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Should semipro/college players be paid, or allowed to sell their stuff? (NIL and Revenue Sharing)

Northwestern players get union vote

In a potentially game-changing moment for college athletics, the Chicago district of the National Labor Relations Board ruled on Wednesday that Northwestern football players qualify as employees of the university and can unionize.

NLRB regional director Peter Sung Ohr cited the players' time commitment to their sport and the fact their scholarships were tied directly to their performance as reasons for granting them union rights.

Ohr wrote in his ruling that the players "fall squarely within the [National Labor Relations] Act's broad definition of 'employee' when one considers the common law definition of 'employee.'"

Ohr ruled that the players can hold a vote on whether they want to be represented by the College Athletes Players Association, which brought the case to the NLRB along with former Wildcats quarterback Kain Colter and the United Steelworkers Union.

"I couldn't be more happy and grateful for today's ruling, though it is the ruling we expected," said Huma Ramogi, president of both the National College Players Assn, a non-profit advocacy group that has been around since 2001, and the College Athletes Players Association, the union that would represent the players and was formed in January.

Entire article: http://espn.go.com/college-football...rn-wildcats-football-players-win-bid-unionize

Northwestern players denied request to form first union for athletes

In a surprising decision that amounts to punting on the issue, the National Labor Relations Board on Monday declined to assert jurisdiction in the historic Northwestern University case after football players had been deemed to be employees by the regional NLRB director last year.

Effectively, the decision is a major victory for Northwestern and the NCAA. Analysts expected the five-member NLRB to either back or reverse the decision, but instead, the board exercised its discretion not to take charge of the case and dismissed the representation petition filed by the College Athletes Players Association, which had worked with then-quarterback Kain Colter and the 2014 Wildcats football team.

"In the decision, the Board held that asserting jurisdiction would not promote labor stability due to the nature and structure of NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS)," the NLRB wrote in its decision. "By statute the Board does not have jurisdiction over state-run colleges and universities, which constitute 108 of the roughly 125 FBS teams.

"In addition, every school in the Big Ten, except Northwestern, is a state-run institution. As the NCAA and conference maintain substantial control over individual teams, the Board held that asserting jurisdiction over a single team would not promote stability in labor relations across the league.

Entire article: http://espn.go.com/college-football...lrb-says-northwestern-players-cannot-unionize

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...rthwestern-union-vote-nlrb-football/31647545/
 
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16 months in limbo when the straw poll exit results were that Northwestern players didn't vote for unionization anyway once they learned the effort would pit the players against the school and not against the NCAA.

Now the uncounted ballots will be destroyed and we'll never know.
 
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Also, a little more information on the "gift suites" that are popular now. Article from 2 years ago

http://m.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2013/12/09/Colleges/Bowl-gifts.aspx?

The NCAA allows each bowl to award up to $550 worth of gifts to 125 participants per school. Schools can, and usually do, buy additional packages that they can distribute to participants beyond that 125 limit. In addition, participants can receive awards worth up to $400 from the school and up to $400 from the conference for postseason play, covering both conference title games and any bowl game.
 
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Ranking every bowl game's gifts, from Best Buy shopping sprees to custom cowboy boots

http://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2015/12/8/9872892/bowl-game-gifts-2015-rankings

Re: not to exceed the NCAA limit of $550 per person

Most of these gifts are really shit, why don't they give the players something that they actually want (and would use), i.e. $550 gift certificate at a tattoo parlor...:lol:

Re: ■AT&T Cotton Bowl
Fri., Jan. 3, 7:30 p.m. (Fox); Arlington, Texas
Information not available; bowl committee would not disclose

Their gifts are so bad that they are too embarrassed to tell you what they are?...:no:
 
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The Solution To Big Problems Is Never Simple – Except When It Is

StadiumAtNight_700.jpg


Friends, allow me to share with you one of the more hard-won lessons of life: the solution to big problems is often not as simple as it first appears.

Over the years, you will encounter a number of situations that have stymied other people or organizations, but which seem to have extraordinarily obvious answers.

“What’s wrong with you idiots?” you will kindly ask. “Why can’t you see the answer to this is simply to ____?”

This life lesson can be applied to situations from childhood: “Just climb over the fence to get the ball, idiots! Fine, I’ll… OH! Now I understand! It’s electric!”

It can be applied to situations in adulthood: (If you think I’m going to provide an example in the current political climate, I have another hard-won life lesson to share with you).

This, however, is not one of those situations.

The NCAA finds itself in a quite a quandry this final week of February. Bombshell reports have come out, linking some of the nation’s top college basketball players and coaches to payments from agents that would violate NCAA rules.

Take a moment to position your fainting couch properly before you clutch your pearls and drop lifelessly onto it.

This puts the NCAA in the position of having to nuke a big chunk of its blue blood programs just before its marquee annual event in March, removing star players and coaches from the NCAA Tournament and likely crippling both fan interest and the precious, precious TV ratings that CBS/Turner recently signed a $1 billion per year contract extension for.

The other option is to either delay a punishment until after the last commercial break before “One Shining Moment” has aired, or punt the decision down to individual schools.

Based on the strong moral fiber shown by NCAA President Mark Emmert throughout his time in Indianapolis, I know which direction I’m betting on.

Friday afternoon, Emmert put out a statement that he was shocked, shocked to find gambling in this establishment and emphasizing that he had already formed a blue-ribbon panel something something get to the bottom of something.

The most ridiculous part of this entire situation is that the solution to the NCAA’s problem was relatively straightforward. However, the NCAA chose to spend the last few years continuing to cling to the absurd fantasy of “the purity of amateurism” to avoid paying players even as TV rights fees skyrocketed.

The correct answer was right in front of them all along, thanks to another definitely not corrupt and self-dealing sporting agency overseeing the purity of amateur athletics.

The International Olympic Committee allows athletes competing in the Winter and Summer games to make money from the sale of their image. Basically, Michael Phelps can’t sign a $5 million contract to do the breaststroke in Major League Swimming, but if Subway wants to hand him a big, fat check to say, “eat these sandwiches” then that’s okay.

The beauty of the “Olympic model” is that it solves many of the hurdles that get thrown up in front of any proposal to pay the players in a more traditional way.

“The schools can’t afford it!” Great news! The schools don’t have to pay a dime. The money all comes from outside sources.

“We can’t only pay the players in revenue sports because of Title IX!” Any athlete in any sport can make whatever money they are able to get someone to pay them. If a local car dealership wants to give the field hockey team’s goalie $50,000 for a TV ad, go ahead.

The current system is a ridiculous facade that maintains that all players have no value beyond their tuition, room and board, a small stipend, and the access to training and exposure they receive now. For some players and likely some entire sports, that’s probably true.

However, the black market for players that the NCAA is currently having the vapors about is one example where it clearly isn’t. The ever-growing revenues across college athletics also show that to be a lie.

Under the Olympic model, players earn whatever they can in the free market. If someone wants to pay a top quarterback recruit $1 million to advertise for some convenience store, good for them.

Entire article: https://theozone.net/2018/02/solution-big-problems-never-simple-except/
 
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I've long been opposed to paying college athletes. They're paid in various ways already, of course, but speaking generally I mean increasing and formalizing their payment so that they are on a livable salary - maybe even in some cases on a very healthy salary. I'm talking, then, about converting college football and men's basketball teams into professional minor league teams hosted by Universities. But I'm slowly reversing my opposition to this, and thinking maybe this is the way to go. The reasons I was long opposed are: (i) I am willing to accept the student/athlete pretense, as long as some reasonable effort is put into maintaining it (and it certainly does apply to some); and (ii) I don't think I'd have any interest in following an explicitly professional minor league team hosted by OSU. On the latter point, I suspect there are a lot more like me in that respect, so that college football and men's basketball would be irreparably damaged as major spectator sports. I'm slowly changing my mind on this because I'm not sure that would be a bad thing. Maybe let them go minor league pro, while in college, and see where the chips fall. If they fall on the side of college football and men's basketball losing a major portion of their viewership and revenue, maybe that is how it should be.
 
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I still don't think any pay the players scheme administered by the schools or NCAA will survive a true Title IX test....
I know. It really is a problem that doesn’t seem to have good answers. Obviously some schools could afford to pay all student athletes something, but most could not. I don’t know if all the P5 schools could ultimately afford to do it if large portions of TV proceeds went to that cause. But doing that would create ripple effects I cannot fathom in terms of school athletic budgets.
 
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The NCAA needs to be rebuilt from the ground up or just scrapped. Let the schools create a new governing body with actual teeth. Dont want to hand over any and all documents pertaining to a possible scandal, that's fine but you are out of the league. That goes for private schools too. Hand down ACTUAL punishments to schools caught cheating.. things like if you get caught cheating then all of your gate receipts for next years games are given to charity. Convince the NBA to wave the one and done rule so players good enough to make money can do so without leaving the country. Coaches, and athletic directors of all major sports are held accountable for what happens while they are running theirs whether proof of their involvement is there or not, including signing contracts that lets monies be reclaimed in the way of fines even after they have left the university.
 
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