One of the hot topics right now in sports is whether college athletes should get paid or not. At one point in time, I though they should for many of the reasons that you hear. However, I have done a complete 180 and strongly feel that college athletes should not get paid.
Why?
First, they already get paid. They get paid in the form of college scholarships. A lot of times these scholarships are full rides to school meaning that they don’t need to apply for financial aid, they don’t have to get part time jobs, they don’t have to apply for scholarships. They are getting everything paid for. And once they graduate, they will have no debt to pay off unlike the majority of college graduates. I realize that most college athletes don’t go on to play professional sports so it’s unfair to say that they have millions of dollars waiting for them after college, but what these student athletes do have that many of us don’t is a balance of zero in the area of college loan debt which puts them far ahead of most of us.
Second, I don’t buy in to the fact that these colleges are making money off their star athletes. It’s true that last year college football fans went to see the likes of Colt McCoy, Tim Tebow and Sam Bradford (before he was hurt) and that fans were buying these jerseys by the thousands. However, that does not mean that these players should be making money off of this. That money is going right back into the schools so that they can provide the best equipment, stadiums, workout facilities and all the other incentives that lured these players into playing at these schools. It’s not like these colleges have endless sources of income (like the New York Yankees). In this case you can use the saying that these players are going to make millions of dollars someday. This is their way of giving back to the school that is giving them a chance to prove their talents and abilities.
Third, and this argument may be a little weak, but I think it has some validity. I was recruited by UW-Eau Claire to play trombone. I was given a scholarship for both my academic achievements and my trombone playing ability. Throughout my career as a student at UWEC, I performed concerts, did recording sessions, toured many different high schools and communities and assisted with various events to help university recruitment. At no time was I paid for any of these situations nor should I have been. All these experiences helped build me into the type of person who was qualified to become a music teacher and a performer. The same could be said for somebody who becomes a math major and presents at conferences, competes in academic competitions and assists staff in recruitment. I realize that these comparisons may not be fair since neither bring in anywhere close to the amount of money that college football does. However, it is the same because college is a training ground for life, not an employment opportunity.
Finally, how is paying players going to solve the problem? No matter how much you pay them, they will want more and agents and runners for agents will continue to tempt them with more. I don’t see how any good can come from paying collegiate student athletes.
www.songerstudio.com
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Monday, July 5, 2010
Bucks Free Agency Update
You wouldn’t know from watching ESPN that it is baseball season right now or that the World Cup and Wimbleton have been going on. All you hear about right now is NBA free agency. Every other story is on LeBron James, Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh amongst others.
Although it was my Bucks fan dream for Milwaukee to sign Dwayne Wade, I knew that it wasn’t going to happen. What the Bucks have done instead is what I think is the second best approach they could take. They have taken advantage of teams trying to clear salary cap space to sign these NBA divas and obtained decent players for reasonable (by NBA terms) wages. These moves are not going to lead the Bucks to a championship in and of themselves but it should keep them in the playoff hunt for the next couple years.
In the past couple weeks, the Bucks have signed veteran Corey Maggette from Golden State, the young and upcoming Chris Douglas-Roberts from New Jersey, the well-travelled Drew Gooden from the Clippers and their own free agent John Salmons who almost single handedly led the Bucks to the playoffs last spring.
When you look at these names, nothing jumps out at you too much but I think the Bucks have made a huge upgrade to their roster. Maggette had one of the best years of his 11-year career last year with the Warriors. His role will most likely be to back up Salmons. In order to obtain Maggette, the Bucks dealt Charlie Bell and Dan Gadzuric. Both players although serviceable and talented have shown in their fairly lengthy tenures with the Bucks that they weren’t going to help get this team very far, even as role players. And Gadzuric especially was taking up a lot of salary space. In some ways, I look at the subtraction of Bell and Gadzuric being even more important than the addition of Maggette.
Chris Douglas-Roberts was a gift from the Nets. He showed great potential last year with a terrible team. He ended up not playing much the second half of the season after a change in coaches and philosophies. He will back up Carlos Delfino and probably get plenty of playing time especially if he can adopt Scott Skiles’ approach of tenacious defense.
The Drew Gooden acquisition doesn’t impress me as much. However, they are not paying him as much as some other teams have spent on average big men. Gooden will likely start next to Andrew Bogut. And if he can conjure up the way he played in Cleveland a couple years ago when he played power forward along side a top-notch NBA center, this could be a good move for Milwaukee. When you also consider that the Bucks also have three other guys who can play power forward/center (and maybe four if they keep Kurt Thomas), they should be very strong inside both offensively and defensively.
So this is the deepest the Bucks roster has been in many many years. They should be able to go 10 or 11 deep easily. They will need that without a superstar. That is what frustrates me most though is that we don’t have a superstar. The teams that win NBA titles, have superstars. What the Bucks are banking on is that Brandon Jennings, Andrew Bogut and possibly John Salmons can become superstar level players. If that happens, then the Bucks go from a 5-8 seed in the playoffs to a contender.
We’ll see. Regardless, though it is pleasant talking about a team that should make the playoffs instead of debating what lottery pick they will get next year. The Bucks are finally back into the conversation.
Although it was my Bucks fan dream for Milwaukee to sign Dwayne Wade, I knew that it wasn’t going to happen. What the Bucks have done instead is what I think is the second best approach they could take. They have taken advantage of teams trying to clear salary cap space to sign these NBA divas and obtained decent players for reasonable (by NBA terms) wages. These moves are not going to lead the Bucks to a championship in and of themselves but it should keep them in the playoff hunt for the next couple years.
In the past couple weeks, the Bucks have signed veteran Corey Maggette from Golden State, the young and upcoming Chris Douglas-Roberts from New Jersey, the well-travelled Drew Gooden from the Clippers and their own free agent John Salmons who almost single handedly led the Bucks to the playoffs last spring.
When you look at these names, nothing jumps out at you too much but I think the Bucks have made a huge upgrade to their roster. Maggette had one of the best years of his 11-year career last year with the Warriors. His role will most likely be to back up Salmons. In order to obtain Maggette, the Bucks dealt Charlie Bell and Dan Gadzuric. Both players although serviceable and talented have shown in their fairly lengthy tenures with the Bucks that they weren’t going to help get this team very far, even as role players. And Gadzuric especially was taking up a lot of salary space. In some ways, I look at the subtraction of Bell and Gadzuric being even more important than the addition of Maggette.
Chris Douglas-Roberts was a gift from the Nets. He showed great potential last year with a terrible team. He ended up not playing much the second half of the season after a change in coaches and philosophies. He will back up Carlos Delfino and probably get plenty of playing time especially if he can adopt Scott Skiles’ approach of tenacious defense.
The Drew Gooden acquisition doesn’t impress me as much. However, they are not paying him as much as some other teams have spent on average big men. Gooden will likely start next to Andrew Bogut. And if he can conjure up the way he played in Cleveland a couple years ago when he played power forward along side a top-notch NBA center, this could be a good move for Milwaukee. When you also consider that the Bucks also have three other guys who can play power forward/center (and maybe four if they keep Kurt Thomas), they should be very strong inside both offensively and defensively.
So this is the deepest the Bucks roster has been in many many years. They should be able to go 10 or 11 deep easily. They will need that without a superstar. That is what frustrates me most though is that we don’t have a superstar. The teams that win NBA titles, have superstars. What the Bucks are banking on is that Brandon Jennings, Andrew Bogut and possibly John Salmons can become superstar level players. If that happens, then the Bucks go from a 5-8 seed in the playoffs to a contender.
We’ll see. Regardless, though it is pleasant talking about a team that should make the playoffs instead of debating what lottery pick they will get next year. The Bucks are finally back into the conversation.
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