It was announced this morning on ESPN that Adrian Peterson believes that college athletes should be paid. This, of course, has been a major talking point as of recent. The immediate knee jerk thought that I had was this: What about actual college students that are not athletes? You know, the ones that actually go to college to get an education so that they can function successfully in the real world (i.e., the world in which most people dont make millions -- or even hundreds of thousands -- of dollars a year in their vocation). The two issues that seem to concern Peterson so much are [1] the money that colleges make from having successful (non-paid) athletes play on their teams, and [2] the potential danger of injuries to those athletes that can end (or lessen) their sports careers before they ever get a real shot at the big bucks. Two thoughts in response to Petersons two concerns: [1] Those star college athletes that have legitimate shots at becoming a pro athlete are typically in college on full ride (or certainly major) scholarships. As a person who had to actually work jobs while in college to pay my way through (like the vast majority of college students do), I cant help but equate full scholarships to some large degree as being pay. In fact, I consider it quite a bit of pay. For every person who completes a college education, somebody, somewhere (whether its the student, the students parents, or some other benefactor) has made a significant monetary investment. For all those who go to college on a full scholarship, someone has paid their college expenses for them. (That truth seems to have become lost in the mix to many folks.) These expenses often include tuition & fees, books, room & board, and various stipends. Folks, that all adds up to big bucks. These are big bucks that full scholarship recipients dont have to pay. That equals money in their pocket. Just ask any of those many, many college grads who are still paying off college loans years after graduation day. [2] As to injuries -- they can happen at any level of sports (or virtually anything else, for that matter). What if Adrian Peterson had suffered a severe football injury while playing neighborhood league football or in high school football, and was unable to later compete at the college level? When you play sports, whether its for money or not, the danger of injury -- even severe injury -- is always present. Thats just a part of reality. Maybe thats a very good reason why every college athlete, who is immensely blessed with the opportunity to even ATTEND college at all, should take every advantage of the ACADEMIC opportunities presented to them. That means, while there, actually taking courses that matter, actually going to those classes, and actually completing the required assignments, papers, projects, and exams for themselves. After all, college is supposed to be primarily about academics and education anyway, i.e., they are institutions of higher learning. In fact, even the reason that many of them are where they are (an athletic scholarship) implies a quest for something more than just athletics -- like, uh, scholarship. Coming out of college with a sheepskin and an education along with the bum-knee incurred while playing college sports is not the worst fate in the world. You may not make the gazillion dollars playing with a ball like youd always thought, but there is a whole lot more to life than having bukoos of money and playing sports. Believe it or not, it is very possible to be successful and live a fulfilled life without being famous and/or having a big bank account. Of course, learning that lesson is also part of being educated. So, big time college athletes (and pro athletes, too), count your many blessings, try to be smart, and stop whining. The rest of us who live in the real world are getting tired of hearing it.
Posted on: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 14:41:04 +0000
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