A Short Summary: Should Sports Professionals Be Paid

Do you think that NCAA players should get paid for playing their sports. NCAA players should be able to get paid for playing in games that generate millions of dollars for universities, they can get seriously injured playing the game, their images are used for other people to make money, and they are not able to get a job because of all the hours put into their sport.

They are fundamentally exploited by a system that makes not millions of dollars, but billions of dollars, and that enriches everybody around expect themselves”- Joe Nocera (Should the NCAA Pay College Athletes?). In an effort to draw a clear line between college and professional sports, the National Collegiate Athletic Association has prohibited the payment of athletes for their sports related skills by emphasizing that college sport is one of the many branches of the educational program. However, it is my belief that the established guidelines by the NCAA seem to unjustifiably limit the opportunities and success that a student-athlete could have, thus, new rules should be implemented that allow athletes to be fairly financially compensated for their talents.

Division 1 schools have generated a total of $9.15 billion in revenue during the 2015 fiscal year. (2) That's a lot of money for students to make. College athletes will go straight from highschool to going to another 4 -12 years of college. They are using their adulthood to do more school. Not start a family, or get money for their family. Should the NCAA pay them a small cut of it? If student-athletes make all of this money for the league, they should at least get a piece of what they have made for them. Could we possibly be seeing college players make more money than the average adult? Sometimes players have injuries. Who would pay for that? Would the school or league pay for it?

As the years have gone by and college sports attract larger crowds and generate more money, the question arises of whether or not star college athletes should be paid. The NCAA currently prohibits college athletes from receiving payment of any kind from the schools, boosters or endorsements. This is a hot topic in society because many consider the athletes to be “working” for the money only the school is receiving. However, some argue that there is a need for amateurism. In college sports, athletes work hard, but they should not get paid because the college part of the sports is what makes the money, not the athletes.

If an employee earned millions of dollars for a company and received little to no compensation, many issues would arise, possibly even a riot. In contrast, when this same dilemma comes about for a collegiate athlete, the only people who believe that these athletes deserve this money are the athletes themselves. The definition of a full-time job is commonly considered to be a 35-40-hour work week, and these everyday employees get paid, so why do college athletes who work over 40 hours for their sport not get paid (Edelman, Marc)? During recent years, there has been a great debate that has arisen over whether these athletes deserve to be paid for their hard work, rather than simply receive scholarship money that the athletes never see. Many spectators wish to preserve the amateurism of the sport, filled with athletes that play because of their love for the game, not because of a paycheck. On the other hand, there are a growing number of proponents who firmly believe that

Many different people brought up that collegiate athletes deserve to be paid. The number one supporters of paying the athletes are the athletes themselves. Each athlete dedicates over twenty hours a week just for the sport and don’t earn anything for it (Entman). The only person that truly statistically benefits is the coaches because their pay salries are based on the team’s performance. The college athletes sometimes feel used because other people and organizations are profiting by using these athete’s

With debate on whether or not to compensate the college athletes in monetary terms due to the students’ sports talents help their various colleges to receive awards both rewards and cash money, it is important to look at criticisms of the National Collegiate Athletic Association with regards to the association’s advertisement deals of approximately more than a billion shillings profits yet no athlete is being compensated for his or her hard work. That according to Zimbalist (2013) is because the critiques are using the very developments to argue in favour of the payment of the student athletes since the opportunity for education and exposure to earn a professional contract is enough compensation since the cost of paying the student athletes would be too high.

“College football and basketball players are promised an education in exchange for playing on the team” (Zimbalist). Andrew Zimbalist, professor of economics at Smith College, is co-author of "The Sabermetric Revolution: Assessing the Growth of Analytics in Baseball”. Andrew states this fact to emphasize the situation that some argue that college players shouldn’t be getting paid. Typically, the people who feel this way are either coaches, players or the parents of the players. If the college players were to get compensated this would be fair for various reasons. School is in place for you to get an education; playing a sport is considered as an extracurricular activity. In a similar sense college is for expanding your education possible future

On average annually schools make all the way up to over 50 million dollars across every sport in profit. All these schools are making a great deal of money off these star athletes and they are only going to have a bunch a books in return. On the other hand, how could this affect the other programs in the school? This is where the discourse begins on whether we should pay the college athletes or, is a scholarship more than content for the student.

Every year at the beginning of the college football and basketball seasons the same intense debate comes up: should student athletes be compensated for their work. The Chronicle of Higher Education recently estimated that college athletics is a $10-billion marketplace (Suggs). That is $500-million more than Major League Baseball (MLB) (Brown), and $2-billion shy of the National Football League (NFL) (Belzer). It’s quite obvious college sports are making money. However, according to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) rules, “You are not eligible for participation in a sport if you have ever: taken pay, or the promise of pay, for competing in that sport” (NCAA Regulations). While college sports, particularly football, have brought in huge amounts of

Some people say that paying for sports is unacceptable, while the majority of others think paying for sports is great. A high school in Pennsylvania, Red Land High School, raised $55,000 through their football program that enforces the pay-to-play policy. Athletes should pay-to-play for sports because they can use the money to upgrade equipment for athletes, and put money towards academic expenses.

Division 1 athletes have it all: the glory of representing the school’s colors and honor, the pretty girls, televised games, and most have room and board along with classes paid for. Some think that all this is not enough for these young players; they deserve to be paid for their dedication and hard work. This is a very controversial topic because there is such a fine line between professional athletes and amateur athletes. College athletes get scholarship money for performance on the field or court, and the definition of a professional athlete is someone who gets compensation for on field or court performances. When you add a paycheck and

Imagine: it is Thursday afternoon and your first soccer game you were supposed to play is in five minutes but, you were told that you can not play because your family can not afford the uniform or the equipment. Many families a year spend thousands of dollars on sports. Kids just want to have fun enjoying a sport and they can not afford to play it. Sports cost way too much money from the ball to the uniform. Families can not balance the money to pay the gas, snacks, and the essentials.

In today’s society many will argue whether or not professional athletes are overpaid. In the present time athletes are being paid phenomenally large amounts of money for their entertainment. It is my claim that all professional athletes are overpaid because they do not offer society an essential function that improves or enhances our world in comparison to other professionals such as medical doctors, lawyers, and teachers. Society does not value entertainment enough to warrant such high salaries such as those of many professional athletes. There is no reason that these athletes should demand these tremendous amounts of money. This is why you have to put into question their reasoning for demanding

The passages present a discussion about arguments concerning whether or not professional athletes are overpaid. This is an important debate since professional sports represents a multi-billion-dollar-per-year industry. The two positions argue whether or not professional athletes should be paid the large yearly salaries they are paid. Both viewpoints have valid claims warranting consideration. For example, evidence suggests that people with far more important jobs are paid much less than professional athletes; in contrast, opposing evidence suggests that since professional athletes generally have short careers and must train very hard to build and maintain their skills, the higher salary is justified. While both sides of the issue have valid points, the viewpoint that professional athletes are not overpaid is the best-supported position, the position supported by the preponderance of the evidence cited in the passages. The strongest and best reasons supporting this position are that professional athletes must endure grueling and intensive training, they generally have short careers that often end in injury, and the amount that they are thought to be paid is often inflated. Accordingly, these reasons and opposing viewpoints will be discussed next.