Amateur Athletes Aren't Indentured Servants

At least a dozen times this past weekend during coverage of the National Football League draft, analysts referred to Reggie Bush as the Michael Jordan of football. The former University of Southern California running back is a game-breaker, a wondrous mixture of speed and compact explosiveness. Now he is a member of the New Orleans Saints -- a savior, if you will, for a town that desperately needs one.

But Bush will arrive with heavy baggage: Last week allegations surfaced that Bush's mother and stepfather, Denise and LaMar Griffin, lived rent-free in a $750,000 home owned by California businessman Michael Michaels, and that Michaels allegedly arranged to clear up the Griffins' $28,000 debt and pay for their trips to Bush's away games last year. Michaels also claims that, in exchange for this deal, Bush would sign with Michaels' firm and hire an agent of Michaels' choosing.

If all of this is true, of course, it would mean that Bush violated NCAA rules prohibiting a college athlete (and his family) from accepting anything that would jeopardize that player's amateur status. But Bush acknowledges no wrongdoing and denies involvement in this arrangement. The NFL Players Association and the PAC 10 Conference are investigating the charges.

Should the investigations find Bush guilty, then his 2005 Heisman Trophy could be stripped. The NCAA is very clear on its rules for amateur athletes, and the governing body of college athletics will not allow anyone, even someone of Bush's fame, to tarnish the dignity with which it conducts business.

But last season, while the USC Trojans attempted to win a third straight championship, Bush was featured on the cover of just about every major sports magazine. His No. 5 jersey was sold in bunches throughout Southern California, and in every other American town, for that matter. Life was good; at least it was for the people collecting the proceeds on that No. 5.

No one knows for sure how much money college athletes earn for their universities, but we do know for sure is that it's a considerable sum. Robert Brown, a professor of economics at Cal State-San Marcos, has tried for the past 15 years to calculate the financial impact an athlete has on his or her university.

Using direct revenues, such as ticket sales and television contract dollars, Brown compares the total team revenue to all of the revenue-making factors that contribute to it. He predicts a premium college football player is worth at least $500,000 to his university. Brown explained, "It's an estimate, an approximation. If you ask me where Bush fits in, I'd say he's worth quite a bit more than that amount. Reggie Bush isn't your typical premium player. He's the premium player."

Brown's method does not include indirect revenue, such as increased jersey and hot dog sales. But he admits that if he did, the projected value of Bush would climb considerably. Consider that during a two-day period prior to the Trojans' Rose Bowl meeting with the University of Texas, more than 1,000 No. 5 USC jerseys with a Rose Bowl emblem on them flew off the shelves at roughly $80 apiece. With a startling figure like that, it starts to make sense how having a Heisman Trophy winner might impact ticket sales and thus concession sales. How many more programs are bought as keepsakes? Just think about how many students might choose USC simply because it has the nation's best football program. The list goes on and on, and the only people keeping track are the ones who likely know little about football, only its economic value to educational institutions.

In short, college athletics generates a fat bottom line every year. And the labor is as cheap as it gets.

For a century the NCAA has paid its athletes slave wages because it has held firm to its stance on amateur status. But that policy does not hold up to today's supply and demand for sports entertainment, and amateur status is merely a hurdle for hordes of otherwise good kids in their attempts to collect on what's rightfully theirs anyway.

Sure, you can always argue that college athletes get a free ride to school, and they live like kings on campus. Bush lived the life of a celebrity on campus and in Los Angeles, but it is a far cry from reaping the financial benefits that come with such a status. Bush helped pour perhaps millions of dollars into the university's pocket during his three years in the limelight, but for that he was only given a comfortable bed and good food to eat.

So, naturally, a kid like Bush feels he deserves more. He is a star, after all. He is on the cover of ESPN the Magazine and the Sporting News. Why shouldn't his family be able to stay in a house he could probably afford a thousand times over today, now that he is a spokesperson for Adidas, Hummer and Subway?

And Bush is not alone in this situation. The past few years have served up quite a few examples that understore this point:

• On Monday, it was reported that USC quarterback Matt Leinart (now a member of the Arizona Cardinals) and wide receiver Dwayne Jarrett may have violated NCAA rules by underpaying for an apartment off-campus furnished by Leinart's father. The two players each paid $650 per month for real estate that cost nearly three times that amount (Leinart's father paid the difference).
• Last summer, two University of Connecticut basketball players were charged for stealing laptops from campus dorm rooms. A.J. Price and Marcus Williams were both recognizable names on a team that was widely considered a frontrunner for winning a national title.
• In 2002, Florida State's Adrian McPherson was charged in a check-cashing scam that involved illegal gambling. At the time, McPherson was a quarterback for one of the nation's most visible programs, and he was considered a promising NFL prospect.

Would those players need to gamble and steal if they were more adequately compensated for their services? Perhaps, perhaps not. What I think can be argued is that you can't build a kid into a celebrity without handing him the financial benefits that come with it and not expect trouble to come of it.

What's worse, the NCAA's strict policy hurts kids who don't cheat or steal, too. University of Colorado wide receiver Jeremy Bloom was made a fifth-round pick by the Philadelphia Eagles last weekend. He may have been drafted higher had the NCAA allowed him to play during the 2004 and 2005 seasons. Bloom, a two-time Olympic skier, was denied by the NCAA because he accepted sponsorship money for his skiing career. Those sponsorship dollars are almost essential for a skier to compete at that level, but the NCAA told Bloom it was one or the other. Bloom thumbed his nose to the NCAA and finished sixth in the moguls freestyle at Torino this past February.

Sometimes a set of checks and balances needs to be put on a governing body like the NCAA. Clearly, the NCAA is hypocritically endorsing and profiting from a system that tempts nationally known athletes to commit petty crimes just so that they might live the life of luxury everyone assumes they already live.

I'll admit that if the Griffins and Bush are indeed guilty of what Michaels claims, then some sort of punishment is in order. If such is the case, then the Griffins should repay the sum of what Michaels lent them during the past year. It might also be only right that Bush gives back his Heisman, seeing that the award stands for how a player carries himself as much as it recognizes outstanding individual achievement.

But the NCAA needs to learn its lesson, too. Amateur status is no longer applicable to today's star athletes. When a player like Bush is making millions for his university, you can't expect him not to feel like he's owed something. As Robert Brown says, "There's a market for these players, and if the money can't flow over the table, it's going to flow under it."

My solution is simple: Allow college players to sign limited endorsements for companies that meet certain criteria. That way, the university and the NCAA can keep a firm grasp on the pot of gold they're already making from these kids, and Madison Avenue can help someone like Reggie Bush live the life he's entitled to.