The most important play in college sports won?t unfold on a football field.
Instead, in the excitement-parched environment of a court room, amid the ties and suits and volumes of text that could leach the drama out of a moon landing, a judge will rule in a case that could stand college athletics on its head.
No small feat, considering how pointy it is.
Some former athletes, including former UCLA basketball player Ed O?Bannon, want to strip the NCAA and member colleges of the source of much of their power ? their cash flow.
I won?t lay out all the legalities. I would probably get something wrong and there would go my case, besides which, I get paid too little to be that bored but too much to be that boring.
Essentially, former athletes are taking the NCAA, the entity that governs college sports in reality and the multi-verse in its own mind, to court over licensing of images, names and a host of other things.
Very profitable things. Hundreds of millions of dollars worth for the NCAA and member institutions.
The haggling right now is whether the suit can go forward as a class action suit that includes current athletes as well.
One minor sticking point ? no current NCAA athletes are a party to it.
Gee, I wonder why. Maybe for the same reason college athletes sign the NCAA?s licensing agreement ? no sign, no play.
Legal types believe the possibility of a class action suit is a big deal. It would multiply the stakes tremendously, instead of limiting any damages to licensing agreements, transactions and athletes long discarded.
But to me, as rivetingly uninteresting as all that is, the essential point is a lot simpler and more interesting.
Where besides college athletics can a person not own their own image or profit from their highly valuable labor?
Sure, college athletes attend college on a free-ride scholarship (and I?m equally sure a choice few get free-ride rides). The NCAA believes (or least argues, not the same thing), that a college education is payment of a sort for all the hundreds of millions of dollars athletics generates.
And it is true that the majority of athletes in most sports (they don?t call them nonrevenue for nothing) aren?t household names with the earning potential of a new MacBook.
But what does any of that have to do with the Johnny Manziels of the world?
The Texas A&M quarterback can?t sell so much as T-shirt with his face on it, pose for a calendar for coffee money or do any of a number of lucrative things that you or I could do. Except we can?t, because nobody cares about us. They do care about guys like Johnny Football.
And the NCAA and member institutions make the most of it.
I find it supremely ironic that NCAA colleges, most funded by their respective states, fire off carefully worded agreements with their mandatory credential applications for athletic events.
There is a lot of legalese (sort of computerese but less understandable) in these, but basically they say the college retains the rights to all images, and you can?t take photos, videos, drawings, sketches, cave paintings or doodles except for the severe limits set by the school.
Punishable by revocation of the press credential.
OK, so sometimes that might be a blessing.
But the point is this: This is an institution that won?t let an athlete benefit a nickel from the same skills that will make him a millionaire when class is dismissed.
This is an institution that belongs to a governing body that produces nothing, nada, zip, but sells the labor and images of unpaid teenagers.
The NCAA collects money from colleges, manages playoffs, such as the NCAA Tournament, and collects the fat proceeds.
In fairness, the NCAA does look out for its member schools, particularly the smaller schools, and makes a gesture at watching such things as eligibility and recruiting, and routinely produces insanities like the Academic Progress Report.
And if the NCAA loses control over the earning power of its top athletes, no can predict what that will mean for the college sports we all love. And we do love them ? that?s why there is so much money at stake.
It would certainly mean more change in store for athletics and less change in the till for the NCAA and member institutions.
The upheaval that might bring isn?t only scary to the NCAA.
But there is something unfair about anything that denies someone the right to make pennies off his potential, then lets others rake in millions off that same potential.
Class action? More like no-class action.
Anthony Stastny is sports editor of the Savannah Morning News. Contact him at 912-652-0356 or anthony.stastny@savannahnow.com.
Source: http://savannahnow.com/sports/2013-06-29/anthony-stastny-former-athletes-vs-ncaa-imagine
Winsor McCay Amanda Todd washington nationals Gary Collins bus driver uppercut Alex Karras BCS Rankings 2012
No comments:
Post a Comment