Maybe this belongs in a college thread, maybe not. Nick Bosa withdrawing from OSU to fully rehab his injury and focus on the draft, I see the talking heads going round and round on the tv about it, and personally, I like his decision, “But he made a commitment to the school!” Ha, that’s probably my favorite argument against it, and that school made a commitment to him, but you best believe that if he got injured and couldn’t return that (barring massive media attention/fallout) his scholarship would be gone or reduced, and when there is a #1 draft spot, and millions of dollars on the line, I’d be looking at my future too. Thoughts?
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The NCAA and Ohio State made money off him, which he sees none of unless he gets drafted. He didn’t go to Ohio Stste to play school.
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It’s crazy to risk your head and your body for free when you know you can make millions.
Do we pay college athletes? How much? Does anyone make more than others on their team? Do different universities pay more? It’s a really loaded premise but college sports are seriously suffering from young people leaving early, and too many people are making millions off of 18-21 year olds breaking each other’s bodies.
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Gase is between a Brock and a hard place with next weeks QB decision…
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It’s not for free. My wife and I paid money for our education. She was on the track team for five years and I was on the baseball team for two.
I know these players have no intention of getting a degree but that doesn’t make the scholarship worthless. They’re getting paid whatever books, tuition, dorms (off campus housing for older players), and food would cost. Depending on the school this could add up to a lot more than my annual salary.
It’s the equivalent on on the job training with zero expenses for big time athletes. I’d take that. Look what we do now. We pay money to work out and play recreational sports.
I know people are making millions off college sports but the athletes basically enter into a trade deal. Their return is training and development to prepare them for the next level.
How do you pay athletes? How to you determine what’s fair? What’s a football player at KU get compared to Ohio State? There’s no way to regulate that. It’s a mess.
Look at it this way. In most professions the employers want experience for entry level jobs. How do you get that? You volunteer or get an internship (sometimes unpaid).
Once you get your experience then you can get you starter job and start working your way up. Maybe someday you get promoted and finally make six figures.
These big time college athletes are giving two to three years and signing multi million dollar contracts. That sounds better than four plus years of school plus volunteer work to get $40k.
Edit: back to your actual comparison…given the choice between going pro and stay on 9 in school is a no brainer. If you’re ready then go for it.
It’s not training, they’re playing a nationally televised sport that generates millions in revenue. More people I know follow college football than the NFL around where I live now. And I honestly would classify brain damage, broken limbs and other bodily harm as an expense, especially when those injuries can ruin a short career.
Plenty of people enter the job market at 18 - I think that’s what these kids did, only they’re getting suckered into doing their extremely popular and dangerous job for free.
But yes, I have no idea how we’d actually go about implementing paying them, and the solution may be too loaded to ever come to fruition.
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I guess they could implement a salary but it’d have to be a flat rate regardless of popularity. Is the scout team risking less? What about the small D 1s? D 2s?
Anyone who steps on the field is taking a risk regardless of how good or bad they are. I guess you could call it hazard pay and give a flat rate for practice sessions and scale it according to number of snaps played on game day?
All good points. The hazard pay idea is good. I could see things getting nasty with or without equal pay, to be honest. I really can’t even think of how to make it work unless it just essentially becomes the NFL minor league
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Instead of putting a dollar figure on it use a percentage of profits from televised games and stadium swag.
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I understand that approach by it doesn’t satisfy the argument of “We’re putting ourselves at risk.” That would mean the athletes at small schools would get $0. Some of them still make it big so they have the same argument as a player at Alabama or Ohio State.
Those schools obviously don’t generate revenue but if the argument is risking a future in the NFL then how do you tell one team they’re not valuable?
I also considered jersey sales for compensation but the same problem would arise - fairness. Who’s going to buy the jersey of the best right tackle in the league? He’s worth millions but it’s not glamorous.
I’m probably I’ll equipped to talk about fairness or equality of pay as it relates to risk. I’ve seen people delimbed for $11.00/hr.
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Could there be a worse game on the schedule for tonight? I mean really, do Broncos or Cards fans even want to watch TNF tonight?
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When they make the schedules they don’t know who’s going to suck.
The Cards offered up Peterson (one of the best corners in the league) for a first round pic. All the fans in Pittsburgh are screaming at the team to take him and use that LeVeon Bell cap space. The Steelers can’t draft and develop corners to save their lives. They won’t do it though. Watch bellechick pick the guy up.
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Steel curtain is lookin like a shower curtain these days. Anyone who thinks the Steelers offense isn’t putting up enough points to win games is crazy.
Von Miller is a force of nature.
Saquon Barkley’s response to people criticizing the Giants’ picking him at the #2 spot shows character and maturity.
Also, Von Miller is a force of nature.
Edit: Sack of the year goes to the hit Fitzgerald put on Kurt Warner.
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Saquon is a generational talent. During that disastrous drubbing at the hands of Philly last week, Troy Aikman commented that Barkley already looked like the leader of the team (at fricking 21yrs and change!); it looked it to me too, since Barkley was the one calming Shepard and The OBJ down when they were acting up, again…
Maybe, maybe, with hindsight I could agree with the Giants drafting Mayfield over Barkley if Mayfield had still been available. None of the other QB schmoes though, Barkley all the way!
Personally, I think if the Giants had taken the money they threw at OBJ and used it to chase Kirk Cousins (successfully), they’d be (much) better off right now.
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…or some linemen.
They tried. If I’m not mistaken, Nate Solder is now the highest paid offensive lineman in the NFL.
Ereck Flowers, the tackle they drafted in the first round with the NINTH pick, was just released because he sucked. Caveat: if the dude now succeeds with Jacksonville, the OL coach(es) with the Giants need to be fired ASAP.
That’s why when you have a generational talent like Barkley, he needs to be drafted.
Different sport, but Sam Bowie was drafted ahead of Michael Jordan to fill a “need” at center; even though it was acknowledged that MJ was the better basketball player.
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Yeah. You don’t pass that up. He’s making up for shortcomings all over the field.
Wow… You can’t really guess how a draft pick is going to turn out but with the benefit of knowing MJ’s career…that was a bad move.
Back to OBJ. I’m shocked that any receiver is valued like that. How many guys are making highlight plays every week? There’s a lot of potential in the league which means a lot of guys can catch the ball and run.
It’s not very often that you hear the announcers say “They’re really missing (Insert receiver here).” The Cowboys might be missing Dez Bryant but I believe if the line can block then there will be an open receiver somewhere.
There are some positions that aren’t worth paying. Look at Josh Norman. I haven’t heard much about him since his big deal (except when he’s on TV as an analyst).
Umm…the giants have the worst offensive line in the NFL. Why would anybody think that any QB would be beneficial for that offense at this point? They now have the best RB in the NFL and a top 5 WR. O-line is the only offensive factor they need to address, and they need to do it BEFORE they bring in a rookie QB and ruin his confidence.
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