Quote Originally Posted by Extendedcab View Post
Your reasoning in point #1 is ass backwards.

The athletes are STUDENTS, you had to qualify to be a student first, and sports is a past time or extracurricular activity that you have to qualify for in order to participate - a C average or that was the intent years ago.

Student athletes are NOT employees of the university like the coaches are. They are given a scholarship, if they are good enough, to help cover the cost of their education. Even the IRS recognizes the difference between a scholarship and being an employee - employees have to pay taxes on the money they receive from their employees as that is earned income where student athlete with a scholarship do not as long as the money is used to pay for reasonable education related expenses. This is how kids, in days past, who may not normally be able to afford college were able to attend and better their life thru a college education.

The idea of student athletes - amateurs, receiving money for pay or name image and likeness (NIL), has only been an issue in recent years. The question is WHY - WHY NOW? The answer is PURE GREED! Years ago when stadiums were relatively small compared to today (22,000 at MSU vs 65,000 today) plus televised games were a rarity unless you were highly ranked or some high profile named rivalry game. The point is, years ago not much money, relatively speaking, was made by the university. Not much money, not much interest in NIL concepts.

But now, since most games are televised and stadiums have increased dramatically, so has revenue for the university. Now everybody suddenly wants a piece of the big ole pie, including the poor ole student athlete who gets a free education, room, meals and tutoring, plus other perks I am sure I am unaware of!

Turning amateur college athletics into a pro league is turning A LOT of fans off. If you wonder why our NIL fund is not as big as say other schools who have a handful of crazy rich donors, look no further as most everyday fans do not want to pay, some can't pay, a STUDENT to play sports.

I get being competitive and so does the average fan, but turning STUDENT athletes into pros is not the way to do it! It is ruining college sports and if this keeps going it will ruin high school sports as well!

This is PURE GREED and is very quickly ruining college athletics!

Have the universities create a pro farm league, for those pro minded and physically gifted, separate from the university itself where now TRUE STUDENT ATHLETES can compete at the collegiate (amateur) level.
The irony of your post is you claim student athletes are greedy?. Then proceed to list all the ways they are bringing in money for the universities? yet somehow go back to them being greedy because they would like to be benefactors of a portion of that? its like you wrote this with the intention to contradict yourself.

Make it make sense.