Amateurism vs Professionalism

History was made on Lebron James’ show, “The Shop” when SB 206 (Fair Pay to Play Act) was signed by Governor Gavin Newsom of California. Many former and current players are supporters of the bill. On air, James imaged how life would have been like had he attended college. Stating, “...if I would have gone to a big name college that 23 jersey would be sold all over the place… and me and my mom didn’t have anything, and we wouldn’t have been able to benefit from it.” (ESPN 2019). This bill allows college student-athletes the ability to profit off their name, image, and likeness. There are still questions about what the law is all about. Like does it include sponsorship dividends? And what this means for college sports. Although what it will do is open a discussion about what college athletics is concerning and what the college athlete is worth.

According to State Senator Nancy Skinner, the NCAA has opposed the bill from the start. She stated, “The NCAA has told (me) that they will ban California schools if they do not drop the bill” (Murphy 2019). It’s possible that California schools will not be able to participate in championship tournaments, and school officials will not implement the policy (Murphy, 2019). Being barred from playing in National Championship games would take a toll on recruiting, fundraising, and have numerous other unforeseen consequences.

Monetizing children could be a new epidemic sweeping across lower income areas as parents strive to make more money. Or in some cases, parents will seek fame over fortune, seen sporadically with the Ball family. Parents may start training their kids at 4 and 5 years old in ways we’ve never seen before. Sports will become a job instead of play. With this bill passed, how early will companies be responsible for talking to kids to promote their brand? Kids should be focused on friendships, school, and sports, but not “building their brands,” dieting, and training before homework.

The bill may change the early development of an athlete; the fact is that parents are already pushing their kids to train earlier in youth. This bill allows players to be able to make money from their talent. Kids are investing in their brands with social media and will enable them to make money off their work. Technology allows social media bloggers and things like Hoopmixtape to make a killing. Taking the marketplace landscape into account, what is the difference between a social media star who posts about makeup, and a D1 college athlete? When it comes to popularity, nothing. The only difference is under the NCAA model, the D1 athlete can’t make any money off their brand, and the school can make billions off them. In 2017, the NCAA made 1.1 billion in revenue (Berkowitz 2018). (It sounds like a fun legal quandary between LLC and athletes.) More money is missing. This total doesn’t consider what the school generates from the players. The NCAA may argue that they aren’t professionals, and they, as amateurs are receiving a free education. The reality is that the scholarship only covers playing for the team and doesn’t include talking to the media, community events, travel, and other duties. A college athlete essentially has a professional athlete’s schedule but can’t be compensated, with homework to boot. College players pose for magazines and contribute their names, stories, backgrounds, and who they are to a school, and earn nothing in return. Securing no money for hard work is not what America believes. This country was founded on capitalism because that drives innovation, and refusing to pay adults who are of legal age for their valuable service is borderline criminal.

The bill will not go into effect until 2023, so there is still time to figure out what the real implementation will be and how it will change the game of college athletics. Other states are already looking at this bill and are interested in making their versions. States such as Florida and New York could shift the whole argument in the bill’s favor. With such large markets involved, the NCAA will have to listen, and this could be the push that makes it an NCAA policy and not just a state by state policy. However, if California is the only state willing to implement this law, then schools will have a tough decision to make. Will they decide to accept the NCAA ruling or they will join with other California schools to create a new league. (Murphy,2019) This policy may bring in a couple more top recruits to California, but more than likely most players will still be going to schools outside of California. The bill won’t change much for most athletes in their day to day life. There are very few athletes whose profitability is high enough to become valuable faces of brands for more than a couple years. Those athletes are already busy running, training, studying, gaining skills, attending clinics, and becoming better. However, for a very few numbers of athletes, they will be making close to the same amounts as professional’s endorsement deal. The new law may keep athletes in college longer and finish their degrees because, for students who grew up in poverty, their focus is to go to the professional leagues for money. There is still time for both parties to work this bill out, which will create discussions for many years to come.

Originally Posted October 23, 2019: https://www.sports-management-consulting.com/blog/amateurism-vs-professionalism

References

Berkowitz, S. (2018, March 8). NCAA reports revenues of more than $1 billion in 2017. Retrieved October 15, 2019, from https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/2018/03/07/ncaa-reports-revenues-more-than-1-billion-2017/402486002/.

[ESPN] (September 30,2019. “LeBron James honored to be involved with California law defying NCAA | ESPN”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTVf5A4hhxk

Murphy, D. (2019, September 30). California defies NCAA as Gov. Gavin Newsom signs into law Fair Pay to Play Act. Retrieved October 3, 2019, from https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/27735933/california-defies-ncaa-gov-gavin-newsom-signs-law-fair-pay-play-act