The Problem with College Athletics

University of Louisville basketball player Montrezl Harrell walks out of the arena after a big win.  He walks by the official clothing store that sells U of L merchandise.  Montrezl sees his number 24 jersey there in the store being sold for $100, but the jersey does not have his name on it.  The issue with this jersey being sold is that the effort that Montrezl just put in on the court and the honor that comes with wearing that jersey have no effect on the fact that he will receive no sort of payment for that jersey being sold.  The issue with college athletics is clear.  I believe that it is unfair that student athletes are do not receive any sort of payment under the current NCAA model because the NCAA makes billions of dollars while student athletes do not receive any money outside of their academic scholarship.

So what's the deal with the current NCAA model and why isn't it working? The current way things are run goes like this.  Athletes at major athletic schools usually receive a full-ride academic scholarship which pays for all of their schooling in return for playing a sport there.  But outside of this scholarship, there is no payment allowed to be accepted by student athletes.  The schools pay the athletes nothing, they aren't allowed to make money from advertising, they can't even accept $10 from someone to go buy a meal.  Athletes are just as broke as any other college student struggling to get by.  So what is the problem with this?  Athletes put in unbelievable amounts of effort and time in order to perform best on the field.  Stress and injuries take their toll very quickly.  Constant travel, workouts, lack of time to do schoolwork-all of these things take a lot of dedication.  But what is received by athletes for putting in all this effort? Absolutely nothing.  This is my main issue with the NCAA and how it runs its student athlete model.  Athletes put in the same amount of time and work load as any other typical employee, but they do not receive any sort of compensation for doing so.  This lack of payment speaks volumes to how unfairly college athletes are treated by the big-business mentality of the NCAA and member schools. I believe that student athletes should be able to receive money from third parties as well as making money off of their own name.