Wolford, Montgomery agree with paying players

March 30, 2014 at 12:10a.m.

YOUNGSTOWN

In 1989, when Young-stown State offensive coordinator Shane Montgomery was a senior quarterback at North Carolina State, he felt lucky to get $5,000 a year in tuition just to play football.

“I was getting a full scholarship and I was very grateful for that because there were a lot of kids that had to pay for their schooling,” he said.

For a long time, Montgomery felt a scholarship was enough for players. But over the past few years, his opinion has started to change. And there’s one big reason why: money.

In 1989, CBS and ESPN were paying about $70 million to televise Division I college football games, a number that has soared to $10 billion (albeit on a few more channels), according to CBSSports.com.

The top 10 college football programs now make a combined $750 million per year, up from about $300 million a decade ago, according to Business Week. Texas, the richest program in the country, rakes in more than $100 million per year — quadruple the amount from a decade ago.

And the compensation for college football coaches has jumped 70 percent since 2006, according to Forbes.

Through it all, the players’ compensation has stayed the same: room and board.

Northwestern’s football team took the first big step toward changing that this week when the Chicago district of the National Labor Relations Board ruled that the players qualify as university employees and can unionize.

The NLRB’s decision is the start of a long process — Northwestern will appeal and, because NU is a private school, the ruling doesn’t extend to state schools like YSU or Ohio State — but it could eventually force universities to share some of their revenue with players.

“With the way the money is right now [in college football], I can see how they feel,” Montgomery said.

YSU head coach Eric Wolford, a former offensive lineman at Kansas State, has often said he favors paying players, something he repeated this week.

“Exactly what will come of this, I don’t know, but I’ve always been for the student-athlete,” he said. “There’s a lot of [conference] commissioners and [university] presidents and ADs [athletic directors] who at the end of the day will have a really big decision to make as to how far this thing goes.

“But I’m all for the student-athlete. I lived in their shoes. I understand.”

Not surprisingly, his players agree, although it’s still too early to know what effect, if any, it will have on Youngstown State.

“I did see that [NLRB ruling] and I’m not quite sure what it means or anything, honestly,” said senior wide receiver Christian Bryan. “I’m too busy watching SpongeBob.

“Whatever it is, it sounds like a good idea. I’m all for it.”

“Honestly I feel like sometimes we should be following their [union] guidelines and everything, but we’re getting a free education for doing what we love,” added senior defensive end Vince Coleman. “That’s what matters most.”

The NCAA’s board of directors passed legislation in 2011 that would have allowed schools to give players a $2,000 stipend beyond the cost of tuition and room and board, but enough schools opposed the measure that it was put on hold.

While tuition-paying students aren’t exactly feeling sorry for scholarship football players not having spending money, Wolford said many of his poorer players send their Pell Grant funds home to family members to pay for cell phone bills or car insurance.

“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve asked a kid, ‘What did you eat for lunch today?’” Wolford said. “And they’ll say, ‘I didn’t eat lunch.’ Well, why? ‘I don’t have any money.’ Well, what did you do with your Pell Grant? ‘I sent that home last month to my brother or to my aunt or to my mom.’ That’s reality.

“I think [a stipend] is something that’s gonna happen naturally. I don’t expect it to be large sums of money. Maybe more pocket money so we don’t have all the little things going on, like signing autographs for money. They’re just trying to eat or pay bills.”

While most Division I football programs could likely afford the stipend — particularly the ones in the power conferences — colleges have questioned whether they would have to extend the stipends to non-revenue sports and, particularly, to women’s sports in order to comply with Title IX.

“I think you’ve got to do it for everybody,” Montgomery said. “At a place like Ohio State, where money is unlimited, they don’t have a problem with that. But at a place like Youngstown State, where money is a problem, there’s gonna be some issues there.

“I think there’s a long ways to go before they get the whole thing figured out.”