Husker Football in a World Of Paying Athletes

I was intrigued a little bit by hearing it coming around to that.. until I heard Ernie Chambers talking it up.  

Now I'm against it for the simple reason that anything he talks up must be.. never mind.  :lol:

Anyway, one of my concerns about it is the "money to entitled playing time" dynamic.  It'll be harder to discipline or even make the best choices for high paid players, same as in the NFL and NBA.   Harder.. not impossible, but it becomes part of the coaches job now.   I don't like that at all.

 
4skers89 said:
We should go ahead and hire a marketing/agent guy in the athletic department to bring local businesses and players together.  You could probably film about 50 players for a 1 second spot at the end of a car dealer commercial in less then a day and pay the players $20K each.  That will help with recruiting.
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The wealth won’t be spread out like that. It will be mostly based on recruiting stars and go from there, with the player being their own agent or having their own. 

 
I think there are many supporters of paying college athletes some kind of cash wages in addition to the numerous non-cash benefits (tuition, room, board, medical, books, fees, travel, etc) that just have not actually really looked at the math.   There is just not the money to do what they are suggesting.   Dam few colleges (probably less than 20% of the D1s) have ANY money available to 'pay' their athletes cash wages in addition to the cost of the education etc.  And probably less than 20% of the ones that have ANY money would have the funds to pay cash wages of $20,000 or $30,000 a year per athlete.   Nebraska is one of those very few that actually have a self suporting athletic department (no State tax money is provided by Nebraska's 300,000 or so tax payers).  I believe that the budget surplus for 2018 for NU was around $8 million.   If Bill Moos were simply to say to our 700 or so student athletes "Here you go, here is your pro rata share of the 'profit"' (this is not a profit as it does not reflect the depreciation of literally hundreds of millions of dollars of current facilities, etc).

Moos would be writing 700 checks for $11,425 roiughly. 

Those are rough numbers for Nebraska as one of the wealthy few schools.   If student athletes become 'employees' as I believe these laws would ultimately require, then there would be numerous other legal issues such as insurance, benefits, and hiring and firing rules and regulations, discrimination based on physical or other disability, etc etc etc.

And, of course, the dreaded INCOME TAXES apply (state, local and FEDERAL.   It is not certain whether the value of the benefits including food, housing, travel, tuition, etc would then also become taxable.   It is not inconceivable then that the student athlete may find that instead of actually gettinga check for the cash wages, there may be money owed to the employer to cover the unpaid tax liability to be withheld to cover tax burden in excess of the cash.

And what are the great majority of schools that don't have operating supluses (any cash at all) to pay athletes going to do?   Drop sports altogether?  

 
Waldo said:
I think it’s  less about them getting paid and more about fans selfishly knowing this will be the end of college football as we know it. I’m one of the selfish ones. 
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I’d like to know why it would be “the end of college football as we know it”?

 
Huckleberry Muhammad said:
Anyway, one of my concerns about it is the "money to entitled playing time" dynamic.  It'll be harder to discipline or even make the best choices for high paid players, same as in the NFL and NBA.   Harder.. not impossible, but it becomes part of the coaches job now.   I don't like that at all.
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Why would the coach care if player X is getting $10k from Amigos to pimp their crisp meat burritos on his instagram?

 
Red Five said:
Why would the coach care if player X is getting $10k from Amigos to pimp their crisp meat burritos on his instagram?
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Exactly. You understand the bill well and this is a perfect example of a player getting paid under this legislation. Why is that so bad for college football? 

 
Nebfanatic said:
Exactly. You understand the bill well and this is a perfect example of a player getting paid under this legislation. Why is that so bad for college football? 
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Because while the schools aren't paying them, the opportunities they have are hugely dependent on the school. Going to Bama or Clemson is essentially a guarantee of lucrative opportunities, while a lot of other schools aren't. Also don't think there's anything against a booster massively overpaying for the athletes likeness to swing them to a certain school. Dude owns some car dealerships, decides he can drop a million on a player for advertising. 

It's just another huge recruiting advantage, which isn't really new. But the lower end D1 schools just aren't able to supply the same opportunities. That's already true now - the exposure from big schools and the degrees from school to school are not equal. But it just exacerbates the problem. 

All in all I think athletes should have the right to make money on their likeness, I just don't know how you can do it without basically letting boosters pay whatever they want. 

 
Husker in WI said:
Because while the schools aren't paying them, the opportunities they have are hugely dependent on the school. Going to Bama or Clemson is essentially a guarantee of lucrative opportunities, while a lot of other schools aren't. Also don't think there's anything against a booster massively overpaying for the athletes likeness to swing them to a certain school. Dude owns some car dealerships, decides he can drop a million on a player for advertising. 

It's just another huge recruiting advantage, which isn't really new. But the lower end D1 schools just aren't able to supply the same opportunities. That's already true now - the exposure from big schools and the degrees from school to school are not equal. But it just exacerbates the problem. 

All in all I think athletes should have the right to make money on their likeness, I just don't know how you can do it without basically letting boosters pay whatever they want. 
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Schools would be stupid to not utilize this to draw in top talent.  I'd say the potential for abuse is high but there are no limits to abuse.  It's going to be extremely humorous when some no name school with a rich booster wins a NC.  If this goes through then I'll give CFB the same interest as other professional sports which is to say none.

 
Red Five said:
Why would the coach care if player X is getting $10k from Amigos to pimp their crisp meat burritos on his instagram?
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Who would decide what a student athlete can or cannot peddle? I'd assume there are some products a school might not want their student athlete to affiliate with... maybe alcohol, tobacco, vapes, weed brands in legal states, some drugs or supplements, or condoms.

I also wonder how equal opportunities for many female athletes to earn equal money might not exist. Is the school on the hook to ensure equality?

Not saying I'm against it, but without some type of consistent regulation, it appears to be a giant can-o-worms.

 
zeWilbur said:
Sure, go to your boss and tell them that the free food, housing, cutting edge training facilities, top tier coaches/trainers, full time nutritionist, and 'job training' for the your life goals simply don't count because it isn't cash in hand. Except a living stipend which is cash but still doesn't count because it isn't enough... apparently.

My problem isn't that you don't think it's fair, the problem is that your argument is completely dismissive of the other side and it is condescending. 

If you wanted to make an argument about some arbitrary amount needing to be met and having the school/booster/bagman make up the difference from what they already get we can have a great conversation around it. But it seems some want to take a match to the whole thing to get to something they think is "fair". Some of us disagree.  
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Yes im sorry I was a little heated so I def was more condescending than needed. The NCAA is unbelievably corrupt and greedy, and hide behind the guise of "integrity".  That doesn't mean people supporting not paying players are though. 

The way I see it benefits are not the same as a wage. I would absolutely not allow my boss to replace the majority of my wage with benefits.  How about schools just get exposure instead of money from networks. If someone wants to use integrity as an argument then that's fine.  Broadcast the games for free with just enough ads to cover the cost of production. There is tons of money getting into this and its directed where to go for a very specific reason. Like really how are you gonna try to say you own someone's name and they can't make money off of it. That is really the least they can allow. 

 
A couple million subscribers on Youtube pulls in a lot of money.  Let's get the Nebraska bots fine tuned.  The athletes can post videos of themselves studying.

 
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