(03-15-2019 08:12 PM)Mister Consistency Wrote:  

(03-15-2019 03:06 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  And I love capitalism. Its the best economic system in the world. However, what is so difficult to grasp about the fact that I'd prefer college athletics to stay as close to amateurism as possible?

Because enforced amateurism is inherently and aggressively anti-capitalist.

You are actively supporting preventing these athletes from maximizing the proceeds of their athletic prowess when there is clearly a market for their names and likenesses. Remember, EA didn't drop the NCAA Football games because they didn't want to pay for the rights after O'Bannon - the NCAA refused to let them do it.

This bill is the way for the NCAA to create a fairer system for the athletes without having to directly compensate them with additional cash out of the budget. Naturally there would need to be some regulation of that market; for example, maybe athletes who take endorsements before they enroll are still ineligible, and schools act as intermediaries to negotiate deals and take a 5% cut. Maybe they employ agents instead. Maybe they bake it into their licensing deals with IMG/Learfield/whoever and that company is the intermediary. Maybe they cap it at a certain dollar amount and pool the excess in an escrow to be distributed among the entire team or all athletes in the department. Maybe they don't get involved in it at all. It could take any number of forms, and the details only matter if the legislation passes, but it's clear that more and more people are taking issue with the way the NCAA operates, and the time where the schools are the only ones feeding at the sports marketing trough is likely coming to an end soon.

Aye, there's the rub. Figuring out how to do it without abuse is the problem.
Now if you give up amateurism in total, its not an issue, but if you want to keep that, its just a huge loophole that's hard to close.