Thursday, December 11, 2008
Friends, These Are the Reasons I Am Boycotting NCAA
By Dr. Boyce Watkins
http://www.boycewatkins.com/
Last year, I engaged in a short campaign on CNN, CBS Sports, ESPN and the LA Times to highlight major problems with “big time” college athletics. It is not my goal to anger anyone, but rather, to share what I have seen in my 15 years teaching at universities with major athletics programs. As a finance professor, I find the financial problems of the NCAA to be borderline criminal. As an educator, I find the educational mission of the NCAA to be fraudulent. As a black man who has seen what the NCAA does to the black community, I find myself simply offended.
The NCAA is in possession of an 11-year, $6 Billion Dollar contract for the rights to air March Madness. This does not include hundreds of millions of dollars earned each year from bowl games, regular season games, merchandizing agreements and concessions. Coaches earn as much as $4 Million dollars per year, while the players and their families, many of whom come from poverty, earn almost nothing. Coaches are allowed to jump from job to job, going to the highest bidder, while players who transfer lose a year of eligibility. Coaches and administrators earn millions from excessive commercialization of player images, while a player is not allowed to earn a penny from his/her own image. This does not include the fact that many institutions will praise and promote a winning coach with low graduation rates and quickly fire coaches with low winning percentages and high graduation rates.
I have witnessed students being taken out of class for an entire week to play in a nationally-televised football or basketball game, with academics (and the fact that the student’s grade has been jeopardized) becoming an afterthought. Players are treated like professional athletes, not students, and a weak performance on the field will cause them to lose their scholarship. Any institution operating as a government-sanctioned cartel, riddled with hypocrisy, disproportionate and exploitative compensation schemes, and glaring disregard for educational values should be scrutinized more carefully. Earning money is a wonderful thing, but I am not sure why coaches and administrators are allowed to earn billions each year from the labor of players with mothers who can’t pay the rent. I know how much tuition costs, and it is miniscule compared to the amount of money players generate for their coaches and universities. I say pay the players a fair salary, let them negotiate their own contracts and shoe deals, and then allow them to pay their own tuition.
If you believe in fairness for these young men and women, I hope you will consider joining our coalition to boycott the NCAA and March Madness.
I am not trying to "shake the ground" with these statements. I am simply asking for fairness. One star player (whose coach received millions in bonuses) saw his brother shot and killed in a housing project because his mother was too poor to move to a better neighborhood. Another player took money from a booster to help his family pay the rent, and then saw his scholarship taken away. I saw a player’s mother forced to beg her church to help her get to the Final Four to see her son play, while the coach’s family received first class accommodations. Another player was paralyzed from the neck down in a college football game and subsequently denied health and life insurance benefits from the NCAA. I feel this is wrong.
If you don’t agree with me, I understand. But as a professor, financial expert and a human being, I cannot remain silent on such an injustice. Some don’t feel the athletes deserve anything better than what they already get. We all must agree that basketball games don’t happen without basketball players, so if a game earns millions in revenue, then the basketball player is more deserving of this revenue than the coach. If that doesn’t make sense, then I’m sorry.
I hope you’ll join me in this effort.
With complete respect and sincerity,
Dr. Boyce Watkins
Syracuse University
http://www.boycewatkins.com/
ps.
Q&A On the NCAA:
1) If the athletes don’t like the system, then why don’t they just do something else?
The problem is that the NCAA is allowed to operate as a Cartel. Effectively, this implies that all of the schools exist under the same umbrella and make price-fixing agreements that keep players from having any other options. North Carolina, Duke, The University of Kentucky and other NCAA schools all agree that none of them are allowed to pay the players for their services (other than the scholarship). This sort of operating behavior is illegal in nearly every other industry, because the source of labor then has no bargaining power. Going to the NBA is not an option for most of the players, so there isn’t much else they can do.
2) What are you asking for in all this? Some sort of special treatment for athletes?
No. I am simply asking that they have a free market. Many rules are put in place alleging to “protect” the athletes. The problem is that many exploitative regimes throughout history have used protection as a cover for self-interest (i.e. The War on Terror and the Patriot Act). The truth is that many restrictions placed on players exist to simply control the athlete and to ensure that the administrators don’t have to share the revenue. Schools should never be “forced” to pay the players. I am saying that we should not force schools to allow multi-million dollar players’ families to remain in poverty. Just let the market work, the same way it does in the rest of America. If a player has no value, then he/she will not be paid. But if the school can earn $15 million dollars from a player’s ability, then his family should get some of that money, not just the coach and the administrators. Remember: When money comes in the door…..SOMEONE IS ALWAYS GETTING PAID. I believe that the person doing the work should get a substantial percentage of the revenue generated from that work. It’s really that simple.
3) Are you against the NCAA making money?
Absolutely not! I am a Finance Professor and a Capitalist. I appreciate good business when I see it. I think that the NCAA should simply make a choice: either go completely professional or completely amateur. You can’t operate as a professional organization while signing billion dollar TV deals and then become a non-profit amateur organization when it comes time to reward the players who are actually doing the work. I am in favor of the NCAA either paying everyone according to the fair market value they can negotiate, or NOT PAYING ANYONE. Non-payment, a more socialist model that the NCAA claims to promote, would imply that no coach earns more than (say) $70,000 per year. Every coach with low graduation rates would be fired, and players would not be allowed to miss class to play in a game. In other words, the players would come to college to actually get an education, not to simply play sports.
4) Isn’t a scholarship fair compensation?
Quite simply, the answer is no. I say this as both a financial expert and an educator who places a high value on learning. Many universities earn more money from one nationally-televised basketball game than it costs to pay tuition for every player on the team for an entire year. I would personally rather see the players allowed to negotiate their own contracts and then pay their tuition afterward. If one were to offer a coach and his family free tuition rather than their seven figure salary, they would be outraged.
5) It’s too complicated to find a way to pay college athletes, it just won’t work.
This argument was put forth by NCAA President Myles Brand, who I was on a CBS sports special with last year (along with “Coach K” from Duke, Billy Packer and others who earn millions of dollars from the labor of college athletes). My problem with this argument is that things work when we want them to work. Schools always find a way around the technicalities when it comes time to pay a coach $4 million dollars per year. They find ways to make sure that the tournaments occur, that vendors are paid, complicated TV deals are signed and merchandizing agreements are worked out. If it were a priority, they could surely find a way to be fair to the athletes. If they can’t, then simply drop all the restrictions on compensation and let the market do its work.
Some argue that paying athletes would destroy the purity and integrity of college sports. Actually, it is this glaring hypocrisy that continues to destroy the integrity of collegiate athletics. Allowing coaches and players to have the same rights to negotiation would allow the system to make more sense.
6) Which athletes should be paid anyway?
Athletes should be paid like the rest of us: If what you do earns money, then you have the right to negotiate (without oppressive restrictions) for your share. When Tom Cruise makes a film, he gets paid quite well. He doesn’t get the money because he’s a nice guy, he gets paid because he is generating revenue for someone else. That’s how capitalism works. So, any athlete in a revenue-generating sport should be allowed to negotiate with his/her school. If the athlete is not worth the money he/she is asking for, then the school won’t pay it. The same occurs when you try to get a job: if they offer you $45,000 and you are worth $70,000, you negotiate with the company across the street. It would be illegal for all firms in your industry to come together and agree to only pay you $25,000 per year. But that is what happens in the NCAA, where all the schools agree to non-payment of athletes. This should be outlawed.
7) What are the possible solutions to this problem?
This is a big problem and a big system, it’s going to take work. But I have some thoughts on possible solutions to the NCAA puzzle:
- The IRS and Congress must get involved: The Ways and Means Committee of the House of Representatives began proceedings last year that questioned the non-profit status of the NCAA and argued that they should not be considered an amateur organization. In their letter, it was stated that “Corporate sponsorships, multimillion dollar television deals, highly paid coaches with no academic duties, and the dedication of inordinate amounts of time by athletes to training lead many to believe that major college football and men's basketball more closely resemble professional sports than amateur sports.”
I argue that challenging the NCAA’s financial situation might get their attention and inject some fairness into the system.
- Teach athletes and former athletes to work together: Most of the people exploited by the system don’t realize they’ve been cheated until after it’s over. I argue that former athletes and others who are aware of how the system works should explain this to young athletes, who are sometimes so blinded by their own “shine” that they can’t see what’s going on. Athletes coming together and considering a boycott of the NCAA tournament would send a strong message to the league. That is my dream, but the reign of terror the NCAA has over the athletes makes a boycott situation difficult to imagine. Any player thinking of rebelling is likely to be punished quite heavily.
8) There are other problems in the world, why are you spending your time on this one?
I agree that it’s hard to get someone to feel sorry for a player on national television. But I’ve witnessed many horror stories about players who are punished for doing the right thing. For example, there have been cases of players not having enough food and losing their scholarship because someone gave them a bag of groceries. If a player takes money from a booster to help a homeless relative, they are then punished. When a player like Reggie Bush used his fame to help his family get a home, he was demonized and penalized. Simultaneously, his coach and university earned millions from the fact that Reggie was the most highly recognized professional athlete in America. This doesn’t make much sense, given that coaches can take money from nearly anyone who offers it to them. I fight for many issues of injustice, and this happens to be the one that we are attacking right now. We must fight one battle at a time, and I hope that my passion for this effort is understood.
If you don’t agree with me, I respect that. But if you do, please join me in this effort.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Dr. Boyce Thoughts on College Sports And Black Coaches
Dr. Boyce Watkins
http://www.boycewatkins.com/
I am sending out this article because the NCAA should be held accountable for the fact that African Americans are giving their lives and bodies on the field, but not given opportunities to be involved on the sidelines and in the administrative offices. The article below highlights this issue, as Miami's Randy Shannon is now one of only 3 African American coaches remaining in D-1 men's college football (the lowest total since 1993). Excuse my french, but this is a damn shame. With all our community gives on the field (the NCAA earns at least $1B per year from uncompensated African American labor), there should be opportunities off the field as well.
The NCAA has much work to do when it comes to fairness and equity. Please join our fight.
To join our Money advice list, please click here.
Boyce
http://www.boycewatkins.com/
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Miami's Shannon will be only black BCS coach, says things haven't changed
ESPN.com news services
Of the 65 coaches leading programs affiliated with the Bowl Championship Series, Miami's Randy Shannon is about to stand alone.
Miami coach Randy Shannon says mandating a graduate assistant job for minorities would help provide a more diverse base. After Sylvester Croom resigned Saturday from Mississippi State, along with the recent firings of Kansas State's Ron Prince and Washington's Tyrone Willingham -- who'll coach his final game with the Huskies on Saturday -- Shannon is one of three black coaches left in major college football, and the only one at a BCS school.
The last time there were only three black coaches at the Division I-A level was 1993, and Shannon, who waited many years before getting his first legitimate chance at becoming a head coach, simply can't understand the lack of progress in bridging the sideline race gap.
One of the few black candidates believed to have legitimate interest from a BCS school that's changing coaches is Illinois offensive coordinator Mike Locksley, who has been mentioned as a replacement for Greg Robinson at Syracuse. Buffalo's Turner Gill -- who, along with Shannon and Houston's Kevin Sumlin, is one of the three black coaches who have jobs for '09 -- is also thought to be a Syracuse candidate.
The only other prominent black assistant to be mentioned so far is Notre Dame offensive coordinator Michael Haywood, who reportedly was interviewed by Washington to replace Willingham.
Floyd Keith, executive director of the Black Coaches and Administrators, has said many times he'd like to see the number of black college football coaches get to at least 10 -- but now the total is headed the other way, even though nearly half of the players at the level formerly known as Division I-A are black.
Shannon, though, knows there's no easy solution. But he likes one idea.
"It's a diverse community," Shannon said. "You can see every ethnic group in Miami. Coach Cristobal, he does a good job, and white, black, Hispanic, we've been this way for years in Miami.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Duke Lacrosse: Heroes or Thugs?
by Dr. Boyce Watkins
www.BoyceWatkins.com
I recently noticed that the Duke Lacrosse team, the same guys caught in the middle of the rape fiasco that occurred a couple of years ago, were knocked out of the NCAA tournament. The upset by Johns Hopkins ended a season that will surely allow these young men to be remembered as heroes. Granted, their comeback from the depths of despair after the rape scandal in 2006 is quite remarkable. Also, Duke is a great school, a place that my little brother was planning to attend. However, we might want to put the “heroism” of Duke University athletes into perspective, for we don’t want to get carried away.
I was quite vocal about the Duke lacrosse situation in 2006, and I don’t regret one word of my commentary. When a young black student at another university accused the athletes of rape at a party, there was quite a bit of legitimate racial tension in the Raleigh-Durham area, as well as across the nation. I did not stand up in defense of the young black woman’s story, nor did I accuse the athletes of anything that was not yet proven in the court of law. I wasn’t there when the event allegedly took place, since I don’t hang out at drunken stripper parties.
What concerned me about the situation was not the lies that may have been told by the victim. I assume she was lying, since she disappeared and her story fell apart like a Sean Hannity argument. Perhaps she was paid or threatened to remain quiet, but we will never know what happened. I also had no problem with the punishment of Mike Nifong, the District Attorney who seemed to presume guilt before actually proving it.What I had a problem with is that everyone continues to miss an important piece of this picture. The athletes on the Duke Lacrosse team are NOT great American heroes. At best, their behavior was that of drunken thugs who were fortunate enough to be able to hire good attorneys to get them out of trouble. I have friends in “the hood” who behave this way, some of whom are still in prison for things they didn’t do. There is a Bill Cosby argument to be made which states that staying out of trouble means avoiding situations most likely to get you into trouble.
Heroes don’t drink till they puke every weekend. Heroes don’t hold parties with booze and strippers till all hours of the night. After all was said and done, I hope that these men were not given the green light to continue the same egregious behavior that got them into trouble in the first place. That would be sending the wrong message to these young men.
But the kids on the Duke Lacrosse team are not alone. I find myself consistently shocked at some of the behavior I see on many college campuses. While we consider college campuses to be havens of the elite, I can simply say that I know men who’ve gone to prison who don’t behave in such a deplorable fashion. The fact that individuals like George Bush are products of this tradition explains a lot about the brilliant policies of our great nation. It also explains why Bill O’Reilly has a loyal audience. I can’t use this culture to explain the drug abuse and illegal behavior of the caricature known as Rush Limbaugh, since he never graduated from college. In fact, according to Rush’s own mother, “he flunked everything, even a modern ballroom dancing class”. I’m honestly not surprised.
After spending my life on major college campuses for the last 18 years, I can only ask this question: Who IN THE HELL decided that it was normal to drink every weekend until you pass out? Who decided that this behavior is simply a “part of college life”, with kids not being taught the first thing about personal responsibility? I’m sorry, but in the real world, people who engage in excessive alcohol consumption destroy their livers, are far more likely to get raped, are more likely to be caught in violence, are at risk of driving and killing their best friends and put the rest of us in jeopardy. I’m not cool with that.
The U.S. Surgeon General has identified binge drinking on college campuses as a major health problem. I have middle aged alcoholic friends who took their first drink on a college campus. What concerns me the most is that the parents of these students and administrators around them are not stepping up to the plate and forcing these kids to chill out. Even well-intended administrators are ham strung by overzealous parents who believe their children can do no wrong. Perhaps they should call Bill Cosby in on this one, since there is a lot of bad parenting going on.
I know cops and prosecutors who claim that parents are one of the primary reasons that arrested college students don’t usually learn lessons from their audacious behavior. The next time I hear someone criticizing parenting in the black community, I am going to tell them to look to our elite campuses as the greatest examples of irresponsible parenting. I’m no bible thumper and I’m surely not a conservative, but I grew up with good role models who taught me the importance of common sense.
When I read about the Duke Lacrosse party, that is what I saw: another episode of college campus culture teaching young men and women to be comfortable behaving as menaces to society. Over 1,700 college students die each year from unintentional alcohol-related accidents. Roughly half of all college women are sexually assaulted during college, with at least half of these incidents involving alcohol. Individuals who consistently promote this kind of behavior on campus are no heroes of mine. But I don’t blame the students, I blame their parents and the adults who refuse to tell them the truth. If my son were at that party engaging in this kind of embarrassing behavior, I would (keeping it honest, in the words of my grandmother) “whoop his black ass”. Only men who host drunken stripper parties have to worry about strippers accusing them of rape.
I grow weary of appearing on shows in which I am asked to defend the behavior of black males, when I see students on college campuses behaving in ways that should make their families ashamed. I long for the day that a man like Bill O’Reilly takes a break from judging the values of the black community and turns that same self-righteous eye toward the Ivy League and private university thugs-in-training who think it’s ok to begin the quest toward alcoholism right after freshman orientation. But of course, the racism and elitism of America lead us to only see flaws in the oppressed. That is what my book, “What if George Bush were a Black Man?” was all about.
So, my tough love for the lacrosse players at Duke University is this: Congratulations on coming back from your setback. You were lucky, because prisons are full of men who never got a second chance. I’m sorry the stripper you hired lied to the police after your liquor and stripper-fest was over. But you shouldn’t be hiring strippers at the age of 19, and you should never have been in that situation. Now that we’ve had this conversation, you are free to go out in the world and truly become heroes.Dr. Boyce Watkins is a Finance Professor at Syracuse University and author of “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About College”. For more information, please visit www.BoyceWatkins.com.