The Athletic Cartel
February 19th, 2009 by Tank
Great article from an economics professor from NC State on the NCAA as a cartel.
http://www.popecenter.org/clarion_call/article.html?id=2134
Money quote:
Imagine if colleges gave the right to hire their electrical engineering graduates to a group of employers who would, one by one, have exclusive rights to negotiate with each graduate. The graduate would have to accept employment with the employer that “drafted” him, or search for a job outside electrical engineering. No one would think that fair, but the public accepts such a practice for sports.
February 23rd, 2009 at 9:08 am
I understand the idea - but reject the notion that it’s akin to electrical engineering and the like, and that’s it’s patently unfair. To me, the NFL (or MLB, or NBA, or NHL, or CFL, or MLS) is the company and the franchises are… well, the franchises. In that vein, a college student/graduate can decide to go to work for the company (pro league) of their choice - and then the company (via the draft) decides which location they will work in.
When I graduated college, lacking the athletic ability to be “unfairly treated to millions of guaranteed dollars”, I went into retail grocery. I was hired by one company - who then told me which store I’d be working at. If I wanted to work for that company, I’d have to work at the store they determined for me. I don’t believe a draft was held amongst the stores for my services, no… but the company told me which location to go to, and I went. Then after a period of time, having proven myself, there was a means by which I could move to other stores/locations within the company… call it free agency, if you will.
My analogy is loose, yes - but far more accurate than the analogy the author chooses to use. For football, a player can play for several companies… the NFL, the CFL, the Arena Football League… heck, isn’t there an AFL2 as well? They can go oversees and apply their skills to other sports like Australian Rules Football as well, for example. If a graduate wants to get paid to play football, the fact is that he doesn’t *have* to play in the NFL. He does have other choices. The fact that the other choices are likely to pay (much) less is moot.
If the author’s electrical engineer doesn’t like the top-paying company, he can choose to go to a lower-paying company. It doesn’t preclude him from entering the industry altogether… and a college football player who doesn’t want to play in the NFL can actually choose to play for another “company”, it doesn’t preculde him from entering the industry altogether.
The NCAA can reasonably be found to be at fault for any number of things - but please spare me the righteous indignation of tying those concerns to the NFL draft.
February 24th, 2009 at 10:11 pm
You really see no collusion whatsoever between the NCAA and pro sports leagues to support their revenues at the expense of player compensation? Is the relative contribution to success of coaches and players truly inverted at the collegiate level? Ask yourself, which team would be more successful: the Cornell basketball team led by Coach K, or the Duke basketball team led by… whomever coaches the Cornell team? If your answer is the Cornell team with Coach K, then clearly the market for talent is clearing and there is no collusion. On the other hand, if you believe (as I do) that Duke would still stomp Cornell’s guts out, then something else has to explain the disparity in remuneration.
February 25th, 2009 at 9:38 pm
Call me cynical (you wouldn’t be the first), but I have little patience for those who want to cry foul for today’s “student-athletes”. First, depending on the pro league, they can turn pro and get paid… if they so desire. But, second, college is (in most cases) the best case for them to learn their trade… for *free*. Oh, and third, if they’re so inclined (and many are, to be fair, although the few that aren’t tend to get all the ink), they get a *free* education. What is the value of a degree from Duke University - as well as the free vocational training from one of the top coaches in the history of the game?
Now, is it criminal when Dexter Manley leaves college and is functionally illiterate because his school (and by extension, the NCAA and the NFL) “used” him? Absolutely. But he is the exception, not the rule… first of all. And second of all, he does bear *some* responsibility for his inability/unwillingness to take advantage of his free education from kindergarten through college. To that end, I completely agree with anyone insisting the NCAA (and more notably, it’s member schools) need to ensure that student-athletes are indeed *students* before they can be allowed/permitted to be athletes. To my knowledge, the NCAA has made great strides in this department - though they should always strive to do better, IMHO.
But who’s using who when a kid “goes to college” for one season to be drafted in the first round of the NBA draft and be guaranteed tens of millions of dollars well before they can legally drink? Such kids go to class in the fall to stay eligible, then don’t attend in the spring… cuz by the time the NCAA makes them ineligible, they’re up on the dais shaking hands with David Stern… preparing to get paid very well, thank you very much.
No, sir. When a free education is the *minimum* compensation for an NCAA athlete, I think they’re making out just fine. It’s a free country, if they want to get paid… go somewhere and get paid. If college is the best forum for improving one’s chances of cashing a pro paycheck, then collect the free education (as a fallback option) and take the free vocational training to pursue that dream.
Spare me the crocodile tears for folks in that situation.
February 26th, 2009 at 9:17 pm
By your logic, shouldn’t MLB have been allowed to keep the reserve clause? I think the logic is the same; you’re making out well just to be compensated at all to play a game, if you don’t like the offer on the table from the only team we’ll permit to hire you, go do something else for a living.
Further, I think the fact that an education is very valuable in absolute terms says nothing about the relative value of college tuition to the economic contribution of, say, Tyler Hansbrough.
February 28th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
First, you really need to come to Mecca this summer so we can have these debates/conversations in person… say over lunch… in the bleachers. I’ll even bring the most recent copies of the Cornell Daily Sun that I can find in case we run out of material to discuss, which seems unlikely of course… but the Cornell Daily Sun is just a treasure trove of inane commentary that we could spend days talking about and/or laughing at. And yes, I recognize the “most recent copy” would be from May… but does that really matter?
Second, I disagree… I don’t think the logic is the same wrt the MLB reserve clause. The simple fact is that a professional sports league is *not* a collegiate/educational setting. It’s not. An MLB individual is getting paid in salary to participate in that league… period. An NCAA individual is getting paid in scholarship/free education to (a) get an education, and (b) represent the school in athletic endeavors, and in a low percentage of cases (c) prepare for a professional career in athletics (with a free education to fall back on, if said invidual is smart enough to take advantage of the opportunity).
Third, how far does it go my friend? Tyler Hansbrough, for example, almost certainly brought incrmental revenues to his high school and/or prep school (as I have no idea where he was before UNC). Why aren’t we clamoring to get him paid in high school as well? Specifically, if he went to a prep school, private school, or even a public school that is a top school in terms of prepping kids for college scholarships in basketball… then by your logic, we should clearly be paying him for his efforts in high school. Then… did he help bring incremental revenues to his AAU team, his junior high school team… what about the bake sale that his middle school held when he played basketball in 5th grade? Certainly he should get a cut of that!!!
The fact of the matter is that NCAA athletics (at least at the Division I level, in a few select sports) is a money-maker. Nobody can dispute that. But this notion that the “poor” student-athletes are mere chattel is preposterous. The select elite can go straight to a pro career in three of the four major sports (NBA, NHL, MLB) without getting “exploited” by a school that’s offering them a free education in the process (in many cases, a top notch school - like Duke, Stanford, Georgetown, etc). In the NFL, it’s widely recognized that an 18- or 19-yr old is simply not going to be mature enough physically for the demands of pro football. Course, a guy like Eric Swann didn’t waste his time in college - but rather was paid to play semi-pro ball, and after a couple of years of getting paid for his efforts without the annoyingly free education that might have accompanied that, he was drafted #6 overall by the Arizona Cardinals and paid handsomely for that right. His career went nowhere, and with no college degree to fall back on, I have no idea what he’s doing with his life now… but he stuck it to the NCAA Man, didn’t he?
If we limit the discussion to the NBA and NFL, which correlate to arguably the two highest-revenue NCAA sports in men’s basketball and football, then we have to acknowledge the obviously free benefits that these “athletic slaves” are enjoying: (1) Free education (as long as they want to take advantage of it - and if they don’t, that’s on them), (2) Free training and preparation for the professional ranks, arguably in the best forum for that training, (3) Arguable the best exposure to the highest-paying league(s) in their proposed profession.
For this largesse, the NCAA (and its member schools) are rewarded by, and seek to fund it (and many other non-revenue NCAA sports) through TV contracts and the like. As noted previously, I do agree that the member schools have a responsibility to make every reasonable effort to actually educate these student-athletes, so that a case like Dexter Manley’s never happens again. But for the incredibly small percentage of NCAA athletes who will go onto NBA/NFL success, the payoff is obvious. For the rest, the payoff is free education (oftentimes from a very prestigeous academic institution) and the name recognition (if they achieved at the collegiate level but fell short professionally) that will help give them the tools/edge in the real word when they seek employment after escpaing the “gulag” that is NCAA athletics.
For an 18- or 19-yr old that wants to get paid right away, then…. for a basketball player, submit his name for the NBA draft; try to catch onto an NBDL team as a free agent; or try to hook on for an extensive three-year tour in Europe, Asia, and the subcontinent… where countless pro leagues will pay for talent as young as 18 years old. If not good enough to get paid in those scenarios, then go get a free education, great athletic training, and possibly unlimited exposure at an NCAA member school. That’s the “worst-case” scenario? Poor baby.
… for a football player, again given the physical maturity that is required for NFL football, getting a free education while receiving top-notch instruction and exposure in an effort to secure an NFL contract by submitting to the onerous parameters as laid out by the callous NCAA is the way to go. I have no idea what the age minimums are for the CFL or Arena League, or any number of semi-pro teams playing across this country - but there are other outlets for getting paid to play without having to subject oneself to free top-notch education (in the classroom and on the football field).
Your concerns are baseless, sir.