I don’t get why colleges should pay athletes like pros. These athletes get to attend colleges where they can’t get accepted if it weren’t for their sport, they get free full+ rides, free coaching, healthcare, VIP treatment, mentoring, free publicity, academic help, easy grades and get showcased in highly competitive college sports where professional scouts spot and sign them up for multimillion dollar contracts. Good education and grooming by being at college campus and ability to date college students are fringe benefits.
“ability to date college students are fringe benefits”
I honestly doubt guys like Zion would lack for potential dates (even of college students) even if he never went to college.
It’s also pocket change compared to what Nike paid to his family while he was in college for the semester.
Why go to a college you have no intention of graduating from, why enter a restaurant you have no intention of eating at, why start a training course you have no intention of completing. Does anyone see why this is wrong. Its one thing to go to a University WITH the intention of getting a degree and then dropping out later for whatever reason. This is NOT what college is for. Period. Money is driving this, hopefully the courts rule for the athletes and the schools start paying athletes like they should be or drop the sport all together. This is a multi billion dollar industry that perverts universities, exploits athletes who otherwise could go pro. $300k over four years is NOTHING compared to the millions that the athlete could be making and the $100 of millions the universities get to spend in facilities and publicity all at the expense of the exploited athlete.
Don’t think of this from the point of view of a college fan who wants to see his team win, think of it from the athletes perspective who gets a pittance compared to the coaches and universities.
If a high school graduate decides to attend college I don’t really see how it’s the business of anyone but the student and their family. Walking into a restaurant to look at a menu is far different from attending a full course load of classes for a year or two. You walk away with nothing from the restaurant. You leave the college with transferable credits and a broader knowledge base than you entered it with. Education is a good thing.
Maybe Nike should allocate more money to R&D and build a better shoe, a shoe that Zion doesn’t almost blow his knee out with.
@CU123 Unfortunately the system in place currently is set up to create these one-and-done basketball players. The minimum age to play in the NBA is 19 (per NBA rules). And while young basketball players can go to a developmental league in the NBA or play for a team abroad, for many young men joining an elite NCAA is the best option for the year after HS (until they turn 19). A few of the advantages of going to college for basketball players include: outstanding coaching (assuming the athletes choose a top program with an excellent coach), fewer games to stress their still developing bodies, a chance to be with people their own age as they continue to mature, nationwide exposure for big games/the tournament, and getting a taste of college life/classes etc.
For better or worse a number of top colleges (including Duke) have embraced these one-and-done students as a way to create a strong team and seem to welcome a new crop to campus every year.
This system is not great. But IMO it is wrong to blame a young man for taking the best opportunity he has available to grow in his chosen field. Just like any other student Zion Williamson (your example in post #1) went to Duke to improve his career options. However, instead of being a doctor or lawyer, Mr. Williamson is going to be a professional basketball player. His best opportunity to go pro is now as he will likely be the #1 draft pick and will be set to earn many millions of dollars through an NBA contract and endorsements. If he was allowed to go to the NBA out of HS that may well have been his path but that was not an option.
If you don’t like the system, let the NBA know – let coaches you admire know that you don’t think they should bring in one-and-done students. But don’t blame the young men for taking the best option made available to them to further their life and career.
It’s not applicant’s fault. Universities are the ones with double standards for scholars and athletes. If a merit scholar writes in his essay that he only intends to chill there for a year until he transfers to Harvard, he’ll be denied AND shamed.
Not everyone can have Levar Ball directing his career and not even playing one second of basketball at UCLA before going to Europe. His youngest isn’t even going to college.
The purpose of our universities is to facilitate an education which enables each student to contribute more effectively to the development of our society. In their one year in university, Harvard helped lay the foundation on which Gates and Zukerberg achieved their ambitions, UT Austin did the same for Dell, and Reed for Jobs. Why is it wrong for Duke to do the same for athletes such as Williamson, Barrett, Reddish, etc.? During their short time in university all of the above have been exposed to an academic environment, cultural context and ways of thinking that will profoundly shape their future and how, as thought leaders and cultural influencers, they inform the future of our country in ways most 4 year graduates of these universities are unlikely to.
On the issue of athletes being paid by universities, the vast majority benefit far more than they contribute. They are receiving: admissions preferences; full tuition, room & board, and travel expenses; high quality education not only in academic subjects (that they may or may not take advantage of) but also in their area of athletic specialization; conditioning related training; nutrition and medical related training; medical care often related not only to injuries incurred while at the university, but also to pre-existing conditionings. If they are at a Duke, they are also being exposed to an academic and cultural context and experience which is elite in every respect. It is a truly once in a lifetime priceless experience.
In today’s world a basketball player has choices. If they are good enough to be paid and sign endorsement deals (most are not), they can go abroad or straight to the NBA’s D-league. Most don’t (and Williamson, Barrett and Reddish chose not to although they are among those few capable of doing so) because the Duke college experience and education/training are far better than the alternatives. And, as with most Duke students, attending Duke sets them up to do far better over the course of their lifetime than would have been possible if they had not attended Duke. It was a mutually beneficial outcome.
You don’t only have to be 19 to play in the NBA, but your high school class has to be one year out. I’m sure there are many 19 year old high school grads ready to play (at least in their own minds). For the NFL, it is three years out of high school.
NHL doesn’t care but you don’t see many 18 year olds playing at the top levels, most having to go to AAA or lower first. This week a kid did play in the NCAA championship on Saturday and for the Avalanche on Monday night. Even scored.
Missy Franklin gave up a lot of money after the Olympics so that she could swim with Cal. She wanted the college experience. When she was at the top of the Olympic level, she still swam with her high school team and of course won the state championship. It’s what she wanted to do.
You have to be kidding me, again for clarification, I DO NOT blame the athlete (third time on that one). Athletics are the source of scandal after scandal. Colleges creating classes for athletes that don’t even show up for class to receive an A, back door entrance with bribes, culture of rape, colleges recruiting athletes and booting them (politely) if they can’t play, lifetime injuries with no compensation. This is corrupt and the money is what is corrupting these schools. I mean when Enterprise rent a car is bragging on commercials how many college athletes they hire, I’m thinking, do you need a college degree to rent cars?
Again I’m not against college athletics I’m against what the colleges are doing by hiring (they call it recruiting) professionals to play sports, and oh by the way you need to go to a couple classes so we can call you a student athlete. Div 1 football and basketball are no longer student athletes, they are in fact professionals.
Seriously, the FBI is having to do the work of a complicit NCAA, and there isn’t a problem? It’s like having the drug kingpin making sure drugs continue to flow.
@CU123 I think people are humoring you, but you are really way off-base with your charges. Duke has never been accused of any of the things you allege in post #31. Just because a degree was not awarded does not mean that anything unethical occurred. If you want to blame someone, blame the NBA for their one year out of HS requirement. (As others have noted, the rule has already been changed, so the point is moot.)
Well of course that is step one, and I don’t think it’s changed yet, of course I guess Duke is just “looking into” whether Nike paid Zion. BTW this isn’t a Duke issue it’s an NCAA issue.
@CU123 I thought your points were excellent.
A superstar who wants to be a professional hockey player can go into a development league or play in college. A superstar who wants to be a professional baseball player can sign a big contract for the minors or play for a college. There is a well-trod path for superstar high school athletes in other sports that doesn’t force them into college. That does not exist in basketball (or football). Kobe Bryant and LeBron James went right into the NBA but even that wasn’t allowed in Zion’s case. (Is that changing soon?)
Is Zion finishing his coursework now? Or is he just done?
The NCAA is the colleges. They are one and the same. The NCAA does what the colleges want them to do.
Duke’s coach recruited Zion as a basketball player. He got to attend the Duke College of basketball for a while. He is really not much different than Duke paying a young, famous actor to pretend to be a college student for 6 months to get some good publicity for the university.
There is no comparison to Zuckerberg or Gates. Harvard didn’t admit them because their high school skills would earn money for the university. And they attended to take the classes Harvard offered. If Harvard had hired 17 year old actress Natalie Portman to spend 7 months at Harvard as a “student” who was obligated to do publicity and showcase how great the university was, and what Portman got out of it was that saying she went to Harvard for 6 months made her a more marketable actress, that would probably be a better analogy.
The rule has not been changed, nor is any change imminent.
Both were pre-2005 CBA. And I’ve said before that I feel the one-and-done is a waste of time for both the athlete and the college. But it is what it is for now.
At the end of the day, there is a reason why football and men’s basketball are called revenue sports. Duke, like all of its peers,will always have a basketball team (and recruiting). Williamson did not “take” an admissions slot from Joe Sixpack Applicant. If he did not attend Duke, another recruit would have.
Not a well-worn path, but high schoolers can play professional b-ball in Europe, for example, like Luka Doncic (Real Madrid at age of 13 I think) or LaMelo Ball, who played in Lithuania, when his father pulled him from Chino Hills HS.
The “one and done” rule will exist in the 2019-2020 season, but may be changed in either the 2020-2021 or 2021-2022 seasons. Condi Rice led the commission that took a look at the problem.
But now, the NBA’s G League (minor league) will accept 18-year old high school basketball players this coming season.
https://www.nba.com/article/2018/10/18/g-league-professional-path-official-release
Some sports have age minimums and/or time requirements for years out of high school. Football and basketball do, swimming and soccer and golf do not. No one seemed to have a big problem when Tiger left Stanford after his sophomore year to go pro. No one accused him of taking another student’s spot.
Many of the great players stay through all 4-5 years of eligibility and others don’t, even at Stanford and Harvard and Duke.
At least in the Pac 12 (not sure if it is all Power 5 schools), any scholarship athlete who plays at least 2 years has the right to finish his/her degree. I think some who go pro will do that if only because they have promised their moms. Larry Fitzgerald finished at U of Phoenix. I think Christian McCaffrey will finish his Stanford degree, mostly because he comes from a family of athletes who all have college degrees, most from Stanford or Duke.
Emphasis on “may.” Right now, it appears to be in the “thinking about setting up meetings to possibly set up a task force to potentially review a proposed implementation for an unspecified future date” stage. 
I stand corrected, but I was going by the other posters and also what I read last February.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/basketball/ct-spt-nba-one-and-done-rule-20190221-story.html
You’d think if Adam Silver, the league and the players’ union all want something to happen, then it will happen.