Around the Big Ten

[Hannibal]

come to UNL off of a 28 hr bus ride and don't even have a sweatshirt.

I call bullshit.

[entropy]

I call bullshit.

you can call what you want. But the kid got loaners from his teammates for the winter months.

[Hannibal]

you can call what you want. But the kid got loaners from his teammates for the winter months.

I'll bet my left nut that either this kid or his family had a cell phone, an XBox, and at least one plasma TV in their home.

And even if the kid's family truly was that destitute, he's getting free food that he didn't used to get at home, and he's no longer using electricity, gas, phone, etc. There's some spare cash flow that didn't used to be there, no?

I'm not opposed to paying players a stipend, but let's call it what it is -- a salary for their profession, which makes lots of money for the university.

[entropy]

hanny.. if you have gov't assistance, you don't have to spend money of food. It is provided.

it is ok if you believe everyone can afford dates and movies. I believe many kids are poor and giving them more to enjoy their college experience is ok by me. the schools make enough money. The kids should be able to go on dates or buy some clothes or take in a movie, etc... without relying on parents to send money.

[WM Wolverine]

For the most part, these kids don't produce much revenue other than one sport, football. These full scholarship kids largely have very little 'expenses' as all food, room & board, school expenses, etc are paid for...

On the other hand, these scholarship athletes aren't allowed to work part-time or summer jobs per the NCAA rules. They do have needs for clothes and other things they'd be able to purchase, if they were allowed to work summer/part-time jobs...

This likely does produce a major split in Div-I athletics, this would be a major expense that the MAC, Sun Belt, WAC, C-USA likely couldn't afford to pay all their scholarship athletes without cutting back programs. You'd see the BCS conferences separating themselves much further from the non-BCS conferences.

[geo weidl]

I have read the discussions on paying student-athletes, but my question is, what kind of monies are we talking about?

[WM Wolverine]

$2500-$5000 is what I read, sounded like every full scholarship athlete would receive that amount, partial scholarships would be less.

[entropy]

I don't think all school expenses are paid for with scholarships.

[Jamie H]

I think it depends on the scholarship.

[Hannibal]

$2500-$5000 is what I read, sounded like every full scholarship athlete would receive that amount, partial scholarships would be less.

LMAO

"pizza and date money"

[Hannibal]

This likely does produce a major split in Div-I athletics, this would be a major expense that the MAC, Sun Belt, WAC, C-USA likely couldn't afford to pay all their scholarship athletes without cutting back programs. You'd see the BCS conferences separating themselves much further from the non-BCS conferences.

Are they allowed to get loans? If so, then let them get loans.

[Hannibal]

And I have another solution -- let agents pay players. As long as the agent is not a booster for the university, it's not pay for play, and the university isn't on the hook to pay anyone else.

[Jamie H]

Are you kidding? Every school in the country would sign up a roster of "non-booster agents" that would pay every good kid on their team. And no one would be able to directly link the agent to the school, but it would be unbelievably easy to have some periphery booster direct cash to the agent for taking care of their kids.

[lineygoblue]

And remember. If you pay the football players, every athlete on every team on campus will hold their hands out.

You can't just pay the football players. You'll have to pay basketball, track, swim teams, soccer, etc. All of them.

[WM Wolverine]

Yup, that is exactly what they are looking into; paying all scholarship athletes. It sounds like the other 4 BCS conferences (SEC, ACC, Pac 12, Big XII but not the Big East) are considering it as well...

Only C-USA has taken a stance and they are obviously against it...

As for the $2500-$5000 figure, not sure where I read that so don't hold me to it. To me that sounds about right, that is a decent amount of money for a college kid who worked a summer job that really has little to no expenses other than clothing and entertainment. Also realize that a lot of non revenue sports are largely partial scholarships and are far more limited in total scholarships allowed (per league of NCAA rules) relative to the amount of players to field a team.