Northwestern Could Drop D-1 Football, If Players Form union
- Thread starter derek4tide
- Start date
If college football players unionize and refuse to play until they get paid, what's to stop the basketball team? Or the baseball team, or eventually the women's gymnastics team?
The point is, there is no way to fix this. Fixing a small problem leads to a bigger problem, which will lead to an even bigger problem. The best solution is probably what we currently have in place, but there's a lot of people too blind to see that.
This ruling and Title IX will absolutely be connected because what applies to athletes of one sport will apply to athletes in all sports.
If the Northwestern players go through with it expect Northwestern to discontinue the football program. No way it is in their best interest to play along with this circus.
I'm now waiting for the "employees" to report a coach who yells at them to HR for creating a "hostile work environment."
Yeah, and I simply don't see how the unions and Title IX can co-exist. They do understand that most athletic departments lose money, right? So, on one hand the players want a cut of "profits", while Title IX demands said profits are distributed throughout the entire athletic department. It's also the issue of a particular union (which, from my wife's experience uses fairly devious tactics) muscling their way into college athletics, which is even worse than simply trying to muscle their way into steel mills in which the employees don't want them there.
The truth is, if everyone was paid an equal portion of athletic department revenue, in most cases they'd end up making less than their scholarship...
It won't surprise me if the union chooses not to seek pay. I'll bet their first demand will be to end the practice of terminating athletic scholarships for any reason the university sees fit. Then they'll proceed to their concerns about medical issues. There are a lot of things that can be addressed without demanding pay (if they're smart).
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Unions dues are what it's all about, will they demand the colleges pay them dues directly then? As to the terminating scholarships thing, that would be incredibly ironic considering the fact that their premise is that scholarships are tied to performance. If they then say scholarships shouldn't be tied to performance, they'd be destroying their entire premise for unionizing... If anything, unionizing should make scholarships easier to lose, as players would be making themselves employees and the whole student athlete thing would be far less relevant.
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Unions can't survive without dues. No pay = no dues. Unless this really is that rare example of people doing what they perceive is the right thing with no ulterior motive, it's a matter of when, not if, pay is involved, assuming the decision stands on appeal.
Well, it's not a surprise that the regional NLRB, in Chicago, found in favor of organizing. They've never seen or heard of a union initiative they didn't just love. The full NLRB (and whether it is constitutional as currently established is an open issue) is likely to say the same thing. Whether a real court would agree is another kettle of fish.
Won't matter much for state universities where the NLRB has no jurisdiction, but I could easily see smaller private schools just ending football -- or cutting out scholarships altogether, which would eliminate the argument that the players were somehow paid by the college.
Don't want to be the one who gets this kicked off the football board, but it would be interesting to see how conferences with a mix of schools reacted. Vanderbilt has to recognize the union, let the players exploit their personas, etc., but Tennessee and Kentucky players can't? And what would the nzaa do? And no reason to think it ends with football. There are a lot of private schools with no football but lucrative basketball programs.
What a mess. Wonder if there is any impact on the possibility of conferences breaking away from the nzaa? Take care of some of the players' concerns if a new College Football Association could make its own rules on things like player stipends.
Won't matter much for state universities where the NLRB has no jurisdiction, but I could easily see smaller private schools just ending football -- or cutting out scholarships altogether, which would eliminate the argument that the players were somehow paid by the college.
Don't want to be the one who gets this kicked off the football board, but it would be interesting to see how conferences with a mix of schools reacted. Vanderbilt has to recognize the union, let the players exploit their personas, etc., but Tennessee and Kentucky players can't? And what would the nzaa do? And no reason to think it ends with football. There are a lot of private schools with no football but lucrative basketball programs.
What a mess. Wonder if there is any impact on the possibility of conferences breaking away from the nzaa? Take care of some of the players' concerns if a new College Football Association could make its own rules on things like player stipends.
I didn't know/think about this. So, Title IX is not applicable since that only applies to public universities.
Very interesting, private universities might have unions forced on them, and public universities have Title IX forced on them. The only way I could imagine the NCAA dealing with this sort of scenario is simply to not allow schools with unionized student athletes to participate, providing they actually got any additional benefits.
I'm not sure there's any real question that the long road we're headed down (the EA ruling, the union ruling) will see us with fewer programs, which all in all might not be a bad thing. The NCAA almost has to relax some rules, allow stipends and that sort of thing, but on the other hand they can't really allow full-on collective bargaining. The end result is that one by one programs that were struggling financially anyway, are likely to go by the wayside.
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You could have a situation where private schools subject to this have to pay players while public schools can't/don't. The you have a huge imbalance.
Who'da thunk it --
The most popular sport in the country -- and yet it's being squeezed from so many angles -- at some point the zit is going to pop, and we will be saying "bye" to College Football.
The most popular sport in the country -- and yet it's being squeezed from so many angles -- at some point the zit is going to pop, and we will be saying "bye" to College Football.
Unless I'm mistaken (disclaimer - happens a lot), Title IX applies to any university, public or private, receiving federal funds. Lots of private universities get federal funds for all kinds of things. I'd be willing to bet the list of private schools not subject to Title IX would be WAY shorter than the list of those subject to it.
What a mess.
So, assuming this union thing moves forward, doesn't that in the very least put the private universities (in which both apply) in a spot in which they either stop receiving federal funds or drop all athletic scholarships? I think I'll just stop trying to figure this all out. I just know that if I'm a president of a private university, and I'm not a big fan of the athletic department and/or it's losing money, I'm probably thinking about how I can put an end to this mess before it gets out of hand.
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