Paid to Play
The college football season is less than 90 days away. Already prognosticators have projected the top 25 teams in the nation for 2025 and are even predicting their favorites to make the College Football Playoffs. Preseason, of course, is the time of the year when expectations are high for almost every team and partisan fans are convinced that this year their school will win it all.
I started following college football during my high school years, and I have enjoyed keeping up with my favorite teams ever since. I wasn’t a slave to the television on Saturday afternoons, but I would usually pick out one game to watch with friends or family. College football for me was as much a social event as an athletic contest, and cheering for my team with friends while munching on snacks was a great way to relax and spend the day.
In the last two or three years, however, the sport has changed or at least the business side of the game has changed. In today’s college football landscape players are paid to play. Some of the more talented players are paid hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars to showcase their talents for the benefit of the school. And then, if the athletes are unhappy with their NIL deals (Name, Image, Likeness)—paid by boosters, companies and other organizations—they can transfer to another school where their endorsement contracts can be even more lucrative. Some of these kids will make more money playing college sports than at any other time in their life.
I still watch college football, although not as much these days, but the enjoyment has diminished for me. It seems that players no longer play for their school or the sheer love of the game, but now play for monetary gain. I’m sure that’s not true for all players, but the yearly exiting through the portal of players to other schools for richer NIL deals has tempered my enthusiasm for the sport.
As a fan of a particular university (Baylor), I never know from one year to the next what players will still be on the team. Players have little loyalty to their university and simply sell their talents to the highest bidder. Moreover, there are few restrictions or guidelines that limit the amount of money a player can receive through the NIL. Bidding wars between the wealthier schools have become common practice to acquire the best athletic talent. And the price for the top-tier athlete increases with each passing year.
Most of the athletes who play college sports receive far less than the most talented and coveted athletes, maybe just a few thousand dollars or less per month. I wonder what that does to the locker room dynamics and the comradery between players when one athlete receives 20 or 30 times the amount of money that another athlete receives, an athlete who comes to practice every day and toils through the same grueling challenges. One expects a salary differential in professional sports based on performance, but college athletes are not professionals—they are student-athletes—or at least they used to be.
I realize that some of these young people come from financially strapped homes and need additional financial support during their college years. I’m all for that. I’m not against compensating athletes. Colleges profit enormously in numerous ways by the athletic prowess of these gifted competitors. Not to financially assist the athletes making money for the universities would be unethical. But as things stand now, with little to no regulation, the tail is wagging the dog and tarnishes the historic brand of college sports.
What troubles me more than the money used to buy players or the yearly transfer of players through the portal, however, is the devaluing of a college education. To earn a college degree is such a privilege! To have the opportunity to attend college, to read great literature, to explore scientific concepts or philosophical thoughts, to study history and culture, to grow intellectually as a human being is a gift that far outweighs sports. A mind is simply too precious to waste! And college is foremost about receiving an education. Have we forgotten that? Then, too, many 18 and 19-years-olds struggle to grasp the importance of a college education, especially early on, and when tens of thousands of dollars pour into their bank accounts due to their athletic skills, I fear the importance of serious study will be further undermined.
Many of the NIL deals pay these recent high school graduates more than a tenured professor makes in a year, or in some cases, a lifetime. The signal that sends to an athlete is clear: education doesn’t pay and, consequently, is not important. How tragic when an athlete leaves college and struggles to find a job because his education was not a priority! How tragic for our country as well!
A nation’s future is tied to the education of its young people, whether vocational training or university studies. Our nation has led the world in scientific research, technological innovation, and medical breakthroughs since the middle part of the last century. Moreover, the importance of the humanities and liberal arts, which help provide balance in an increasingly technological world, have critical value in the continued progress of our civilization. Technology does not make us more civilized; only art, literature, religion, sociology, psychology, philosophy, music and the like can lead us to be more completely human.
Sports are extracurricular activities that contribute to a nation’s emotional health and certainly have a role to play in our culture, but they are way over valued in America today. Continued global leadership is not dependent on athletic achievements, but rather by the development of our nation’s intellectual powers. We do a disservice to young people when we monetize college sports at the expense of higher education.
