Ruling may bring major changes to college sports

Associated Press

Chicago

Vince Dooley is sure relieved he’s not running an athletic program these days.

Not after a decision allowing Northwestern football players to unionize, and what that might mean for all college sports.

“If this ever happens,” said Dooley, now retired after four decades as Georgia’s football coach and athletic director, “the issues would be unlimited. What might happen from school to school, from day to day, from year to year, I don’t know. I’m just glad I’ve served my time.”

Around the country Thursday, coaches and administrators pondered the potential ramifications of the stunning decision by the National Labor Relations Board, which ruled the Northwestern football team — up to now, referred to by the NCAA as student-athletes — are actually university employees in everything but name. Therefore, they should be able to bargain collectively for their fair share of an industry worth billions.

That set off speculation over what might happen if the ruling holds up on appeal:

Would the big-revenue sports have unions, but others be left to fend for themselves?

Would private school athletes get to negotiate over issues such as compensation and health insurance, while their public school counterparts are denied a spot at the bargaining table?

Would high-profile programs such as Notre Dame and Alabama be better positioned financially to share a piece of the pie with athletes, leading to an even wider gap between the haves and have-nots?

“I just don’t think you can come up with any kind of formula that’s going to be equitable and fair to all,” said John Chaney, who coached men’s basketball at Temple for a quarter-century and was never shy about expressing his views on the ills plaguing college athletics.

The NCAA and its conferences came out in unison against the ruling — not surprising, given their enterprise has contracts worth nearly $18 billion just for the television rights to the NCAA men’s basketball tournament and football bowl games.

“We’ve got something very special in this country that is unique in the world that combines athletic competition with higher education,” Atlantic Coast Conference commissioner John Swofford said. “When it’s done right, it’s a beautiful thing.”

But some wondered if the NCAA brought this all on itself by dragging its feet on concerns that have been lurking for years, everything from stipends to at least close the gap between what a scholarship pays and the actual cost of going to school, to covering the cost of health insurance for athletes who may still be feeling the aches and pains of the playing field long after they leave campus.

In a sense, it’s what happened to baseball in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, when owners desperately clung to the archaic reserve clause, which prevented players from changing teams when their contracts expired. When the reserve clause was overturned in 1975, it led to free agency, exploding salaries and years of strife between players and owners.

“Maybe the leadership at the NCAA has not been as aggressive in trying to come up with solutions as it should have been,” said Pete Boone, the former athletic director at Mississippi.