonprofit institution netting $20 million couldn't share some of that revenue with the players who are the main attraction on the field of play.

Sanderson also points out that funds flow not just from sports profits to academics, but the other way as well. Research published in 2013 reflected in Sanderson's article show that, "…over $1 billion of student tuition and fees was transferred annually to athletic departments in NCAA Division 1" -- largely to support intercollegiate sports programs (120).

On page 122 Sanderson doesn't specifically mention the Saban issue, but he states that sports programs have taken on "…the characteristics of an arms race" as the more profitable athletic departments "bid aggressively for high-profile coaches." These athletic departments also spend big money to improve their facilities in an ongoing attempt to impress recruits to their programs; and so, the less profitable athletic departments have no choice but to "ratchet up their spending" lest they fall well behind in recruiting and ultimately success on the field of play. Hence, the reference to an arms race.

Unfairness in NCAA Disability Insurance

Quite apart from issues of direct compensation for athletes, there is the matter of insuring against injury while playing sports that are governed by the NCAA. Certainly every elite athlete in college who is talented enough and ambitious enough to potentially play professionally (whether football, basketball, hockey, baseball or other sports) -- especially at the Major League Baseball level or the NFL or NBA level -- knows that a catastrophic accident could occur. That accident could result in loss of opportunity to play professional sports, and a resulting loss of future earnings in that chosen sport.

An elite student athlete is very unlikely to have disability insurance coverage, and if that athlete's parents do have disability coverage it isn't likely that their policy would cover the athlete's lost income potential (Lens, et al., 2014). But a student athlete that has a very good chance of being drafted into the NFL or NBA, for example, and thus expects a very lucrative income, should by all means have insurance to cover losses in the event he does become disabled.

The NCAA's catastrophic injury insurance program -- for those who can afford it or are able to borrow the money -- only covers those who are "totally disabled"; Lens quotes the NCAA definition of "totally disabled," which is not available through public access but the author did obtain the details:

"The individual must have suffered the irrevocable loss of speech, hearing in both ears, sight in both eyes, use of both arms, use of both legs, use of one arm and one leg, or have severely diminished mental capacity due to brain stem or other neurological injury such that the person is unable to perform normal daily functions…and: a) for the period beginning on the date of the accident through the fourth anniversary, the inability to engage in substantially the same activities as the person engaged in immediately prior to the accident; and b) for the period thereafter, the inability to engage in any gainful occupation or employment for compensation or profit for which he or she may become reasonably fitted by education, training, or experience…"

Imagine the NCAA's bank of high-profile attorneys in a court of law going up against a former talented athlete that lost only one leg, not two, or only one eye, not two. Does that seem like the NCAA has really got the backs of the players that make schools and the NCAA so flush with cash?

Meanwhile, current NCAA rules make it tough for student-athletes to get the insurance; premiums are usually up to or over $10,000, and so a student athlete would in most cases need a loan. As for collateral, student athletes are not allowed under NCAA rules to use "future earnings capacity, perhaps their greatest asset, as collateral for a loan" (Lens, p. 7). While the NCAA allows for a student athlete to get total disability coverage, the NCAA does not offer "loss-of-value" insurance, which it should, according to Lens.

The reason why the NCAA should offer loss of value insurance is easy to see. Let's say a lauded, major university quarterback who will very likely go at the top of the first round of the draft, seriously injures a knee. That injury does not "trigger the coverage" (if the athlete has been able to afford the coverage); rather, it is triggered "…only if the student-athlete falls some amount in the draft because of the injury"; and falling dramatically in the draft because of an injury means the loss of millions in potential compensation (Lens, p. 6).

And who decides what that compensation would be? The NCAA will hire "draft experts" that will project where the player might have been drafted; and if that particular place in the first… READ MORE

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