[Husker] Cut

[Steve Stone]

  Bob Beach wrote:

>gzimmerman at everestkc.net wrote:
>Ernie Chambers, please pick up the white courtesy phone.
>
>      You know, I rarely agree with Ernie Chambers on anything.  But, 
>I did somewhat agree on this issue.  The hard part of paying players 
>is how much do you pay them?  Some people believe they should just 
>get run around money and others believe they should get a pretty 
>good  salary.  That is where I just can't decide but I do believe 
>there should be some kind of compensation.  One reason I say that is 
>the NCAA rules pretty much eliminate student/athletes from any 
>income.  Then on top of that they can't get compensation from their 
>sport.  People are very quick to point out they ARE paid.  Their 
>education is totally paid for.  That's true and that is wonderful 
>but it doesn't give you money to live day to day.


Ernie Chambers does, indeed, have a point, but neither he nor anyone 
else I've seen in print has really gone into the question in any 
degree of historical depth.

The amateur ideal was conceived by Baron de Coubertin, a French 
nobleman, as he was beginning to formulate the concept of the Modern 
Olympic games in the late 1800's. Back then, only noblemen and a few 
affluent members of what might be called the mercantile classes had 
the leisure and inclination to pursue sports, and it was utterly 
unthinkable that working-class and/or lower-class men might wish to 
participate or have the skill to do so.

Baron Coubertin believed, quite correctly, that it should be beneath 
the dignity of a nobleman to accept financial reward for 
participating in what amounted to a hobby. "Amateur" means "one who 
loves," and he believed that the game(s) should be played solely 
because the players loved the game(s).

Thus was born the notion that created a divide between those who 
played for the love of the game and those who played for money, i.e., 
bare-knuckled prize fighting and the like.

The Baron's classification in the first Modern Olympics held in 
Athens, 1896, became an accepted standard for decades. However, World 
War I changed the social structure of Europe forever, and soon it 
became possible for working-class men to participate successfully in 
sports, Finland's Paavo Nurmi becoming possibly the best example. His 
descent/ascent into "amateur professionalism" marked the beginning of 
the end of the Baron's ideal.

Scholarship players today receive compensation for their time and 
talent but not in cash. Tuition, books, board, and room runs 
approximately 25-35 thousand per year for any student, but that's not 
all players get providing they have enough brains to pounds sand in 
rat-hole. What they get beyond tuition, books, room, and board is an 
education, and that as the current TV commercial would have us 
believe is priceless.

Of the 100+ players on the Husker squad, perhaps three to five will 
make the squad on one professional team or another for, say, three 
years. The other 95+ players will become professionals in insurance, 
real estate, coaching, and other real-life adventures.

Should college players get cash in addition to their other perks? 
Probably, but how much and on what basis remains thorny questions. 
Should starters get bonuses and screw-ups receive fines? Should 
seniors get more and freshmen less? Should players with high 
grade-point averages get additional pay? Should All-Big XII and 
All-Americans get performance bonuses? Should the guard who clears 
the way for the tailback to score get payment equal to the tailback's?

It's a can of worms, gentlemen and ladies, and you can bet your 
legendary bottom dollar that the NCAA's going to avoid opening it 
anytime soon.

Steve Stone