Major lawsuit filed against NCAA

[Indoor66]

I like and enjoy college athletics and can put up with some of its evils because of that.

sagegrouse

I agree with you, Sage one. It is unfortunately true that there is no perfect world.

[tommy]

I have a hard time seeing how this would make anything cheaper. More likely it would make men's nonrevenue sports a thing of the past at schools engaged in major conference athletics.

Why?

[Duvall]

Why?

Most athletic departments are losing money now. Giving men's basketball and football players a share of various revenue streams without increasing the amount of revenue means something is getting cut. Could the cuts come from somewhere else? Sure, but based on the way athletic departments have handled budget crises in the past, cutting nonrevenue sports seems the likely way to bet.

[sagegrouse]

Most athletic departments are losing money now. Giving men's basketball and football players a share of various revenue streams without increasing the amount of revenue means something is getting cut. Could the cuts come from somewhere else? Sure, but based on the way athletic departments have handled budget crises in the past, cutting nonrevenue sports seems the likely way to bet.

Duvall, buddy, in my view this is not true. Most athletic programs, especially the prominent ones, do very well. Now the USA Today analysis of public school NCAA programs shows a majority receiving a subsidy (although not the most prominent ones). But that is misleading because of what it includes in institutional support, or subsidy:

Subsidy: The sum of students fees, direct and indirect institutional support and state money. The NCAA and others consider such funds "allocated" or everything not generated by the department's athletics functions.

Donations directly to athletics would be a big number at Texas, Ohio State, Alabam and ......... Duke. Consider the Iron Duke donations for basketball tickets, which are a few thousand seats for a few thousand dollars each. Also, in the large state universities, student fees for athletics would also be significant. And, I believe, in some cases state governments give directly to athletics.

While most athletic programs do not cover their expenses through program revenues, the larger programs do quite well, thank you, with support from donors, students, and legislatures.

sagegrouse

sagegrouse

[niveklaen]

Its aweful nice of O'Bannon to focus on the exploitation of male athletes by video games, but a bit sexist too - clearly an equal amount of money will be required to pay women athletes under title IX.

So now poor inner city african american kids will suffer life long debilitating injuries to pack stadiums and generate revenue to buy cars for rich sorority girls who play tennis.

[dukeofcalabash]

Its aweful nice of O'Bannon to focus on the exploitation of male athletes by video games, but a bit sexist too - clearly an equal amount of money will be required to pay women athletes under title IX.

So now poor inner city african american kids will suffer life long debilitating injuries to pack stadiums and generate revenue to buy cars for rich sorority girls who play tennis.

To be honest, how much money do you believe that women sports pull in?

[dukeofcalabash]

Calabash, I have some sympathy for your sentiments 'cuz college athletics seems over the top. At the same time, if the $10.6 billion spent on college athletics were reduced to one-tenth the amount, we would be throwing the baby out with the bath water. To begin with, there are maybe 50,000 athletes who would lose their scholarships.

I like and enjoy college athletics and can put up with some of its evils because of that.

sagegrouse

Sage, maybe the right idea is to have these athletes take out loans against their scholarships since they (especially basketball players) don't seem to put any value on them. When they grauate (or quit) and move on they could then start repaying their loans just like any ordinary student. I still say accept only academically qualified athletes and take back those 'special' acceptance considerations given to many athletes in football and basketball. Tighten up the entrance requirements and watch them go away.

[JasonEvans]

Most major athletic powers intentionally shape their books in a way so as to appear to be less profitable or even unprofitable. They do things like attribute all food sales at football/basketball games to "food service" and they take revenues from the sales of TShirts/Jerseys/Clothing and attribute it to the school store. They will bill the athletic department for all the expenses for gyms and other on-campus sporting facilities even if those facilities are only used a small portion of the time (or perhaps even not at all) by athletic teams.

Why do they do this? Because there is zero incentive to actually show the athletic departments as highly profitable and TONS of incentive to show them as barely break-even if not money losers. Go ahead, cite me one benefit the athletic departments would get by saying they actually make huge sums of money on the major revenue sports. On the other hand, pleading poor allows them to beg alumni for donations; it gives them leverage with legislators who want to trim university budgets but know it is political suicide to hurt the football/basketball teams; it allows them to charge what they want for tickets, booster clubs, apparel, and so on; it allows them to cry poor and spend less on non-revenue sports; and (most importantly to this thread) it allows them to continue to say that the players should never, ever, ever get paid.

-Jason "I wish I was not calling these folks liars, but they have every reason to lie and no reasons at all to tell the truth" Evans

[tommy]

Its aweful nice of O'Bannon to focus on the exploitation of male athletes by video games, but a bit sexist too - clearly an equal amount of money will be required to pay women athletes under title IX.

So now poor inner city african american kids will suffer life long debilitating injuries to pack stadiums and generate revenue to buy cars for rich sorority girls who play tennis.

Huh? First of all, universities already spend way, way more money on mens athletics than they do on womens', and Title IX does not seem to be an impediment to that. Moreover, even if it was, the effect of Title IX on this new issue, that being, paying players to come to school, is not at all clear. Paying them in the way being envisioned essentially makes them university employees. Do universities have to spend the same total amount of dollars on female employees as they do on male employees? Of course not. But it's trickier than that because the athletes being paid are also students. But nevertheless, if there is a bidding war for the services of Andrew Wiggins, and Kentucky pays him $500K to go there, does Title IX require Kentucky to also spend $500K on paying womens' players too? I don't think so. Nobody is going to be buying cars for rich sorority girls who play tennis.

Also, why is what O'Bannon is doing sexist? If he wins this lawsuit, then any athlete whose image is used is going to be entitled to be paid for such use. Women included. They may not get as much, because their images aren't valued as highly on the free market -- as measured by TV ratings of their games and merchandising of jerseys and video games and the like -- but they'd get something. At least that's my understanding of how it would likely work. As always, could be wrong.

[JasonEvans]

Also, why is what O'Bannon is doing sexist? If he wins this lawsuit, then any athlete whose image is used is going to be entitled to be paid for such use. Women included. They may not get as much, because their images aren't valued as highly on the free market -- as measured by TV ratings of their games and merchandising of jerseys and video games and the like -- but they'd get something. At least that's my understanding of how it would likely work. As always, could be wrong.

The Baylor school store sells these...



I can't imagine why they picked the number 42 to use on these shirts. Hmmmm.

-Jason "" Evans

[tommy]

True, true, Jason. And there are tons of sites where you can buy these:

thumbCAO2V3RG.jpg


And . . . I wonder why that particular number has been chosen??

thCA6YYKQI.jpg

[ForkFondler]

^^^^^
...so which one costs more and how many do they sell?

[Duvall]

Huh? First of all, universities already spend way, way more money on mens athletics than they do on womens', and Title IX does not seem to be an impediment to that. Moreover, even if it was, the effect of Title IX on this new issue, that being, paying players to come to school, is not at all clear. Paying them in the way being envisioned essentially makes them university employees. Do universities have to spend the same total amount of dollars on female employees as they do on male employees? Of course not. But it's trickier than that because the athletes being paid are also students. But nevertheless, if there is a bidding war for the services of Andrew Wiggins, and Kentucky pays him $500K to go there, does Title IX require Kentucky to also spend $500K on paying womens' players too? I don't think so.

Well, why not?

Title IX doesn't require equal dollar-for-dollar spending on men's and women's athletics, but it does prohibit significantly different treatment. Would creating a new class of salaried student-athletes in selected men's sports qualify? Maybe, maybe not.

[niveklaen]

Well, why not?

Title IX doesn't require equal dollar-for-dollar spending on men's and women's athletics, but it does prohibit significantly different treatment. Would creating a new class of salaried student-athletes in selected men's sports qualify? Maybe, maybe not.

I guess I jumped the gun assuming that salary spending would have to be the same under title IX - not really sure how/if it would apply - so let me revise a bit - if title IX applied it would dilute payments to revenue generating athletes and if it did not there would be lots of litigation about how discriminatory the failure to apply it is.

[tommy]

Well, why not?

Title IX doesn't require equal dollar-for-dollar spending on men's and women's athletics, but it does prohibit significantly different treatment. Would creating a new class of salaried student-athletes in selected men's sports qualify? Maybe, maybe not.

I checked out the comparative spending on mens and womens's athletics in the most recent year I could find, which was 2011-12, and the disparities were pretty significant. I know these numbers are malleable, but it seems to me that the schools would have an interest in massaging the numbers to make them look as equitable as possible, yet still look at some of the numbers below. I rounded off the millions of dollars, and selected a handful of schools including major state schools, Duke, and a few mid-majors. The last column is a category for reported expenses that the school lists as "unallocated by gender or sport." OK, so in millions of dollars, here was the spending of the following schools on mens and womens athletics in 2011-12:

	Mens	Womens	Unallocated
Alabama	49	15	33
Duke	45	16	16
UNC	30	11	36
Michigan	42	17	40
Texas-Austin	43	18	67
Kent	9	5	9
James Madison	11	9	14
Ball State	9	5	6
Stanford	33	18	36

So as you can see, the big athletic schools are spending two to three times as much on mens as they are on womens athletics. I don't know what to make of the "unallocated" but there it is. If under the current scheme, the schools are allowed to spend three times as much on mens athletics as womens and not run afoul of Title IX, then in a post-O'Bannon world, why wouldn't they able to spend significantly more on paying male players than they would on female players?

[Tappan Zee Devil]

I checked out the comparative spending on mens and womens's athletics in the most recent year I could find, which was 2011-12, and the disparities were pretty significant. I know these numbers are malleable, but it seems to me that the schools would have an interest in massaging the numbers to make them look as equitable as possible, yet still look at some of the numbers below. I rounded off the millions of dollars, and selected a handful of schools including major state schools, Duke, and a few mid-majors. The last column is a category for reported expenses that the school lists as "unallocated by gender or sport." OK, so in millions of dollars, here was the spending of the following schools on mens and womens athletics in 2011-12:

	Mens	Womens	Unallocated
Alabama	49	15	33
Duke	45	16	16
UNC	30	11	36
Michigan	42	17	40
Texas-Austin	43	18	67
Kent	9	5	9
James Madison	11	9	14
Ball State	9	5	6
Stanford	33	18	36

So as you can see, the big athletic schools are spending two to three times as much on mens as they are on womens athletics. I don't know what to make of the "unallocated" but there it is. If under the current scheme, the schools are allowed to spend three times as much on mens athletics as womens and not run afoul of Title IX, then in a post-O'Bannon world, why wouldn't they able to spend significantly more on paying male players than they would on female players?

I would guess that a very large percentage of the difference arises from football and that if you looked at schools without football programs (Villanova, Hopkins, G'town, etc) the figures would be much closer. That is not an excuse, but I think it is at least part of the explanation of why there is such a large difference.

[tommy]

I would guess that a very large percentage of the difference arises from football and that if you looked at schools without football programs (Villanova, Hopkins, G'town, etc) the figures would be much closer. That is not an excuse, but I think it is at least part of the explanation of why there is such a large difference.

You're correct. In fact, once you remove football and basketball (including womens basketball) from the equation, many schools actually spend more on womens sports than they do on mens. Here are some examples, again in millions, and removing football and basketball expenditures:

	Mens	Womens	Not allocated
Villanova	3	6	7
Georgetown	5	6	7
Johns Hopkins	2.4	1.7	1.4
Michigan	13	14	40
Alabama	6	12	33
Duke	8	11	16
UNC	6	8	36

While this is good to confirm, nevertheless a lot of these schools ARE spending huge bucks on mens sports, including Georgetown, Villanova, and all the rest except for Hopkins. Spending on womens sports in total at these schools is dwarfed by spending on mens sports. I still don't see why it would be any different if "spending" included paying for the services of players. The guys would get much bigger "contracts" because as employees or quasi-employees, they bring in a lot more money to the schools, directly and indirectly. And someone with more knowledge than I possess would have to explain to me how Title IX would act to prevent that from happening.

[sagegrouse]

Here's the link. EA will go for a financial settlement for NCAA athletes, whose images, numbers and bio data were used in EA college football games. EA will no longer have college football games in its set of offerings.

The NCAA remains a defendant in the class-action lawsuit.

sagegrouse

[greybeard]

This might have a bearing on an athlete's right to be compensated. Roger the King explained why the $750,000,000 in settlement of the retired players lawsuit, instead of the billions that everyone knows it will take to help these players have some sort of life despite their football injuries. What Rog said was, the players' case was substantially weakened because they in most all instances will be able to link their infirmities to their time in pro ball, as opposed to college and high school.

That's actually a very good point. College players should be able to "get" what the free market demands; they should then sue their high schools and colleges for injuries incurred and the actuarial costs associated with the likely life-altering effects of those injuries. Instead, these kids are treated by high schools and the leagues that they are playing in and getting injured in like lambs to the slaughter as just high school kids doing what they want. Colleges do the same, except in restraint of trade colleges collude through the NCAA set a very low ceiling for the amount of revenue these athletes will receive--a scholarship most don't really want or use, room and board, and whatever dough and/or the things big time dough can buy.

Roger has opened the door and some high school kids were injured while playing for some maniacal coach, whichis to say many, if not most of them, ought to and will sue their schools and the school districts in which they played, and I use that word loosely. The beginning of the end for the goose. Oh what we all do without the eggs. Maybe Woody Allen will write a sequel.

[cf-62]

This might have a bearing on an athlete's right to be compensated. Roger the King explained why the $750,000,000 in settlement of the retired players lawsuit, instead of the billions that everyone knows it will take to help these players have some sort of life despite their football injuries. What Rog said was, the players' case was substantially weakened because they in most all instances will be able to link their infirmities to their time in pro ball, as opposed to college and high school.

That's actually a very good point. College players should be able to "get" what the free market demands; they should then sue their high schools and colleges for injuries incurred and the actuarial costs associated with the likely life-altering effects of those injuries. Instead, these kids are treated by high schools and the leagues that they are playing in and getting injured in like lambs to the slaughter as just high school kids doing what they want. Colleges do the same, except in restraint of trade colleges collude through the NCAA set a very low ceiling for the amount of revenue these athletes will receive--a scholarship most don't really want or use, room and board, and whatever dough and/or the things big time dough can buy.

Roger has opened the door and some high school kids were injured while playing for some maniacal coach, whichis to say many, if not most of them, ought to and will sue their schools and the school districts in which they played, and I use that word loosely. The beginning of the end for the goose. Oh what we all do without the eggs. Maybe Woody Allen will write a sequel.

Having played high school football, and deciding not to play anymore because I didn't want to RISK a severe injury, I can tell you there is no freaking way a lawsuit would make it out of summary judgement. You're either
A) Playing a game for fun
B) Playing so that you can earn a scholarship to college

Either way, you have no leg to stand on that you were used, and that injuries because of that were the fault of the school, or the coach.

Just because football is the most violent of the sports, it's a slipper slope, btw. Who's to say that all the catchers that ever lived shouldn't sue MLB, as well as their American Legion and High School coaches for destroying their knees? And any soccer player with a torn ACL obviously was over-worked, making that ACL more vulnerable. The basketball-induced arthritis is next.

At some point, WE -- the athletes -- MAKE A CHOICE TO PLAY.