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I've never been a big fan of Florida State, but I am glad that their win in the last seconds put Auburn's "team of destiny" tag to rest. Auburn was a good team, for sure. But mistaking luck for anything else is annoying. I'm also glad the SEC didn't win yet another national championship. It should put more fun back in the sport next year.
Sportswriters are crowing about the end of the BCS. I can't see the playoff lasting very long at four teams. With five major conferences playing at very close to the same level, there are going to be hard feelings every single year. The crumby attendance at the bowl games this year tells me when they go to an eight team playoff they are going to have to follow the FCS and play the first round at home fields, which will give the sportswriters something just as pointless to bellyache about.
With attendance dropping in college football, the push to get players paid is going to end up badly. With all the expense of going to college, dropping attendance by students should be particularly worrisome. If students don't go, you lose the future, those alumni who are fanatic enough to pay for those outrageously priced regular admission tickets in the middle of the field. If students feel fine about skipping attending now, later they'll feel fine about not watching the games on TV later. Athletes don't know how much they are getting in subsidies already: tuition, fees, books, board, room if they want it, as much free tutoring as they want, transportation and restaurant meals for away games, valuable goody bags at bowl games for even the most marginal players on the good teams. Certainly it's above the income tax threshold if it were taxable. Add a little walking around money and some bright politician will certainly see an opportunity to tax the whole package. As I've said the whole idea is poison. Letting players have part-time jobs again might look worse, considering all the abuse that caused them to be banned in the first place, but it might save the system, if the players just won't give up the idea of some form of cash payments. My uncle's job when he was a basketball player at a school in the old Big Six Conference was to push a broom across the basketball court with a whole gang of other athletes. Indeed he chose the school because they did have that kind of make-work job available.
Sportswriters are crowing about the end of the BCS. I can't see the playoff lasting very long at four teams. With five major conferences playing at very close to the same level, there are going to be hard feelings every single year. The crumby attendance at the bowl games this year tells me when they go to an eight team playoff they are going to have to follow the FCS and play the first round at home fields, which will give the sportswriters something just as pointless to bellyache about.
With attendance dropping in college football, the push to get players paid is going to end up badly. With all the expense of going to college, dropping attendance by students should be particularly worrisome. If students don't go, you lose the future, those alumni who are fanatic enough to pay for those outrageously priced regular admission tickets in the middle of the field. If students feel fine about skipping attending now, later they'll feel fine about not watching the games on TV later. Athletes don't know how much they are getting in subsidies already: tuition, fees, books, board, room if they want it, as much free tutoring as they want, transportation and restaurant meals for away games, valuable goody bags at bowl games for even the most marginal players on the good teams. Certainly it's above the income tax threshold if it were taxable. Add a little walking around money and some bright politician will certainly see an opportunity to tax the whole package. As I've said the whole idea is poison. Letting players have part-time jobs again might look worse, considering all the abuse that caused them to be banned in the first place, but it might save the system, if the players just won't give up the idea of some form of cash payments. My uncle's job when he was a basketball player at a school in the old Big Six Conference was to push a broom across the basketball court with a whole gang of other athletes. Indeed he chose the school because they did have that kind of make-work job available.
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While this is true, I think it is also true that many of these college athletes are being paid in currency they do not value. In sports where athletes have the option of turning professional and being paid (Hockey, Golf, Tennis, Basketball, Baseball, Skiing) many of those athletes do. It's not a perfect correlation, as you can make a career of minor league baseball, and there is also a cultural legacy of minor league baseball as well... but many players would prefer to get paid in money (even at low minors wages) rather than be paid in the form of College Funding.
Which is to say $50k worth of magic beans =/= $50k.
That said, I do think the market is there. Schools seem to be willing to make the jump to D1 - I can't remember the last team that dropped down or dropped the sport - so there's obviously money in it. Or at least, there's money in it if you don't have to pay the labor force. My guess is, if schools had to pay players, it would be the coaches' pocketbooks that took the hit. High-level college coaches are paid pretty comparably to their NFL equivalents, in large part, because they don't pay players and many gifts and payments come from untaxed foundations.
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Which is what I was starting to get into. As long as there is the illusion that what the athletes get is for education it will all work. An argument can be made that what the athletes get and those gifts that are given are purely (cough, cough) for the purpose of giving an education, just like academic scholarships. Destroy that illusion and the gifts won't be deductible, and the athletes will have to be paid a lot more to cover their tax burden. Just as the athletes seeing giant TV contracts and high salaries for the coaches has created a problem, healthy salaries for athletes just to cover would create massive problems with the rest of the student body. The whole system is getting very shaky. Take the wrong path and it could all be gone, maybe not in my lifetime, but certainly within yours.