These past few weeks have been quite the rough patch for the NCAA, though, in all reality, when isn’t it a rough patch for college sports’ governing body? A recap of recent events that have people furious all over the place right now: Georgia running back Todd Gurley being suspended four games and “sentenced” to 40 hours of community service for accepting $3,000 for his autograph; the leaked emails that show the NCAA board more or less bullied a weak and broken Penn State University into forking over a $60-million fine, on top of myriad other sanctions, in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child sexual-abuse scandal several years ago; and Jameis Winston’s continued eligibility while a very-public sexual abuse case continues to unfold.
More recently, the NCAA board was presented with an opportunity to tackle a case that actually involves academics when allegations were presented around fake courses being offered at the University of North Carolina that ostensibly existed to boost athletes grades and keep them on their respective fields and courts. And all the while, with the results of an internal investigation out there for the public to see, the NCAA sits on the sidelines, seemingly refusing to take action in the one case that seems to fall under its purview.
Sally Jenkins of the Washington Post argued in this morning’s paper that perhaps it’s not that the NCAA doesn’t know what it’s doing, rather that it doesn’t know what it should be doing. If you were to create a linear, timeline-based graph of the NCAA over the years with a baseline that represented its authority level, you’d find that the organization’s decisions constantly fall above that line. They meddle in cases that they have no business being involved in as an organization that is supposed to place the best interests of student athletes at the forefront. At the same time though, it’ll stay mum in instances like the UNC case, where they could step in and make a meaningful decision or set an example, and it fails to do so, thus failing to meet expectations.
Jenkins, in calling for some form of a replacement organization, pointed to a recent article coauthored by Donna Lopiano, former athletic director at the University of Texas, that appeared in Inside Higher Ed in September and got a lot of traction around that very issue. The article cited “the abject failure of the NCAA to retain a nexus with the educational missions,” or to preserve “a clear line of demarcation between collegiate sports and professional employment,” as the main reasons why a replacement organization is necessary at this point in time.
But what does that organization look like?
For starters, they said it should be a federally-chartered organization, similar to the U.S. Olympic Committee, with limited antitrust, which would result in the need to take back the autonomous power given to the conferences. More from Jenkins’ article:
“There is nothing in this story about the kids,” Lopiano said. The Drake Group restores the point, with a simple shift in focus: The new governing body — every rule in its book, and every dime of its revenue — should be devoted to the players on the field, not to the barnacles who cling to and sponge off them.
“What they should be doing is protecting the health, welfare, and educational opportunities of college athletes,” Lopiano said.
Those hundreds of millions of dollars in TV rights fees, bowl monies, and licensing? They should cover injury insurance for athletes and the full cost of their scholarships through graduation. “Every red cent,” Lopiano says.
The Drake Group proposal would return exclusive control of all championships to the new governing body, and not a dime of revenues from a football playoff or Final Four would go to one team over another based on win-loss record. Instead it would be split equally. No more multimillion-dollar salaries for coaches, athletic directors, conference commissioners, and NCAA presidents — those would be capped. No more fueling “the arms race of lavish exclusive and unnecessary athletics facilities” — athlete-only facilities would be prohibited. The money and the focus would be put where it belongs: on the minds and bodies of the kids who play the games.
Other proposals made in the article include developing a 23-person board of directors comprised of former athletes and college presidents, strengthening due-process for accused college athletes, capping the number of practice hours per week, taking away academic oversight authority from athletic departments and giving it to tenured professors, and prohibiting the cancellation of scholarships because of injury or athletic performance. The point of the new organization is simple: Everything that it would do, its goals, its mission, everything, is for the benefit of the student athlete. That’s something, no matter how hard Mark Emmert tries to convince the public, that the NCAA can’t make a case around.