NEWS
Monday, April 05, 2004
Blogger Chetly Zarko sees behind last week's men's basketball NIT champtionship a conflict of interest, and a system of college athletics which abuses the players for its own profits:"Last year at this time, who'd have bet that the Michigan Wolverine basketball team would win a national title this year? At that time Michigan was serving the first of a two year prohibition from postseason play for the various frauds and head turnings of the Chris Webber era. [...]
This die-hard Wolverine still wanted Michigan to win this evening as the game was progressing - any other feeling would have been distinctly against my instincts. Nonetheless, I can't help but question the integrity of tonight's title. ...
Still, the University of Michigan couldn't stomach the bitter taste (and painful economic effects) of this medicine, so it lobbied the NCAA to revoke its second year of post-season prohibition. NCAA General Counsel is now Elsa Cole, the former General Counsel of the University of Michigan. One is lead to ask some pretty hard and obvious questions here. The incestuous network of higher education is frought with its own subtle conflicts of interest and internecine networks of cross-pollination. Did Michigan use its previous relationship, or other information it could have developed through that relationship, improperly. Should Cole have recused herself from any decision-making last fall? In the normal corporate world of legal representation, an attorney can not represent a client in a situation against a previous client. ...
The NCAA should punish schools and responsible individual athletes (and not "teams" with rule-abiding athletes on them). Schools like Michigan should pay many millions of dollars in fines; otherwise there will never be a real disincentive to "look the other way;" and moreso, the NCAA should make those school pay for independent monitoring services (with the teeth to ask hard questions and privately look into athethic behavior) for several years. Individuals caught breaking rules should be quickly punished at appropriate levels; but it must always be remembered that it is the institution that is profitting hugely in a system configured solely for their benefit without similar benefit to the athletes at a rate (zero) controlled by a non-market monopoly. A national system of injury insurance (whereby injured athletes receive a reasonable "disability salary" benefit throughout their lives) and modest compensation while playing (equal to all athletes) above mere tuition grants (a comfortable salary, to discourage the type of behavior at issue), along with contracts obligating the athletes to conduct standards in return for the compensation."
Posted by Rob at 12:46 AM
