Northwestern Wildcat Players Attempt to Unionize

[Soxbadger]

The problem with this entire scenario is that you can turn the language around...I'm just not sure they really are just amateurs...and be completely accurate in that statement.

 

I agree. I think that we should work to protect the kids. Things like guaranteed lifetime tuition/housing (1 degree) if you are a scholarship athlete. That way if you quit basketball/football you can always get a degree. Unlimited food, things like that, no problem. None of these kids should be coming out of pocket.

 

[Balta1701]

I agree. I think that we should work to protect the kids. Things like guaranteed lifetime tuition/housing (1 degree) if you are a scholarship athlete. That way if you quit basketball/football you can always get a degree. Unlimited food, things like that, no problem. None of these kids should be coming out of pocket.

One thing worth noting is that you didn't mention "health care coverage/long term care in the event of a major injury" which I would bet is probably more important to many of these guys than a salary.

[Soxbadger]

One thing worth noting is that you didn't mention "health care coverage/long term care in the event of a major injury" which I would bet is probably more important to many of these guys than a salary.

 

And that would be fine. I think that there could be some sort of set up where X% of revenues are set aside for health care.

[Balta1701]

And that would be fine. I think that there could be some sort of set up where X% of revenues are set aside for health care.

(IIRC there's nothing in their original filing asking for a salary but there is a specific request for health care coverage. But...if that puts universities on the hook for brain damage associated with football...they're going to run screaming the other way).

[EvilMonkey]

In 10 years some rich guy is going to fund a developmental league for basketball. make maybe 10 teams and just sign people right out of high school to 2 or 3 year deals. Give them $40k and some insurance, play your games and make it part of the contract that the league also becomes their agent. Then the league recoups its costs with agent fees. you can get all the guys who can't even spell their name to join so they can skip the pretense of being a 'student athlete', you have them sign contracts ( with an X if need be!) so they can't leave after a year. At first the games would have to be played among the 10 teams you have, but after a while you will get the best players anyway, so the players coming out of your league will be the best prepared when they can enter the pros. You rep them to the pros after the contract is done, either by draft entry of as free agents. College basketball will go bye bye.

[StrangeSox]

somewhat related:

 

From 2004 to 2011, community colleges’ inflation-adjusted educational spending — on instruction, public service and academic support — declined, while their athletic spending increased 35 percent per athlete, the report said. Overall spending per student grew 2.6 percent.

 

Inflation-adjusted athletic spending also increased, by 24.8 percent, at public four-year colleges in all divisions in those years, while spending on instruction and academic support remained nearly flat, and public service and research expenditures declined, the report said. Their overall spending per student grew 1.6 percent.

 

The fastest growth in athletic spending was at Division III schools without football programs, where median inflation-adjusted spending for each student-athlete more than doubled from 2004 to 2012.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/07/educatio...cation&_r=0

[Jenksismyhero]

In 10 years some rich guy is going to fund a developmental league for basketball. make maybe 10 teams and just sign people right out of high school to 2 or 3 year deals. Give them $40k and some insurance, play your games and make it part of the contract that the league also becomes their agent. Then the league recoups its costs with agent fees. you can get all the guys who can't even spell their name to join so they can skip the pretense of being a 'student athlete', you have them sign contracts ( with an X if need be!) so they can't leave after a year. At first the games would have to be played among the 10 teams you have, but after a while you will get the best players anyway, so the players coming out of your league will be the best prepared when they can enter the pros. You rep them to the pros after the contract is done, either by draft entry of as free agents. College basketball will go bye bye.

 

Why do that when they could just go play overseas for real money, not throw away money? And there hasn't been much of a trend to do that because kids rightly understand that they get more from a scholarship and "starving" in college than they would trying to go pro right away.

 

College basketball and its popularity will never go away unless schools decide they don't want to fund a minor league system. Right now, despite some players not being paid what they think their market rate is, both sides make out great. For the 99% of student athletes that don't go pro, they get a free education, free room and board, free meals and extras, etc. For that 1%, they get a free, year long marketing campaign for their draft stock.

[StrangeSox]

I don't see why the NBA wouldn't just change their "one year after high school" rule to crush any upstart competitors to the NBADL. Plus any new development league wouldn't have the huge, pre-existing fanbases.

 

What good would it have done Lebron James or Kobe Bryant to play for a college team for a year?

[Balta1701]

I don't see why the NBA wouldn't just change their "one year after high school" rule to crush any upstart competitors to the NBADL. Plus any new development league wouldn't have the huge, pre-existing fanbases.

 

What good would it have done Lebron James or Kobe Bryant to play for a college team for a year?

Kobe played 15 minutes per game as a rookie and 26 minutes per game as a 2nd year. He didn't become a full time player until his 3rd year and didn't really step up and put up big numbers until his 4th year.

[StrangeSox]

Ok? He still went to the NBA and started making millions of dollars a year earlier. He still became one of if not the best players of his time, won multiple championships and made hundreds of millions of dollars. I don't see where playing at UCLA or Florida or wherever would have made a difference.

[Texsox]

In 10 years some rich guy is going to fund a developmental league for basketball. make maybe 10 teams and just sign people right out of high school to 2 or 3 year deals. Give them $40k and some insurance, play your games and make it part of the contract that the league also becomes their agent. Then the league recoups its costs with agent fees. you can get all the guys who can't even spell their name to join so they can skip the pretense of being a 'student athlete', you have them sign contracts ( with an X if need be!) so they can't leave after a year. At first the games would have to be played among the 10 teams you have, but after a while you will get the best players anyway, so the players coming out of your league will be the best prepared when they can enter the pros. You rep them to the pros after the contract is done, either by draft entry of as free agents. College basketball will go bye bye.

 

How would that be different than this?

 

http://www.nba.com/dleague/

 

[Balta1701]

Ok? He still went to the NBA and started making millions of dollars a year earlier. He still became one of if not the best players of his time, won multiple championships and made hundreds of millions of dollars. I don't see where playing at UCLA or Florida or wherever would have made a difference.

The guy's a hall of famer and based on his stats it seems like there was no reason to care whether he was in the NBA in his first year+ at all. Why do I want to, as a viewer, watch an overmatched 19 year old play 15 minutes a game? And again, that's one of the best players of all time you're noting.

[StrangeSox]

I'm talking about from the perspective of the player. What good would it have done Kobe to go to Random U and generate a bunch of profits for them and their conference versus going straight to the NBA if some team (really, every team) was willing to pay him millions of dollars right out of HS?

[southsider2k5]

I'm talking about from the perspective of the player. What good would it have done Kobe to go to Random U and generate a bunch of profits for them and their conference versus going straight to the NBA if some team (really, every team) was willing to pay him millions of dollars right out of HS?

 

Honestly, it doesn't matter.

 

This is a workplace setting minimum standards for employees. Every business has the right to do this. You could be the best programmer in the world, but Microsoft isn't going to hire you straight out of HS.

[Jake]

I'm talking about from the perspective of the player. What good would it have done Kobe to go to Random U and generate a bunch of profits for them and their conference versus going straight to the NBA if some team (really, every team) was willing to pay him millions of dollars right out of HS?

 

There are highly positive intrinsic benefits from going to college that you could argue for. Of course, we could also argue that elite college athletes aren't allowed to experience those intrinsic benefits.

[StrangeSox]

There are highly positive intrinsic benefits from going to college that you could argue for. Of course, we could also argue that elite college athletes aren't allowed to experience those intrinsic benefits.

 

Right, I don't think your typical one-and-done who would have been drafted straight out of HS anyway is getting much out of their year playing in college.

[StrangeSox]

Honestly, it doesn't matter.

 

I was originally responding to jenks' saying that these kids rightly realize that they're better off going to college than trying to go pro right away. For the ones who could actually go straight to the NBA from HS (only a few a year), I doubt spending 9 months nominally enrolled at a college really does anything beneficial. For these select few, they'd be better off if they could go to the pros right out of HS.

 

I wonder what the numbers are for kids who go college baseball versus straight to the minor leagues?

 

This is a workplace setting minimum standards for employees. Every business has the right to do this. You could be the best programmer in the world, but Microsoft isn't going to hire you straight out of HS.

 

Isn't the argument a little bit different when you're talking about degree/cert requirements versus a strict age limit? It's not like the NBA requires a college degree, it's simply a time-based thing. Either way, I wasn't arguing whether or not they can or should, just that it isn't necessarily in the individual athletes' best interests that they do. On the other hand, you could make the argument that NBA GM's are horrible at their job and the NBA needs this rule to prevent them from doing dumb things.

[Jenksismyhero]

Just to be clear - when I said go pro I meant go play overseas for a year in lieu of college before getting drafted. Brandon Jennings is the only guy that I know of that did that and was still drafted. There's a huge benefit to playing D1 basketball and getting in the tournament and being on a national stage for a month.

[Jenksismyhero]

I wonder if what the NCAA/universities should do is basically say that to play college basketball you need to stay all four years instead of having four years of eligibility. If you want to go pro, fine, go pro if you can. If not, and some school offers you a scholarship, it's a 4 year commitment. No leaving early. It's then tied to the education/graduation and becomes more of an amateur sport.

[StrangeSox]

I don't see how they could possibly enforce that without some sort of collusion with the NBA, which I have to imagine the NBAPA would fight.

[Soxbadger]

I wonder if what the NCAA/universities should do is basically say that to play college basketball you need to stay all four years instead of having four years of eligibility. If you want to go pro, fine, go pro if you can. If not, and some school offers you a scholarship, it's a 4 year commitment. No leaving early. It's then tied to the education/graduation and becomes more of an amateur sport.

 

 

Right now a lot of the major players in college athletics dont want this. Scholarships are actually yearly.

 

And it would be really difficult to structure.

[StrangeSox]

One of the things the NW players are fighting for are guaranteed scholarships.

[EvilMonkey]

I don't see how they could possibly enforce that without some sort of collusion with the NBA, which I have to imagine the NBAPA would fight.

You enforce it like a regular contract. You agree to play for 4 years and in return you get scholarship, room, board, and exposure to the NBA. Not a thing the NBA could do about it.

[farmteam]

You enforce it like a regular contract. You agree to play for 4 years and in return you get scholarship, room, board, and exposure to the NBA. Not a thing the NBA could do about it.

Yeah but what's the stop players from breaking that contract? I don't know if forcing the kid to pay back the benefits he received would hold up.

[StrangeSox]

Exactly. It'd be like having to repay your employer for tuition benefits if you leave soon after finishing your degree. At least in engineering, you can generally negotiate with your new employer to pay that as a signing bonus. Now compare that to someone signing a seven plus figure contract in the nba-pretty easy to pay liquidated damages for breach of contract.

 

Plus that would seem to explicitly make them more like employees.