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The problem with the NCAA

On April 12th 2016, the NCAA agreed upon an extension with CBS Corp. and Turner

to extend their media partnership for the NCAA men’s college basketball tournament, known as

March Madness, through 2032 (Flint 1-2). The 8-year extension worth approximately 8.8 billion

dollars illustrates the evolution of college basketball’s market, as well as the NCAA’s absurd

exploitation of its athletes. A plethora of Economists and world-wide respected sports journalists

believe that it is senseless that these student-athletes aren’t compensated for their beneficiary

services. They should simply get paid because they are undervalued and exploited by the

NCAA’s monopsonistic system. The players value to the school exceeds their scholarship, their

commitment to the sport is taken for granted and a plan of action for change sees much benefits

within itself.

Firstly, an athletes value to a university exceeds the scholarship in which they receive. An

average 4-year full-ride scholarship for a NCAA division 1 men’s basketball player can range

between 100 000 -120 000$. This large sum of money covers much more than just the standard

full-ride scholarship of tuition, fees, and housing; there are many luxuries that come with the title

of an NCAA athletes such as elite coaching; academic counseling; strength and conditioning

consulting; media relations assistance; medical insurance and treatment; free game tickets; and

future earnings power that comes with some college education (Weiner & Berkowitz 22-25). In a

time where 2/3rd of American graduating from universities and college suffer with some level of

debt (Denhart 1-5), a full-ride scholarships appears to be the greatest blessing to have. However,
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the NCAA’s monopsonistic system has undervalued the true market price of an NCAA athlete;

meaning that full-ride scholarships do not compensate for the beneficiary services of the athletes.

David Berri, a professor of Economics at Southern Utah university, refers to exploitation as a

notion that a worker is being exploited if the wage the worker received is less than their

economic contribution to the firm. By linking this definition with the NCAA’s system, he stated

that an athlete is “exploited” if the athlete generates more revenue than he/she is paid in terms of

his/her scholarship and housing at the school (Berri 25-29). The NCAA have been exploiting the

value of their players for decades. For instance, in 2012-2013 the University of North Carolina

men’s basketball team generated roughly 10.45 million$ in total revenue. David Berri calculated

the wins that each player produced and divided the total revenue among the players (based on the

wins each player produced) to calculate the most valuable players on the team. His study shows

that future NBA draft pick Reggie Bullock produced 6.9 Wins alone, which generated $2.99

million in revenue. Similarly, future NBA player P.J. Hairston produced 4.5 Wins, which lead to

a $1.96 million in revenue (61-69). Berri’s analysis shows that these prominent athletes are

generating millions of dollars for the university (up to 25 x their own scholarship) and due to the

NCAA’s principle of amateurism, they are unable to receive any of the profit. Evidently this

study negates many factors when dividing a team’s total revenue among the players; however,

college basketball fans pay to watch the players play; the players are the main attraction. A

team’s total revenue should be reserved for the student-athletes simply because they are the main

reason that a team even produces money. Furthermore, a player’s overall value to a university

goes far beyond the revenue they generate. There has been many researches that link the

performance of a school’s athletic team with the number of undergraduate applications are that
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are sent in the following year. Current NBA hall of famer Patrick Ewing’s basketball

performance during the 1982-83 NCAA season helped generate a 47% increase in undergraduate

applications and a forty-point rise in freshman SAT scores during the following admissions cycle

at Georgetown University (Edelman 17-21). Even though Patrick Ewing’s tenure at Georgetown

University only lasted 4 years, his impact lasted far beyond his playing years. For the decades

following, many elite high-school basketball recruits chose to go to Georgetown to emulate the

successful career that Patrick Ewing had. Even though Ewing was a transcendent player which

are not produced very often, his legacy puts into perspective the value of an NCAA athlete on the

entire future of a program. With that being said, the services of these student-athletes are

extremely undervalued. Time and time again, former college players attempt to sue and/or put

the NCAA on blast after taking into account how badly they’ve been exploited. It’s asinine that

everyone is benefiting from their services, but the players themselves. They simply deserve to

get paid.

Secondly, the commitment of players to achieve a successful collegiate career (both

academically as well as athletically) is truly undervalued. The NCAA is the highest level of

college basketball. It serves as a platform for players to put their talents on display for the nation

to enjoy. With every up and coming freshman class, the association boasts an abundance of

future professionals in schools across the nation. With such high-level competition, players are

required to be at the highest level of play at all times. Preparation is a key foundation for player

success in the NCAA. A survey of NCAA basketball players revealed that basketball players

spend up to 40 hours a week on basketball (Jacobs 36). Spending hours a week practicing,
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weight-lifting, film-study, visits to the trainer, game-days and much more. With such a high-

level of commitment to the sport and daily opportunity costs for the hours spent on preparation, a

student-athlete’s role resembles a full-time job. The commitment in maximizing your athletic

potential in order to help your school succeed in intercollegiate play is a huge commitment and it

is senseless that the school receives the entire profit of the players hard-work. In addition, the

NCAA requires student-athletes to perform well academically to retain their eligibility. Since

much of a basketball player’s time is consumed towards the sport, their time is very limited to

prepare for academic excellence. With such a great burden of expectations for young adults, time

management and a lack of organization can be serious issues. The vast majority of Division I

athletic scholarships must be renewed annually. That means students who get injured, stop

playing well, or simply don’t fit a new coach’s vision can have their funding dropped after the

year is over. (Davidson 102-104). Lastly, there is also expectations for the athletes to respect

school rules as well as NCAA standards. As the NCAA bases itself on the grounds of

amateurism, they restrict athletes from receiving prize money, benefits from an agent, any

agreement to be represented by an agent and many more (NCAA Amateurism 13-20). As these

young adults can have the wrong types people in their entourage, many athletes make the wrong

decisions which can result in lost scholarships. Former Michigan wolverine Chris Webber recalls

moments where he was struggling financially that he was unable to afford a Big Mac [roughly 4-

5$] at McDonald's and meanwhile the school was selling his jersey in the bookstore for 50$. To

add onto that, players see their coaches and team executives collect 7 figure salaries, while they

work their tail off at practice and during games. The basis of amateurism has been a rumbling

topic over the years with many NCAA investigations revealing players violating ground rules.
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An athlete’s commitment to academics, athletics and an amateurism lifestyle is taken for granted.

Such devotion needs to be rewarded with some sort of compensation.

Lastly, a plan of action to pay student-athletes Is attainable, it needs to be done and the results

can benefit both parties. By illustrating the methods in which the NCAA’s monopsonistic system

undervalues and exploits their athletes through the lens of a high level NCAA men’s basketball

player, there’s reason to believe that these men deserve to be paid; however, the fact of the

matter is every NCAA athlete deserves to be paid. Every NCAA athlete regardless of division,

has significant importance to their school’s athletic program. Whether they generate revenue or

not, their hard work, commitment and value to the sport deserves to be compensated. The first

question that arises from this plan of action is who’s going to pay them? Firstly, every NCAA

school should calculate their total revenue and reserve a certain amount to their players. Along

with some funding from the NCAA, which can be money from their lucrative TV deals, they

could receive monthly stipends which compensate them for their hard work, commitment and

value to each school. Another question that arises is how should the athletes get paid? For the

idea of stipends to take place, the NCAA would be required to take an equitable approach; they

would have to fund the schools that are unable to generate big time revenues, so that their

athletes can receive the same stipends as the rest of the athletes across the nation. With this idea

into place, the NCAA will respect Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 which is a

federal law that states: "No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded

from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any
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education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance (NCAA Title IX 2-5).

Additionally, there should also be one more ground rule in place. For transcendent players who

generate millions in revenue to the school, the universities should write them a cheque following

their studies which compensates them for the services they have brought to the school. Michael

Wilbon, feature columnist for ESPN.com, uses the example of how the most distinguished

professor at the University of Alabama won't make $5.9 million in his entire tenure in

Tuscaloosa, Alabama; Nick Saban [head coach of Alabama’s football team] will make that this

year. So I don't want to hear that it's "unfair" to pay the quarterback of Alabama more than all the

sociology students in the undergraduate college (Wilbon 32-36). Furthermore, paying the

athletes for their services has beneficiary impacts on everyone. Paying college students has

apparent benefits on the player’s side; however, the NCAA would experience much less

violations of their rules and standards. If players had a stipend as a consistent income, they

would gain more independence and not be manipulated by the agents and recruiters for loans or

whatever the case may be. Having said all of that, this plan is attainable only if the NCAA

eliminates their notion of amateurism. Once the NCAA follows through on that idea, this plan

can be done and will benefit everyone involved.

To conclude, the NCAA’s monopsonistic system restricts NCAA athletes to be compensated for

their beneficiary services. By exposing the NCAA exploitation of its athletes through the lens of

male collegiate basketball players, it is absurd to know that the NCAA still operates under such
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manipulative ways. While the player’s value to the school exceeds their scholarship, and their

commitment to the sport is taken for granted, a realistic opportunity to pay these players what

they deserve is attainable and needs to be done

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Bibliography

3 scholarly sources:

BERRI, David. “Exploitation Is Everywhere in Men’s College Basketball. Time. November 14,

2014

WEINER, Jay and BERKOWITZ, Steve. “USA TODAY analysis finds $120K value in men's

basketball scholarship” .USA Today. March 30, 2011

WILBON, Michael. “College athletes deserve to be paid”. College sports. ESPN. July 18 2011.

Secondary sources;

DAVIDSON, Jacob. “3 Mistakes That Will Cost You a College Scholarship” Money- TIME.

September 3, 2014

DENHART, Chris. “How The $1.2 Trillion College Debt Crisis Is Crippling Students, Parents

And The Economy”. Forbes. August 7, 2013

EDELMAN, Mark. “21 Reasons Why Student-Athletes Are Employees And Should Be Allowed

To Unionize” Forbes. January 30, 2014

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FLINT, Joe. “CBS, Turner Strike $8.8 Billion Deal to Televise NCAA’s March Madness

Through 2032” .The wall street journal. April 12, 2016

JACOBS, Peter. “Here's The Insane Amount Of Time Student-Athletes Spend On Practice”

Business insider. January 27, 2015

“Amateurism”. NCAA (Page consulted November 27th 2016)

“Title IX Frequently Asked Questions”. NCAA (Page consulted November 27th 2016)