The usual suspects in the media think this was a grand idea. Ever on the lookout for their next crusade, they have decided that giving semi-retarded teenagers more money for playing a game is their reason to live. Every week some chattering skull is demanding (demanding!) the NCAA pay players. Never mind that the NCAA does not have the authority to pay players. Those fashionable uber-lefty college presidents run college football and they ain’t in the mood to give the knuckleheads a raise. Most of them privately wish sports would go away entirely. Then they would not have to rub elbows with those sweaty drunks at the booster club. If the college president had their way, the booster clubs would be shipped off to the salt mines.

Even so, the debate is the typically vacuous stuff we get from sports media. The typical journalism major is low-average IQ. The sports journalism guys are a at the bottom of that group. There’s nothing immoral about being a dimwit, but these guys should be on an assembly line somewhere, not pestering the rest of us through our TV’s and computers. College athletes are paid and paid exceptionally well for their age and contributions to the college. They get, tax free, tuition, room, board, books, meal money in the form of cash, world class physical training, extra tutoring and professional coaching. The typical state college athlete is getting between 25 and 50 grand a year in tax free benefits. Most contribute nothing to the profitability of the school. The women’s basketball team is all cost and no revenue. Ditto the field hockey team. Only football and basketball generate revenue.

The question is whether they should get more. It would probably serve the interests of the schools if they could give their revenue athletes cash to spend. The corruptions we see is usually from boosters and agents sliding small amounts of money to players who are cash poor. It is amazing in a way, but many of these players are borderline retarded so maybe not. If the players had some cash to spend then some portion would avoid trouble by taking money. It would not solve the problem, but it would make the professional scolds feel better and that’s worth something too.

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