Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Printable Version
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RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - lex24 - 08-03-2020
(08-02-2020, 04:30 PM)gailtate Wrote: It took the first pandemic in a century combined with the worst racial strife in a half-century, but the money-bloated circus that college football (and all professional sports) has become has us at the tipping point. Young men, just few years out of high school, full of themselves, are "speaking truth to power" (gag) with their newfound voice(s). And I say bless 'em all. I love the agitation and the heartburn/discomfort this must be causing certain oblivious people (Hello, Larry?) right now. People including all the shills in and out of the media and money-grubbers in and out of academia lost in their delusional pipe dreams of the Big Paydays of Saturday Night Lights. Shut down these meaningless, hollow games and defeat this virus. THIS is the only victory worth fighting for in 2020.
This goes beyond the virus. These aren’t simply demands for 2020.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - OutsiderFan - 08-03-2020
Most schools have totally pissed away the high ground they had on emphasizing academic value by lowering entrance standards so they can allow otherwise not capable of getting admitted athletes on campus to generate revenue for the school.
Stanford is probably the only school in the P5 that can legitimately say it truly values academics and doesn't see football players as mercenaries to generate revenue for the school. Now it may be that some or even most Stanford Football players couldn't get into school strictly on academic merits, compared to other applicants, but Stanford has at least set a high bar for minimal academic chops that allows it to credibly say those admitted can do the same work as others who have better grades and test scores. Moreover, there is also a "non-academic talent" component to admission.
If the NCAA required a 3.0 GPA for all scholarship athletes to be admitted to school as undergrads, then you'd have a whole lot of guys not able to qualify, which would be an impetus for a development league like the G league. But the universities have not stuck to what they claim to be, so they have - outside of Stanford - no credibility on the "but you get a scholarship" front. Even Duke famously lowered its admission standards in football a couple years ago after doing it for basketball many years ago, to get better players and ostensibly generate more revenue from football.
The whole enterprise is an exercise in contradictions and hypocrisy. until more schools start acting like Stanford, than the other way around, universities have no leg to stand on when it comes to fighting the players for a larger slice of the revenue pie. They made the bed and now they must lie in it.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - gailtate - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 08:03 AM)lex24 Wrote:(08-02-2020, 04:30 PM)gailtate Wrote: It took the first pandemic in a century combined with the worst racial strife in a half-century, but the money-bloated circus that college football (and all professional sports) has become has us at the tipping point. Young men, just few years out of high school, full of themselves, are "speaking truth to power" (gag) with their newfound voice(s). And I say bless 'em all. I love the agitation and the heartburn/discomfort this must be causing certain oblivious people (Hello, Larry?) right now. People including all the shills in and out of the media and money-grubbers in and out of academia lost in their delusional pipe dreams of the Big Paydays of Saturday Night Lights. Shut down these meaningless, hollow games and defeat this virus. THIS is the only victory worth fighting for in 2020.
This goes beyond the virus. These aren’t simply demands for 2020.
The point is that the College Football Industrial Complex has created a monster it must now deal with.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - BostonCard - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 08:51 AM)gailtate Wrote: The point is that the College Football Industrial Complex has created a monster it must now deal with.
Completely agree with your framing. I could not have said it better myself.
BC
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Farm93 - 08-03-2020
I don't think one should look at the list of demands in the way some of you see them now. This is a negotiation situation. Ask for a lot, so that your core demands look more reasonable.
Already on ESPN and in news outlets I have seen writers focus on a few core demands. They then note the 50% revenue idea is not plausible, and then grant that students should have extended health care benefits, the ability to have input on the COVID19 protocol, etc. etc.
My guess is most players would accept...
1 - Health care benefits for an extended period of time more relevant now since COVID19 could become a preexisting condition.
2 - A COVID19 protocol that gives players a seat at the table on testing, any consideration of the suspension of the season, etc.
3 - The ability for players to support Black Lives Matter (see NBA) without threats of suspensions or revoking scholarships
4 - Some greater ability for players to obtain revenue related to their athletic fame and achievements.
Good for them to do this together across the conference rather than as individual tweets. ESPN reports the number of players is around 400, not sure if that is football only or more sports, but 400 is a big number.
FBS level college football is looking pretty bad right now as they chase tv revenue without a lot of regard for player safety. So the players are in a good place right now to ask for a change to the status quo.
Every other sport with meaningful TV revenue has some form of player representation at the table as the sport attempts to return to activity.
I think it is reasonable for college athletes to demand a level of participation in the return to play plan too since it has become very clear that the conferences are willing to do a lot to collect TV revenue that will go to preserve jobs and maintain lifestyles for a number of administrators while putting the lives, health and livelihood of the athletes at risk.
Good for college kids to organize and demand what they believe is right. It will be difficult for most college presidents to not appreciate this type of leadership effort since most schools consistently imply they are trying to educate future leaders. Hard to claim that is your school's mission when you don't support students as they lead efforts to protect their health, lives and livelihood (looking at you WSU).
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - BostonCard - 08-03-2020
(08-02-2020, 10:27 PM)SamuelMcF Wrote:(08-02-2020, 09:15 PM)2006alum Wrote: Couldn't agree with you more. They started to lose me with CTE and this feels like a "pox on all your houses" turning point. Was I the only one watching the hundreds of "just about all D1 athletes will be going pro in something other than sports" ads? There is no free market for the vast, vast majority of these athletes. If there were, it would already exist. There's not even space for a secondary pro football league. Sheesh.
The bummer here is I truly believe the XFL would've survived had it not been for Covid.
The XFL is "not dead yet". Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson (as part of a partnership) just bought it.
https://www.espn.com/xfl/story/_/id/29588303/dwayne-johnson-investor-group-agree-buy-xfl
BC
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Mick - 08-03-2020
(08-02-2020, 04:17 PM)BobK Wrote: Appears washington State just released a player for standing up for We Are United
We Are United...Or Else.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Phogge - 08-03-2020
These kids have not been raised in a culture of compromise and dealing. Evidenced by a tremendous loss of union represented employment and a Congress biting the heads off each other. In my industry "Runaway productions" have sought right to work states to avoid pension, vacation relief pay for freelancers (built into the Motion Picture Producers studio contracts with the IATSE) and other protections.
It's a brave new world out there in just about every human interaction. In the Sixties it was "If you're not part of the .....," and now signs around Marin say "If you're silent about BLM you are complicit."
As a member of three entertainment unions I have tons of sympathy for the athletes. But I also think that their parents should have been a bit tougher about letting them get their way.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - OutsiderFan - 08-03-2020
This provides great insight into what precipitated the Pac-12 athlete movement:
https://theundefeated.com/features/pac-12-followed-the-money-and-found-a-movement/
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Mick - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 11:13 AM)Phogge Wrote: These kids have not been raised in a culture of compromise and dealing. Evidenced by a tremendous loss of union represented employment and a Congress biting the heads off each other. In my industry "Runaway productions" have sought right to work states to avoid pension, vacation relief pay for freelancers (built into the Motion Picture Producers studio contracts with the IATSE) and other protections.
It's a brave new world out there in just about every human interaction. In the Sixties it was "If you're not part of the .....," and now signs around Marin say "If you're silent about BLM you are complicit."
As a member of three entertainment unions I have tons of sympathy for the athletes. But I also think that their parents should have been a bit tougher about letting them get their way.
I'm 57 and I had a very conservative father, briefly a John Birch member. I had a very liberal mother, who voted for McGovern, who used to dress us up as wounded soldiers every Halloween to protest the Vietnam war and today is solidly progressive. Had I interrupted either of them when they were speaking with another adult, there would have been hell to pay. My kids knew, in the 1990s and early 2000s, that if they needed to interrupt an adult conversation, it was with a polite request and acknowledgement they were interrupting and solely for that purpose. Today's kids? I've had multiple situations in which a pre-teen child interrupts adult conversations for any reason, and the adult doesn't even flinch, doesn't excuse him/herself -- just cuts off the conversation unilaterally to focus on the child. That's the only experience of that nature I've had in the last decade. It just seems so odd to prioritize the whim of a child over an adult conversation.
And that's why these kids feel they have their power base. They don't acknowledge an expensive scholarship to a college that they quite likely would not deserve admission save for their football skills.
And it permeates society, this encroaching sense of entitlement. I have, as noted before, had to furlough about 25% of my workforce. I couldn't furlough two people for a variety of entitlement reasons. One of them, to his good graces, understands that he's protected, acknowledges his limitations and at least he feels bad about his employment and mediocre performance which we must suffer. The other not only fails to acknowledge her privilege, she wallows in it. She embraces it. She's a poor performer, she knows it, she doesn't care, and regularly demands raises, bonuses and promotions.
Need a little Frank Underwood right now...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abnlvAQ_E7I&t=140s
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Jamesy - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 11:43 AM)OutsiderFan Wrote: This provides great insight into what precipitated the Pac-12 athlete movement:
https://theundefeated.com/features/pac-12-followed-the-money-and-found-a-movement/
Interesting stuff from the Stanford representative, Treyjohn Butler.
Quote:From there his conversations turned within the Pac-12, as players asked each other about the COVID-19 protocols at their schools. Butler said his colleagues were jealous of Stanford’s weekly testing and diligence, as they weren’t receiving the same treatment, but many were afraid of opting out of voluntary workouts. “Guys who were at risk and who weren’t comfortable were afraid of getting their money cut. Some guys said they had their money cut.”
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Phogge - 08-03-2020
I don't know but we probably need Frank's spouse, the Princess Bride, and her friend Montoya.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - 81alum - 08-03-2020
(08-02-2020, 04:17 PM)BobK Wrote: Appears washington State just released a player for standing up for We Are United
Yes:
https://dailycaller.com/2020/08/03/report-washington-state-players-released-kassidy-woods/
No:
https://www.saturdaydownsouth.com/sec-football/parent-of-pac-12-player-says-son-others-released-from-team-after-sharing-weareunited-graphic/
I was about to lambast the WSU administration, but it seems we need to know more before drawing conclusions.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - fullmetal - 08-03-2020
It's funny that these high-achievers are being cast as entitled since they've had to bow to the system and succeed within the system for many years before rising to the status of Pac-12 scholarship football players. These are guys who have paid their dues to get to where they are, and if they want to take an active role in the system that makes money off their athleticism, then more power to them. I don't look at them like fungible cogs in the system. These are living, breathing human beings who are more than just entertainment-producers for mass consumption.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - 2006alum - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 07:49 PM)fullmetal Wrote: It's funny that these high-achievers are being cast as entitled since they've had to bow to the system and succeed within the system for many years before rising to the status of Pac-12 scholarship football players. These are guys who have paid their dues to get to where they are, and if they want to take an active role in the system that makes money off their athleticism, then more power to them. I don't look at them like fungible cogs in the system. These are living, breathing human beings who are more than just entertainment-producers for mass consumption.
It's true. They're human beings who graduate as much as $250k less in the hole than some of their peers, for the sole reason that they are entertainment producers for mass consumption.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - lex24 - 08-03-2020
All well and good. But there is not going to be revenue sharing. Period. So if they don’t want to play, fine. Maybe college sports has seen its day. Not sure that’s going to do a whole lot of people any good and of course it will mean a whole lot of people who wouldn’t be able to go to college otherwise won’t be able to. But hey again maybe college sport should end.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Believer - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 09:05 PM)lex24 Wrote: All well and good. But there is not going to be revenue sharing. Period. So if they don’t want to play, fine. Maybe college sports has seen its day. Not sure that’s going to do a whole lot of people any good and of course it will mean a whole lot of people who wouldn’t be able to go to college otherwise won’t be able to. But hey again maybe college sport should end.
Naw, there’s a million developing athletes in HS right now. And that’s just football. Sports isn’t going anywhere. But the athletes who are over stepping their ability likely have seen the field for the last time. Good luck
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - pefloresjr - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 07:49 PM)fullmetal Wrote: It's funny that these high-achievers are being cast as entitled since they've had to bow to the system and succeed within the system for many years before rising to the status of Pac-12 scholarship football players. These are guys who have paid their dues to get to where they are, and if they want to take an active role in the system that makes money off their athleticism, then more power to them. I don't look at them like fungible cogs in the system. These are living, breathing human beings who are more than just entertainment-producers for mass consumption.
Completely agree. It is kind of shocking the way some folks on this board are treating these student athletes like they exist in the collegiate environment for no other reason than to provide entertainment and that they should shut up and be grateful. That is the most entitled view I see in this situation. Just because they are standing up for themselves and seeking to improve their position does not mean that they are spoiled brats. It means they have learned something about what it means to join forces, listen to each other, and fight for improvements.
I don't agree with many of their demands and there are many that I don't believe they will ever get. However, I am glad they are getting together and pushing for improvements particularly in the healthcare area. Are we really calling them brats when they want coverage for continuing health conditions for only six years after college? I, for one, would make a special donation to the Buck Cardinal Club to support our student athletes' post college healthcare costs. For me, the bottom line is that they should have a say in the way they are treated. They aren't joining the military where they become GI assets. They are college students.
I went to Stanford on general financial aid and a special minority student scholarship. When I was there, there was no First Gen./Low Income support program. It would have helped improve my experience if there were. If I had realized that such support was possible and started getting people together and advocating for those things, maybe even "boycotting" some classes, would that have made me an over-entitled brat? I don't think so. I think the minority scholarship issue is particularly relevant here because the student athletes in major college football are largely minority students.
Please understand that I agree that many in the younger generations are overly entitled. I just don't see any particular sense of that even in asking for an even split in revenues. I wish most colleges really brought in student athletes who were within the normal admission range for other students because the athletes would be more likely to take advantage of the opportunities at the colleges. At a minimum, colleges should provide programs that help bridge the achievement gap for their student athletes. However, we all know that many colleges don't do that and really treat the athletes like paid entertainers. Since that seems to be the main structure of the major money making male sports, it shouldn't be a surprise that those entertainers want to get more of their share.
I don't really want to see student athletes paid, but I am trying to remain open-minded about ways to improve their experience. That might include some payment that could go into a trust like child actors. I know the college athletes aren't children but there may be ways to find compromise and solutions that don't involve eliminating college sports or forcing those who seek change out of college sports.
Cheers,
Pete F.
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - teejers1 - 08-03-2020
(08-03-2020, 10:09 PM)pefloresjr Wrote: I don't really want to see student athletes paid, but I am trying to remain open-minded about ways to improve their experience. That might include some payment that could go into a trust like child actors. I know the college athletes aren't children but there may be ways to find compromise and solutions that don't involve eliminating college sports or forcing those who seek change out of college sports.
Cheers,
Pete F.
How about this for improving the experience of the collegiate athlete:
1. LESS mandated times to work on your sport. Make the demands of playing the sport LESS (not more) on campuses across the land;
2. If they still want to get paid for all "the value" they bring, then have them take their value to D-league in hoops and football. Make the NFL fund its own D-League (like hoops and baseball do).
That is the path to get college sports more in line with what college sports should be about. Some may want to get rid of athletic scholarships altogether. In principle, I see the purity of that view; however, I think there is value to giving kids a chance to experience college who otherwise might not be able to do so. [I know that's a quaint, outdated view in this money-first society, but . . . well, there it is].
RE: Pac-12 (Football) Players Demands - Phogge - 08-04-2020
Are they willing to negotiate? If not they have no chance. They need two things immediately. One is solidarity and the other is labor help from the outside in the form of advisers who have spent their careers in labor negotiations. Somebody like Marvin Miller.
I imagine some schools are terrified but Stanford doesn’t need athletics. There is so much going on in medicine and science and there is no shortage of high school apps.
Self funded club sports will give kids activities to round out their education along with a healthy intramural system.
But if all that happened what would King Arriaga do?