Now, I'm no expert on the NCAA rules for college football, let alone college sports in general. Apparently though, neither are the colleges and universities. And certainly not the players! The one thing that I DO know, the NCAA rules are exactly that, "rules"....not laws. Violation of these rules, while potentially creating an "unfair advantage", sometimes known as cheating, they do not necessarily (and very likely don't) indicate a violation of law. The net result of these rules though, is that at any point in the season, your favorite team...your Alma Mater that you live and die for every Sat...could suddenly have it's star player disappear from the roster due to some infraction of rule 136.33.222.25.459A(sub12).
Most people seem to get this law vs. rule thing confused...even one of the top ESPN college football analysts (big thanks to Kirk Herbstreit for the immediate on-air correction!). Not that I'm an anarchist about college sports, ok. But many of these rules were instituted decades ago and apparently unnoticed by the NCAA governing body, the world has changed. Not to mention the money involved!
2014 has finally brought us the college football playoffs most fans have been looking for all these long years. As far as I know, this is last college sport to do away with the idea that you don't really need to play a football game to see who's better (for anyone not catching the dripping sarcasm, see week 6 where we had, what, 5 out of the top 8 schools lose). Yet, they still cling to an outdated and all-but-unenforceable, image of the amateur college athlete. Hey, even the Olympics finally caught up to the real world years ago and for all intents and purposes, trashed the idea of trying to legislate who was a pro and who was an amateur. By the way, Legal 101, the more you try to legislate, the more loopholes and inconsistencies you create.
So my problem isn't whether the rules were violated, but the fact that the rules are ridiculous...and un-American to boot (yes, I really went there)! Or maybe it's actually very American after all...using money (read: power) to retain dominance and advantage....hmmm.....but I digress. The rules would also seem to be applied arbitrarily. A college football player receives tuition, room and board and, if qualified, a stipend...which would probably allow him to go to the movies once a week...alone. The argument being, that while they are playing football for the School, they are afforded all these benefits and receiving ANY outside income would somehow tarnish the "pristine" image of The Game. Meanwhile, a scholastic scholarship student from say, Harvard, could hypothetically create oh, a mega-billion dollar social media site and rake in millions of dollars, without raising an eyebrow (although, I would expect that the School's Office of Development would be hoping to help the old endowment account somewhere in there).
And don't even get me started about the difference between making a few bucks from a legal, but unauthorized, means and the subject of sexual attacks or violence. Right now there are players getting ready to suit up for Sat that face these types of allegations, while someone that sold a few signatures are touching up their NFL resumes while sitting out suspensions. It's mind-boggling, to me anyway.
I understand, the Colleges and Universities want to protect their revenue...and protect their brand. But losing top athletes doesn't bring in fans to watch your games...it disheartens them and creates controversy over something that doesn't need to be there. While at the same time, the brand, and the images of athletes in general, are tarnished by the inability or unwillingness of the Schools or the NCAA to police and discipline those whose violent and sexually abusive actions perpetuate the image of the animal-athlete. We can only hope that someday, it will stop being all about the money...but then again, I've always been a dreamer.
