College Football or Professional College Football?

With "The" Ohio State debacle fresh in every one's mind, the rather large elephant in the room must be addressed now. Is it time to pay college athletes, especially football players?

I have always been a huge advocate of this idea of student-athlete because I feel athletics is a great classroom, and, if addressed properly, will contribute to the collective development of the student-athlete. But, and this is a rather large "but," today's student-athletes are being used like mules to rake in millions of dollars. Today, college coaches make millions of dollars a year, universities make millions of dollars from bowl games and conference TV deals and student-athletes still play by the same NCAA rule book from many years ago. This hardly seems fair.

Now, I am not absconding the student-athletes from blame; on the contrary, they must accept their responsibility as well. They do get a free education, room and board, books and all the food they can eat, but again, they are still merely kids, large kids, but kids, just the same. We tend to forget that those who play on Saturdays are 18, 19, 20 and sometimes even 21. Does the school and the NCAA not have a responsibility here to these kids? Is this not like putting a piece of meat on a hungry dog's nose and asking that dog not to eat the meat while you sit in front of the dog and eat meat? Again, we provide them the best equipment, the best dorms, the best food and countless other "legal" perks while flying them all over the country to play games televised to millions of people; we ask them to practice long hours and perform at high levels, and if they do not we fire the coaching staff that has become their segregate family. And, on top of all this, we get upset if their grades are average or failing.

Can we really call these players student-athletes during football season? Maybe a better name for them in season would be independent study athletes because that is what most do during the season. The university hires tutors who go to class and take notes and then tutor the players one-on-one when time allows. What is the solution? I do not know and am not pretending to know. But, I do know this: the room is too small for this ever-growing elephant! Blessings!