The NCAA Should Pay College Athletes
By: Quintin Taylor
Imagine playing for a top school, performing at a high level every game. Many college athletes spend hours in the gym conditioning, looking at film of their opponents, going to practice five to six days a week and putting an endless amount of work in to help their team succeed. Yet, the school is reaping all of the benefits, while the athletes who are generating this money are making no profit. This is unfair to the players because athletes work hard from a young age just to get a shot of making the professional leagues. There’s a very slim chance of making it into the big leagues from college, the students should at least get paid for their hard work during college.
According to USA Today, the National Collegiate Athletic Association, also known as the NCAA had a revenue of $1.1 Billion in 2017. If a student has a significant injury that will keep them out for months, the university will take away their scholarship. The university sees an injured student athlete as useless since they won’t make money for them. Thus, they have to pay the rest of their college funds out of their own pocket. These colleges are toying with people’s lives and education because of something that’s out of their control. At the very least, the university should let them keep their scholarship and allow them to finish college. These students are putting their bodies on the line for the school, possibly suffering long term damage while not getting paid at all.
The person that pushed the idea of having college athletes paid is former UCLA basketball player Ed O’Bannon. He played for the Bruins for one year then got drafted. O’Bannon found out the video game company Electronic Arts was using his likeness in their college basketball game series. In 2009, he sued the NCAA, Collegiate License Company and Electronic Arts for this act and O’Bannion won his case. The NCAA had to pay the players that were used in these games up to $5,000 each. As for Electronic Arts, they stopped making NCAA games completely in 2013 because they either had to pay for the players' likeness or used generic players. All he wanted to do is have college players receive money for their likeness, not to take a beloved video game away.
He stated, "I’m not some mad, angry former player who wanted to take a video game away. That wasn’t my goal, but that happened, unfortunately."
He was thinking about how players would feel if they knew they were in the game, but haven't received a check for it. He wanted the student athletes to get paid so they could provide for themselves instead of relying on the tuition.
Some states are seeing the benefits of college athletes getting paid. California passed the law of college athletes getting paid for their likeness. They won’t get paid from the colleges, but they could earn endorsements from companies.
California Governor Gavin Newsom stated, “Colleges reap billions from these student athletes' sacrifices and success but, in the same breath, block them from earning a single dollar.”
This is a first step towards having college athletes being paid across the whole nation. This law will go in effect on January 1, 2023.