Pay to Play

Being an NCAA student athlete isn't a cakewalk. On top of their studies, student athletes have to find time for practice. In addition, vast blocks of time are consumed as a product of travelling across the country to play in away games.

 Football players bring in billions of dollars alone in revenue for their respective colleges. The same goes for baseball and basketball players. Football players, however, are extremely prone to injury, and if they cannot perform, they lose access to scholarship money.

Athletes in these big-money sports should earn a small stipend for their work. They put in an extreme number of hours to go along with the hours they invest in their academic work.

It's hard to justify punishing someone for working a paid internship, student athlete or not.

Now, sports such as lacrosse, golf and volleyball do not produce the massive revenues that football does. That isn't to say that athletes in such sports work any less than do other athletes. However, are they as deserving as the others are?

To that, I would say ‘yes,' if you give a $500-a-month blanket amount to each athlete. Additional need-based assistance could then be granted to those who live at or below the poverty line.

A dispute could potentially arise if one player performs better than another does. Should that play into how much the out-performer receives? Athletes may be less inclined to perform if they know that another is making more than they are. In this case, we have to consider what made them perform prior to finding out about the difference. They are still trying to get drafted into a professional league, and as such will not purposely play worse.

The main reason for this stipend is that there are players out there who are on a full ride but are still so poor that they can barely afford basic necessities. These players can't take a job because they already have a huge time commitment to sports and academics.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, for example, reported that University of Pittsburgh basketball player Tray Woodall has to share shoes with his sister because they can't afford multiple pairs.

The basketball program generated more than $13 million for Pitt in 2010-2011, and the coach for the program has been making more than $2 million annually.

Despite the fact that Woodall was a on a full-ride scholarship, $2,986 of his academic fees were not covered. On top of paying for other basic needs, this amount is still too much for those below the poverty line.

Seeing how much these coaches make, and the amount of revenue the Pitt men's basketball program alone generated for the school, it doesn't seem like too much to ask to pay these players a small stipend to help them along.