Is it time to pay (some) college athletes?

[Water Pony]

Chicago Tribune writer asks the question:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/co ... 454.column

This slippery slope will require further separation of the student body from FB and BB players, which I submit is not a good thing. Second, determining which, is any, Men and Women scholarship students,(revenue and non-revenue sports presumably or not) will not be easy. Lastly, the costs to athletic budgets (mostly in the red) will be increasing difficult, especially for non-BCS programs.

Since BCS schools will further distance themselves from the have-nots, perhaps they can fund the costs? Or, the salaries/incomes for head FB coaches ($2-4m) and BB too should be reduced? They are teachers, right?

[EastStang]

If they start to pay, schools like Duke, Vandy, Stanford will also be looking at whether its worth it or not. Also, Title IX would probably require that if you pay male athletes, you have to pay the female ones. Which is more than a trickle of money. At that point, as much as it pains me to say this, SMU should try and form leagues with the schools that opt out. Perhaps that old Magnolia League wouldn't look so bad then. Let's be honest even, if its $200/mo/scholarship athlete. That's real money. My guess is that it would be more than $200/mo., too.

[Stallion]

No they shouldn't pay athletes. They should remove all obstacles to players turning professional and let the scum go professional if they want. I won't miss them. They don't belong in college athletics. As always I remain open to cost of living scholarships

[leopold]

First of all, needy student athletes and the scandle now taking place at OSU have no buisiness being mentioned in the same breath.

But whatever - the writer has to make a living too.

- There are those in the Big Ten who think they can fund all student athletes - that's why they are talking about it. The SEC (Vandy) others won't be far behind. Obviously UT has been in that stratosphere for a while.

- The Magnolia League will then look even dumber to VU, Duke, Miami, and any other school able to pay the stipend. My father was on scholarship at Vandy in the early 1970's and got laundry money (I think $15/week) as part of his scholarship. They will have no problem doing this IF they can afford it.

- Olympic sports are starting to bring in a few pennies now, too. HOCKEY has the largest crowds now. UT is going to make 12M/year on their network, but show only, what, 1 football game? Other sports will fill that void. I have the Big Ten Network, it's every olympic sport you could imagine. Anybody watch either the College World Series or the NCAA Lacross Tourney? I've seen NCAA WOMENS BOWLING (possibly the uglies female athletes EVER) on ESPN. It's every sport now.

It could very well be that this is the issue that separates the halves and have nots.

[Charleston Pony]

No they shouldn't pay athletes. They should remove all obstacles to players turning professional and let the scum go professional if they want. I won't miss them. They don't belong in college athletics. As always I remain open to cost of living scholarships

I agree the only way to clean things up is to give the kid coming right out of H.S. a professional alternative, but that would require the NFL to build a minor league network, similar to what MLB does. I don't see the NFL wanting to foot the bill for that and I'm not sure the college presidents really want to risk losing the cash cow that football has become.

As for "paying" players, most schools hand out scholarships that include monthly stipends for students they really value. The top student athletes are valued, right? The problem, once again is that the rich will just get richer and we would see more separation than already exists...not to mention where do you draw the line?

[peruna81]

Spurrier and several other SEC coaches 'volunteered' to 'donate' $300 per game to each football player out of his own salary to help out with 'expenses' this week. Interesting if the NCAA would consider this a violation for inducement, or if 'hypothetical' is allowed.

Jokes to follow.