amateur

I just read an article about Dez Bryant's disappointmentwith the NCAA and the amateur athlete rules and the enforcement thereof.  For those of you like me, who have no clue who Dez Bryant is you can read the article or just know that he's currently in the NFL, and played college football for Oklahoma State from 2007 to 2009 and one time worked out and had lunch with (former NFL star) Deion Sanders.  I don't know the details of this lunch or whatever, but it had the potential to violate NCAA rules so the incident was investigated. 

Remember the scene in The Blind Side where Michael Oher is taken into the NCAA office and interrogated about his connections with the Tuohys and such.  He's a nervous wreck and has no idea what to say about why he chose Ole Miss.  I would imagine that most college athletes that get investigated are pretty nervous about it, especially since you know that none of them have ever even tried to read the NCAA bylaws, and probably don't know if what they did violated Code 4 Law 26 Section 7.3.1.

So in the course of Dez Bryant being investigated he lied.  He said he didn't have lunch with Deion, and when the NCAA eventually found out that he did (though no NCAA rule was violated in the process) he was suspended for 10 games for lying.  10 games aka, the rest of his senior season.  You probably wonder why he lied, and I would love to interview him, I'm sure it had something to do with not being sure if what he did was illegal or not, so he tried to avoid the whole issue by lying about it.  True, not the best choice but a logical one for a 20 year old kid.

Fast forward to 2010, Ohio State quarter back Terrelle Pryor (among others on the team) sells things he owns (championship ring, jersey pieces, shoes, etc) in exchange for some tattoos.  Again, not the best choice but a fairly logical one for a 20 year old kid.  (The choice being "I own this, I'll sell it").  Terrelle (along with some of his teammates) is suspended for 5 games, but not their next game which was the  Rose Bowl.  Terrelle decided he didn't want to be suspended for 5 games and joined the NFL where he still had to sit out for the first 5 games (kudos to the NFL for enforcing that) but got paid half a million to do so ($580,000 signing bonus). 

So to recap: Dez doesn't do anything wrong, but lies about it and gets his senior year revoked.  Terrelle does something 'wrong' and lies about it and gets to play his final game and get paid half a million.  hmm....

In all fairness timing makes a big difference here, because Terrelle was investigated near the end of the year, and his sentence came at the end of the season.  Dez was investigated over the summer so his sentence came near the beginning of the season.  Technically Terrelle also missed his senior year (he went to the NFL early), and Dez did get a 1.9 million signing bonus.  HOWEVER, Terrelle still only got 5 games, while Dez got 10.  Seems unfair.

Okay, new track.... Let's imagine that I'm really cool and still in college.  Let's say I write a book, and it goes on to become #1 best seller.  Some other famous person invites me to dinner, wahoo!  Now imagine that I'm an actor, a director, or singer.  I become famous, go to a red carpet premier, I sign pictures of myself and sell them for $1,000.   It's all good.  Now imagine I did those things, but I also play on my college ultimate frisbee team.  I'll probably be investigated by the NCAA to make sure I didn't receive any improper benefit from my athlete status.  Those are crazy and somewhat extreme examples, but I think its something to think about.  I don't think college athletes should be paid necessarily, but I do think there is some change/reform needed in the overall system of rules, investigation, and punishment.  Also some if the NCAA did something to help protect athletes from being exploited by others.  (When people started selling Johnny Football t-shirts the NCAA just joined in and Manziel's family had to file suit to stop them and trademark his likeness.)  

It's a mad mad mad mad world...  but I still love football, and I sure hope Johnny gets to play this year.  I think by suspending him the NCAA is just encouraging him to leave to the NFL early (as it did for Terrelle).

As another side note, I found this incredibly interestingsite on NFL player's salaries.