NCAA missing the signs with college baseball

An interesting column. How much more exposure does the college game need before the scholarship situation is fixed? Its a joke right now. A local player signed with the Gators last fall, probably for books. He was drafted this month and signed in the 10th round with the Devil Rays and got all of his college paid for, $65,000 plus his signing money. Oh yeah, his dad is a college head baseball coach.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/orl-sptbianchi240...orl-sports-headlines

SPORTS COMMENTARY: MIKE BIANCHI

NCAA missing the signs with college baseball
Mike Bianchi
Sports Commentary

June 24, 2005

The graduation rates are atrocious.

The racial diversity is abysmal.

The rules-breaking is alarming.

That sharp, high-pitched sound you hear coming from Omaha, Neb., is not the ping of the aluminum bat; it's the shriek of college baseball coaches who say the NCAA is driving their sport to ruination.

"It's frustrating," says Florida baseball Coach Pat McMahon, whose team beat Arizona State 6-3 Thursday night to advance to the championship round of the College World Series. "We're getting beat to death."

Baseball is the dirty little secret of college sports. It is the abused and abandoned mongrel in the NCAA's dog-and-pony show.

You hear the pundits and pointy-heads scream incessantly about the exploitation of college football and basketball players who make millions for the NCAA but get paid nothing in return. Puh-leeze. A suggestion for those who don't believe a college degree is fair compensation for chasing a bouncing ball: Try getting a job without one.

If you want true exploitation, check out the College World Series on ESPN. The NCAA is making millions in TV rights, but the competing athletes barely even get their books paid for.

"You'd be surprised how many guys on our roster get zip," McMahon says.

The average college roster is 33 players, but the NCAA allows baseball only 11.7 scholarships. That means the average player gets about 33 percent of his education paid for; the other 67 percent comes from his family's pockets.

In football, the fifth-team running back is on full scholarship. In basketball, the last guy on the bench is on full scholarship. In baseball, your ace pitcher is rummaging through the concession-stand trash looking for discarded wieners.

It's no wonder college baseball cannot attract black athletes. In college basketball, 58 percent of all athletes are black. In football, it's 44 percent. In baseball, it's an embarrassing 6 percent. Future headline: NASCAR gets better grade than college baseball on Dr. Richard Lapchick's Racial and Gender Report Card.

And, really, who can blame elite black athletes for pursuing full scholarships in football and basketball over peanuts and Cracker Jack to play baseball?

"It's hard to convince guys to come play baseball for free," McMahon says.

It's also hard to convince guys to stay and play baseball (see shameful graduation rates). Even if you're taken in the 42nd round of the never-ending baseball draft, you're still likely to choose a minuscule signing bonus of $7,500 over the alternative: continuing to shell out thousands of dollars to play college ball.

Only one of the eight teams competing in the College World Series has graduated at least 50 percent of its players. Under NCAA guidelines that take effect next fall, such profound academic underachievement could become grounds for exclusion from postseason competition. That makes you wonder: How long until Princeton and Lehigh are the only schools eligible for Omaha?

Then again, the NCAA policymakers make these rules, but seem to look the other way when it comes to enforcing them. Did you know two of the eight teams in last year's College World Series were on probation? One of those teams -- Miami -- illegally paid players from funds obtained from running an illicit baseball camp.

In football, there would be hand-wringing if a cheating program played for the national title. In basketball, there would be teeth-gnashing. In baseball, there is only wrist-slapping.

Ethically, academically and racially, college baseball has gone strike one, strike two, strike three.

The malnourished mutt keeps taking kicks to its exposed ribs. All the while, the NCAA's dog-and-pony show goes on.