Research Paper on College Sports: Money for Coaches, Not Players?

Introduction

Sports is a popular industry that is multiplying in the whole world, and it has even infiltrated many colleges where many students have taken on sports as either part-time way to pass their time or as a full-time way to earn money. The colleges make billions of cash from the students playing, but the benefits are mostly enjoyed by the professionals who oversee the sports activities in the colleges such as the coaches. College sports players have most of the time been barred from getting paid with the college authorities arguing that students should not be paid because they are not professionals. College players should be paid due to several reasons and specific challenges that face them in schools where past studies have shown that there are students who are not able to take care of small bills due to lack of money yet they are famous college players.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

College players face a lot of risks when practicing and playing for their colleges where they are prone to risks of getting hurt in any parts of their bodies. Most students get injured in the field, and they require money to access health services and treat their injuries (Sanderson and Siegfried 110). The college does not cater for such damages which makes it hard for the players with their families having to dig into their pockets and fish out money to help them get treatment. Other students get severe injuries and are unable to get treatment due to it being expensive which lead them to have permanent damages to the body parts that get injured. Depression may hit such students because they were famous players known by many people countrywide then all of a sudden all the fame disappears due to lack of funds to treat an injury they get playing for their teams in college. Such injuries are a good reason why the players should get nice salaries so that they can be able to pay for their treatment in case of injuries which are normal in any sports.

College sports requires a lot of training which take up most of the time of the students hence they are not able to take part in any other separate jobs which can enable them to get an extra source of income apart from their parents. This creates a difference between the students who spend their free time from class working for an extra income in other well-paying jobs and the students who spend most of their free time and even their class time practicing and taking part in games away from the college (Sanderson and Siegfried 115). The administration of the universities should take into consideration that the college players should be paid just like their fellow students who seek part-time employment so that they can be able to fulfill their basic needs and not feel different from those that earn while they are not paid anything. Paying the student players in colleges also give them the motivation to continue training and playing for their school teams, and this creates excellent performance in the sports which raise the standards of the games played in colleges. This has been evident in the few colleges that have taken a step in paying their college players a small amount of money with the students reporting increased motivation which pushes them to perform better and be ranked higher than other colleges that do not pay their student players.

Another main reason why college sports players should be paid is that other students in the colleges under scholarships who take part in other disciplines such as music, drama and theatre and other activities are allowed to take part in additional money making jobs. Students who major in music, for example, are allowed to take part in performances in the colleges while performing outside the colleges in clubs to make extra money (Edelman 1137). Students who act in colleges are also allowed to act in films that are outside the school without any prohibitions. The college players spend thirty to forty hours per week practicing so when this time is combined with their time for studying, it is hard for them to get part-time jobs. They should thus be paid for taking part in college sports because they spend all of their free time exercising.

Large Amounts of Payment to Coaches

Football and basketball students bring in much of the money in colleges, and the money is used for other purposes in school with the coaches and other professionals being paid large amounts of money and the students being left out with no payment at all. The head coaches are making millions of money every season with the college players of basketball and football bringing in a lot of money than any other players in the colleges (Edelman 1137). The college football and basketball players provide good times for the audience and the fans who pay to watch any game. The players, therefore, deserve to get paid due to the thousands of people they bring as spectators and the millions of dollars that such fans pay to watch the games.

Many big companies use college players for marketing their products where they wear brand costumes to promote the companies. These companies, therefore, make a lot of profits from using the college players yet these players are not paid. They feel used because the companies that use them pay the colleges significant sums of money but not even a single cent to the players. It is not fair that the companies make billions of cash from the players marketing their brands yet most of the players lack money and even sleep on empty stomachs somedays. A good example is Shabazz Napier who is a renowned college basketball player (Ganim 2). A report from Napier's University showed that despite being among the top basketball players in his country, he sometimes sleeps starving due to his lack of money to buy food. Napier is sad that he goes to bed without eating anything whereas companies and UConn University are making millions of dollars from him. UConn University just like many other colleges in the country use student scholarships as a means to not pay the players arguing that if the college players start getting paid, their scholarships in the universities will have to come to an end. The players should not get countless dollars from playing for their university teams; instead, they should be given a certain amount of money to help them survive and avoid such cases like that of Napier.

Selling of Players' Jerseys

College players watch as their jerseys get sold at high prices yet they are the ones that made that jersey get so famous and get sold at such high prices. They feel that they need to get a particular portion of the money by which that jersey is sold, and when they do not get it, they feel as if they are getting used and this affects their performance (Davison 155). The National Collegiate Athletic Association has specific rules where a plan for maximum meals for the players exist, but in as much as these meals are limited to particular times of the day, the players need to eat other meals from outside the college which is a good reason why they should get paid.

Sports in colleges should be taken as a profession where the players should get paid based on the revenue of the university, the spending patterns and the sales that are made. The free education they get in terms of scholarships is not equal to the countless amounts of money the colleges and industries make out of these players hence they should be paid in addition to the scholarships they get (Davison 155). Most of the colleges pay the coaches large amounts of money and pay nothing to the players, yet the players are the ones who made the colleges earn such sums of money in the first place and not the coaches. Instead of paying the coaches millions of dollars and not paying the players, the colleges should cut the vast sums of money paid to the coach and push some of it to the players.

Career Development

College players should be paid per the sports they play because most of these students play with a mission of continuing with the sport to the end of college and after college. It is a discouragement for the players when they play for several years in the colleges without getting paid, yet they expect that that sport is a potential source of income for them in the future after college (McLeran 255). Lack of monetary gains from playing various games in colleges make the college players see as if the sport does not pay outside the school and this may lead to them giving up on the sport and choosing other career paths. The colleges unknowingly kill the careers and talents of many young students due to lack of appreciating them with payment. College players of different sports in the university should be given similar financial opportunities to the professional players or something closer to that.

Conclusion

Most colleges offer scholarships and other special privileges such as free meal plans in the college cafeterias and priorities in choosing and registering courses, but still, that type of treatment is not enough for them. Many companies use these players to brand and market their products; hence they make millions of money from the players. The coaches of the players are paid vast sums of money ranging to millions of dollars annually or per season. This is why it appears to be unfair when the players are not paid at all yet they are the ones who play the games and win for their colleges and not the coaches. Past reports have shown that some prominent college players are not able to afford a meal on their own hence they spend sleepless nights due to hunger which raises why the players are not paid yet they make millions of money in profits for the colleges and the companies which use them for marketing their products. Physical activities in the form of exercises and when playing the games are a significant contribution to injuries which might end the career of the players any time. The lack of safety in playing as well as exercising and the injuries that come along with the sports should be enough to make the authorities pay the players for the risk they put themselves in to win the games. Even if they are not allowed to earn a payment, the players should at least be allowed to make money from marketing themselves and other companies.

Works Cited

Davison, Joseph. "Throwing the Flag on Pay-for-Play: The O'Bannon Ruling and the Future of Paid Student-Athletes." Wash. JL Tech. & Arts 11 (2015): 155.

Edelman, Marc. "From Student-Athletes to Employee-Athletes: Why a Pay for Play Model of College Sports Would Not Necessarily Make Educational Scholarships Taxable." BCL Rev. 58 (2017): 1137.

Ganim, Sara. "Uconn Guard Shabazz Napier On Unions: I Go To Bed 'Starving' - CNN." CNN, 2014, https://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/07/us/ncaa-basketball-finals-shabazz-napier-hungry/index.html.

McLeran, Michael S. "Playing for Peanuts: Determining Fair Compensation for NCAA Student-Athletes." Drake L. Rev. 65 (2017): 255.

Sanderson, Allen R., and John J. Siegfried. "The case for paying college athletes." Journal of Economic Perspectives 29.1 (2015): 115-38.