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The facts indicate that the revenue sport business is marked by such extreme workforce exploitation, educational compromise, and commercial overindulgence that, rather than being part of a university’s educational purpose, the sports business has arguably become a purpose unto itself that undermines trustees’ effort to fulfill their educational responsibilities.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/20...s-deserves-collapse/

The business of college sports deserves to collapse


WILLIAM DEVINE
 January 5 at 3:00 AM ET


Charlie Baker, former two-term Massachusetts governor, will be the next president of the NCAA, the nonprofit sporting association formed by the trustees of 1,100 American universities and colleges. He thus will be the new man overseeing the business model for football and men’s basketball, the two sports that generate virtually all the revenue the trustees collect from college sports. That’s the business model that lets schools take eight-figure annual slices from a multi-billion dollar TV deal pie, lets bureaucrats and men who teach football and basketball earn seven- and eight-figure annual salaries, and forbids players from earning wages from schools.


According to Duke University trustee and former NBA star Grant Hill, who was on the search committee that selected Baker, the NCAA needs to “realize the opportunities and overcome the challenges” facing it. The statement implies that the revenue sport business model is worth saving.
What to know about Charlie Baker taking over as NCAA president: Major issues, salary, and more
.

If Baker asks legal counsel to evaluate that business model for regulatory risks, however, they could easily conclude that the situation is far more dire than Hill suggests. They could look past Monday night’s Texas Christian-Georgia championship game and look past the reports that the annual TV revenue for the college football playoff might soon rocket from $470 million to $2 billion. They could conclude that the revenue sport business model has warped higher education into a corrosive shell of the societal force it could be and make a strong case for dismantling it. Why? As a lawyer who evaluates regulatory risks for clients, I see the NCAA’s business model falling on the wrong side of too many facts and too many laws to be defended.
Lessons in educational compromise
.

In a 2021 case, NCAA v. Alston, the Supreme Court signaled that, given the chance, it might well rule that the association’s business model violates federal antitrust laws. Those laws prohibit agreements that restrain trade in interstate commerce, and the 1,100 schools’ longstanding policy of prohibiting each other from paying a player a wage is likely a prohibited agreement.


So consider Baker’s plight if university trustees ask him to go to Congress to renew his predecessor’s plea for new laws that would help the trustees keep the business model humming.


First, the list of facts he would probably want to avoid discussing in such a hearing is long.


He would likely not talk much, for example, about workforce exploitation. No mention of Texas A&M’s annual revenue split with its football players. Figuring the players’ cut to be the value of their scholarships, I calculate that the split is about $143 million to $3.8 million, or 38-to-1.


No mention of the University of Kentucky’s annual revenue split with its men’s basketball players. In a world where the annual owner-player revenue split for both the NBA and the NFL is approximately 1-to-1, the split at Kentucky appears to be about $55 million to $600,000, or 91-to-1.


Probably little discussion of how, in using players’ love of playing as a lever for avoiding paying them a wage, the trustees’ business model edges into the territory of stealing player souls.


If he travels to Capitol Hill, Baker would likely not talk much about commercial overindulgence. Little discussion of how, in 40 of the 50 states, the highest-paid person on the state’s payroll is a man who teaches football at a public university. Little discussion of UCLA, which in 2020 paid the football coach $4.3 million, the basketball coach $3.6 million, the football coach fired in 2017 another $3 million, and $1.2 million more to the basketball coach fired in 2018. The school recently announced that its athletic department is $103 million in debt.


Under questioning in Congress, Baker would probably gloss over education. No mention of the 2018 College Sport Research Institute report showing that men’s basketball players at the nation’s 65 biggest basketball universities graduated at a rate that was 35 percentage points lower than the rate for the other men at those schools.


No mention of the Institute’s 2019 report showing that football players at the nation’s 10 top-ranked football universities graduated at a rate that was 27 percentage points lower than the rate for other men.
No mention of how the University of Georgia and its peers in the NCAA fire men who lead revenue sport teams not because players don’t do well in school, but because teams lose games.

No mention of how the men who lead football and basketball teams at less prominent schools know this win-centric reality and know their current job can be a stepping stone to a job with a seven-figure salary. No mention of the three men who’ve gone from coaching at Valdosta State, whose football player graduation rate in recent years averaged 40 percent, to Southeastern Conference schools that all pay a multimillion-dollar annual salary to the man running the football department.

No mention of how, thanks in part to these hiring and firing practices, educational compromise ripples through all levels of the 1,100 schools in the NCAA.


Baker would also likely steer clear of detailing how the trustees’ business model teaches 20 million students a corrupting lesson in prime time every autumn Saturday and every March weekend. The lesson is plain: Talk about honesty and values is fine in those seminars on “Doctor Faustus,” but when billions of dollars are on the table, exploiting whomever you need to exploit to pocket the dollars is OK.


Living outside the laws


Now consider all the legislation Baker might have to convince Congress to pass to keep the business model lawful. That’s a long list, too.


In addition to some sort of antitrust law relief to protect against the risk looming in the wake of the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Alston case, the NCAA’s business model may also need protection from worker compensation laws and tax laws. The National Labor Relations Board recently reviewed complaints by USC revenue sport players that they are employees of the university, its conference, and the NCAA, and that they thus deserve fair-market compensation for their work. The Board determined that the complaints “have merit.”


If the Board determines the players are employees and they start to receive compensation, the likelihood increases that schools will have to pay players benefits under state worker compensation laws. Similarly, the likelihood increases that football and men’s basketball revenues will be taxed under federal tax laws. Schools would owe such taxes because the revenues would be seen as earned from a business unrelated to the schools’ educational purpose. The NCAA itself would owe the taxes because it would then be seen as fostering competition among paid employees, not amateurs.


Left as is, these laws could have an astonishing financial impact on the business model. A pro-player antitrust case ruling could require the schools to allow each other to pay the players. An agreement to pay the players a pittance would likely not comply with such a ruling. A reasonable revenue split with them would almost certainly cause the total financial outlay provided to football and men’s basketball players to soar.


Compliance with Title IX, which prohibits discrimination in higher education on the basis of sex, would then require a corresponding increase in the amount of aid and/or payments given to female players. Add on the worker compensation and tax costs, and operating the model could become a fiscal impossibility.


In July 2020, the trustees sent Baker’s predecessor to a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing to ask for new laws that would exempt the business model from antitrust laws and prevent revenue sport players from ever being considered employees. The trustees told him to pick up a third law, too, if he could. That one would preempt state laws allowing players to make endorsement deals and curtail players’ deal-making freedom.

Baker’s predecessor did not return from the halls of Congress with the hoped-for Preemption Exemption Gift Basket Deluxe. But even if he had, and even if Congress had thrown in a Title IX exemption for good measure, trustees would still face significant legal risks connected to the business model of big-time college sports. State laws governing charitable corporations in California, Texas, Florida, and most everywhere else require trustees to operate their university in accordance with its institutional purpose — i.e., education. The laws empower attorneys general to force compliance with this requirement. The laws also set standards for trustee liability when duties are breached.


Why does this matter? The facts indicate that the revenue sport business is marked by such extreme workforce exploitation, educational compromise, and commercial overindulgence that, rather than being part of a university’s educational purpose, the sports business has arguably become a purpose unto itself that undermines trustees’ effort to fulfill their educational responsibilities.


State laws governing charitable corporations may be the legal reckoning that not even Baker’s formidable political acumen can help trustees avoid.
Baker’s appointment represents a moment of truth for trustees. Perhaps based on his experience as a college athlete and a governor, Baker can help them see that, while basketball and football are gateways to experiences that can border on sublime, operating billion-dollar leagues for these sports is not the job of higher education trustees. Educating students all the way to graduation is.


William Devine is an attorney in Silicon Valley specializing in regulatory risk. He once coached a season of basketball at Menlo College in California.


** The dream is free. Work ethic sold separately. **

Last edited by RJM
Original Post

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RJM - can't get at the link, but I get the message.  Not a big shocker, and definitely a concern for the future of college sports.   Murray Sperber wrote about this topic in 2000 in his book "Beer and Circus" which I've referenced previously on this web site.  I read the book many years ago and found it eye opening as a youth sports parent.   Some of our HSBBWeb old timers (at the time) didn't like the message I was sharing and felt it left college baseball very vulnerable as a non-revenue sport.  This is totally understandable.   Sperber knew what he was talking about in 2000, but I'm not sure he could have foreseen where college sports is today.   

https://fee.org/articles/beer-...rgraduate-education/

I don’t get why the NCAA chose Baker to lead them.  I understand a politician. That might be needed for the situation that  the NCAA finds themselves, but a NE governor?  That makes no sense.  It would have been better to have some one with more connections to DC and from the south.  Those that know a lot more about this then me are saying that this hire looks like a big misstep.  Guess time will tell.

He’s a former D1 athlete. He’s the former CEO of a healthcare company he saved from the ledge of bankruptcy and made it very successful. He’s known for being able to negotiate both sides of the aisle. He’s very respected as a governor around the country and in Washington. He has more Washington clout than the typical non Washington politician.  He’s also very emotionally composed. Sometimes physical stature comes into play when speaking and selling your ideas in front of a crowd (DC). He’s 6’6”.

@RJM posted:

He’s a former D1 athlete. He’s the former CEO of a healthcare company he saved from the ledge of bankruptcy and made it very successful. He’s known for being able to negotiate both sides of the aisle. He’s very respected as a governor around the country and in Washington. He has more Washington clout than the typical non Washington politician.  He’s also very emotionally composed. Sometimes physical stature comes into play when speaking and selling your ideas in front of a crowd (DC). He’s 6’6”.

No one cares to listen to us debate Baker, but he was not a D1 athlete, though I’m sure he would have liked to have been.  

The rest of your post goes to my point that he is not what is needed for federal antitrust regulation.  State healthcare in Massachusetts, he is your guy.  The 6’6” is just a non sequitur.  

Like I said time will tell how successful he will be.

No one cares to listen to us debate Baker, but he was not a D1 athlete, though I’m sure he would have liked to have been.  

The rest of your post goes to my point that he is not what is needed for federal antitrust regulation.  State healthcare in Massachusetts, he is your guy.  The 6’6” is just a non sequitur.  

Like I said time will tell how successful he will be.

He was recruited to Harvard for basketball, played a year of JV (as required then) and walked away from the game.

He’s also a very successful businessman and politician with a national profile. You don’t think that plays in Washington?

if you don’t think height matters in business, you’re wrong. Lack of height can be compensated for. But looks and height are positive starting points for intelligent people. Did you know Robert Shapiro always looked up in court to prevent opposing lawyers from seeing the top of his head? He was only 5’10”.

My daughter is 5’10”. In heels she’s 6’1”. She’s amused all the lawyers who are shorter think she’s a bitch. What she is, is tall, good looking, bright and successful. When she was a prosecutor she had the highest prosecution rate.

Last edited by RJM

The Boston Globe guy is right at every point, and I hope it all collapses as he predicts.  In fact, what I would like would be for "college" football and basketball teams to be private, independent entities with athlete-employees, branded for the universities.  Sports would continue, just not in the same way.

The article was written by a lawyer from Silicon Valley. He coached basketball at Menlo College, a D2.

@RJM posted:

The facts indicate that the revenue sport business is marked by such extreme workforce exploitation, educational compromise, and commercial overindulgence that, rather than being part of a university’s educational purpose, the sports business has arguably become a purpose unto itself that undermines trustees’ effort to fulfill their educational responsibilities.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/20...s-deserves-collapse/

The business of college sports deserves to collapse


WILLIAM DEVINE
 January 5 at 3:00 AM ET


Charlie Baker, former two-term Massachusetts governor, will be the next president of the NCAA, the nonprofit sporting association formed by the trustees of 1,100 American universities and colleges. He thus will be the new man overseeing the business model for football and men’s basketball, the two sports that generate virtually all the revenue the trustees collect from college sports. That’s the business model that lets schools take eight-figure annual slices from a multi-billion dollar TV deal pie, lets bureaucrats and men who teach football and basketball earn seven- and eight-figure annual salaries, and forbids players from earning wages from schools.


According to Duke University trustee and former NBA star Grant Hill, who was on the search committee that selected Baker, the NCAA needs to “realize the opportunities and overcome the challenges” facing it. The statement implies that the revenue sport business model is worth saving.
What to know about Charlie Baker taking over as NCAA president: Major issues, salary, and more
.

If Baker asks legal counsel to evaluate that business model for regulatory risks, however, they could easily conclude that the situation is far more dire than Hill suggests. They could look past Monday night’s Texas Christian-Georgia championship game and look past the reports that the annual TV revenue for the college football playoff might soon rocket from $470 million to $2 billion. They could conclude that the revenue sport business model has warped higher education into a corrosive shell of the societal force it could be and make a strong case for dismantling it. Why? As a lawyer who evaluates regulatory risks for clients, I see the NCAA’s business model falling on the wrong side of too many facts and too many laws to be defended.
Lessons in educational compromise
.

In a 2021 case, NCAA v. Alston, the Supreme Court signaled that, given the chance, it might well rule that the association’s business model violates federal antitrust laws. Those laws prohibit agreements that restrain trade in interstate commerce, and the 1,100 schools’ longstanding policy of prohibiting each other from paying a player a wage is likely a prohibited agreement.


So consider Baker’s plight if university trustees ask him to go to Congress to renew his predecessor’s plea for new laws that would help the trustees keep the business model humming.


First, the list of facts he would probably want to avoid discussing in such a hearing is long.


He would likely not talk much, for example, about workforce exploitation. No mention of Texas A&M’s annual revenue split with its football players. Figuring the players’ cut to be the value of their scholarships, I calculate that the split is about $143 million to $3.8 million, or 38-to-1.


No mention of the University of Kentucky’s annual revenue split with its men’s basketball players. In a world where the annual owner-player revenue split for both the NBA and the NFL is approximately 1-to-1, the split at Kentucky appears to be about $55 million to $600,000, or 91-to-1.


Probably little discussion of how, in using players’ love of playing as a lever for avoiding paying them a wage, the trustees’ business model edges into the territory of stealing player souls.


If he travels to Capitol Hill, Baker would likely not talk much about commercial overindulgence. Little discussion of how, in 40 of the 50 states, the highest-paid person on the state’s payroll is a man who teaches football at a public university. Little discussion of UCLA, which in 2020 paid the football coach $4.3 million, the basketball coach $3.6 million, the football coach fired in 2017 another $3 million, and $1.2 million more to the basketball coach fired in 2018. The school recently announced that its athletic department is $103 million in debt.


Under questioning in Congress, Baker would probably gloss over education. No mention of the 2018 College Sport Research Institute report showing that men’s basketball players at the nation’s 65 biggest basketball universities graduated at a rate that was 35 percentage points lower than the rate for the other men at those schools.


No mention of the Institute’s 2019 report showing that football players at the nation’s 10 top-ranked football universities graduated at a rate that was 27 percentage points lower than the rate for other men.
No mention of how the University of Georgia and its peers in the NCAA fire men who lead revenue sport teams not because players don’t do well in school, but because teams lose games.

No mention of how the men who lead football and basketball teams at less prominent schools know this win-centric reality and know their current job can be a stepping stone to a job with a seven-figure salary. No mention of the three men who’ve gone from coaching at Valdosta State, whose football player graduation rate in recent years averaged 40 percent, to Southeastern Conference schools that all pay a multimillion-dollar annual salary to the man running the football department.

No mention of how, thanks in part to these hiring and firing practices, educational compromise ripples through all levels of the 1,100 schools in the NCAA.


Baker would also likely steer clear of detailing how the trustees’ business model teaches 20 million students a corrupting lesson in prime time every autumn Saturday and every March weekend. The lesson is plain: Talk about honesty and values is fine in those seminars on “Doctor Faustus,” but when billions of dollars are on the table, exploiting whomever you need to exploit to pocket the dollars is OK.


Living outside the laws


Now consider all the legislation Baker might have to convince Congress to pass to keep the business model lawful. That’s a long list, too.


In addition to some sort of antitrust law relief to protect against the risk looming in the wake of the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Alston case, the NCAA’s business model may also need protection from worker compensation laws and tax laws. The National Labor Relations Board recently reviewed complaints by USC revenue sport players that they are employees of the university, its conference, and the NCAA, and that they thus deserve fair-market compensation for their work. The Board determined that the complaints “have merit.”


If the Board determines the players are employees and they start to receive compensation, the likelihood increases that schools will have to pay players benefits under state worker compensation laws. Similarly, the likelihood increases that football and men’s basketball revenues will be taxed under federal tax laws. Schools would owe such taxes because the revenues would be seen as earned from a business unrelated to the schools’ educational purpose. The NCAA itself would owe the taxes because it would then be seen as fostering competition among paid employees, not amateurs.


Left as is, these laws could have an astonishing financial impact on the business model. A pro-player antitrust case ruling could require the schools to allow each other to pay the players. An agreement to pay the players a pittance would likely not comply with such a ruling. A reasonable revenue split with them would almost certainly cause the total financial outlay provided to football and men’s basketball players to soar.


Compliance with Title IX, which prohibits discrimination in higher education on the basis of sex, would then require a corresponding increase in the amount of aid and/or payments given to female players. Add on the worker compensation and tax costs, and operating the model could become a fiscal impossibility.


In July 2020, the trustees sent Baker’s predecessor to a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing to ask for new laws that would exempt the business model from antitrust laws and prevent revenue sport players from ever being considered employees. The trustees told him to pick up a third law, too, if he could. That one would preempt state laws allowing players to make endorsement deals and curtail players’ deal-making freedom.

Baker’s predecessor did not return from the halls of Congress with the hoped-for Preemption Exemption Gift Basket Deluxe. But even if he had, and even if Congress had thrown in a Title IX exemption for good measure, trustees would still face significant legal risks connected to the business model of big-time college sports. State laws governing charitable corporations in California, Texas, Florida, and most everywhere else require trustees to operate their university in accordance with its institutional purpose — i.e., education. The laws empower attorneys general to force compliance with this requirement. The laws also set standards for trustee liability when duties are breached.


Why does this matter? The facts indicate that the revenue sport business is marked by such extreme workforce exploitation, educational compromise, and commercial overindulgence that, rather than being part of a university’s educational purpose, the sports business has arguably become a purpose unto itself that undermines trustees’ effort to fulfill their educational responsibilities.


State laws governing charitable corporations may be the legal reckoning that not even Baker’s formidable political acumen can help trustees avoid.
Baker’s appointment represents a moment of truth for trustees. Perhaps based on his experience as a college athlete and a governor, Baker can help them see that, while basketball and football are gateways to experiences that can border on sublime, operating billion-dollar leagues for these sports is not the job of higher education trustees. Educating students all the way to graduation is.


William Devine is an attorney in Silicon Valley specializing in regulatory risk. He once coached a season of basketball at Menlo College in California.


Excellent assessment.

There seems to be a couple of cases on the docket

House vs NCAA - might be more impactful than Alston case

Johnson vs NCAA

@old_school posted:

In theory she could be both!!

I’m guessing the response was designed to antagonize. As most successful women and father’s of successful women will tell you, the perception by the traditionalist male dominated world is men are aggressive go getters and women who act the same way are called bitches.

When I see this perspective or anti Title IX views I figure it’s from guys without daughters or like a clown on another site who stated education is wasted on women because their primary job should be taking care of their man.

Title IX and girl’s/women's sports turned my daughter into the aggressive go getter she is.

Last edited by RJM

LOL who you are is a matter of how you know someone, you can be an excellent attorney a great mother / partner and a bitch to different people…you ran a business for years, you certainly should understand that. I have never met a successful person who hasn’t stepped on people intentionally or unintentionally along the way. It just isn’t possible.

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