Hollow words target studentathletes
Never fear, college athletes. Larry Scott is here to save you.
The Pac12 commissioner offered a ridiculously selfserving argument the other day on CNN.
He proclaimed that “studentathletes will be in a safer position and a healthier position” by returning to campus.
What was left unsaid? That those athletes then will be able to play sports — most importantly, football. And make money for the universities. And give the struggling Pac12 Network some content. And help pay the beleaguered commissioner’s exorbitant salary (a reported $5.3 million last year).
As sports around the world begin the process of reopening, most are negotiating with their players about how to do that. The NHL, NBA, Major League Baseball and NFL are in negotiations with their respective players’ unions over plans to safely return to action.
College sports? There is no players’ union. The young athletes don’t have a say in whether, when or how to return. As with almost everything else about college athletics, the players are disenfranchised. They don’t have a voice.
Starting June 15, Pac12 athletes will be allowed to return to campus for “voluntary” workouts. But if you’ve been around bigtime sports, you know that the word “voluntary” can reduce athletes to spasms of sarcastic laughter.
Scott’s argument is that the
universities provide “worldclass” medical care and supervision. If that’s the case, and universities are the safest place to be, why have they shut down across the United States? Why have students been sent home?
If college campuses are so darn safe for athletes, why — over the years — have injuries been mismanaged, concussion protocols ignored, sexualassault scandals overlooked, mentalhealth issues downplayed, and why have players dropped dead of heat stroke?
And why, oh why, would it be safe to open campuses for “studentathletes” (again, read: football players) and not for all students? The hypocrisy in the term “studentathlete” will never be more profound than if football players are asked to return to campus ahead of
“regular” students.
It’s like that old line from “North Dallas Forty,” only for college sports, it goes like this: “Every time I say I’m an athlete, you say I’m a student; every time I say I’m a student, you say I’m an athlete.”
Mike Bohn, USC’s athletic director, sounded for all the world like Scott’s lackey when, on a Zoom call, he echoed the commissioner’s sentiments, saying that a college athlete was “safer in an intercollegiate athletic enterprise’s offices, training rooms, than they are anywhere else.”
Aside from the total disrespect that generalization gives to the home life of the average USC studentathlete, exactly how is being in a football setting safer for an athlete right now?
Social distancing in training rooms and locker rooms will be difficult at best, impossible at worst. There are 97 players listed on USC’s roster, along with 38 members of the coaching and support staff.
Oh, by the way, the Trojans are scheduled to play Alabama at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, on Sept. 5. Alabama’s reported payout is $6 million. USC’s payout hasn’t been reported but it is certainly significant.
That kind of pay day is the priority. Not the safety of the “studentathletes.”
Meanwhile, it is going to take more testing, tracing and tracking than we currently have to bring back college football. Cases have been on the rise in several Pac12member school locations, including Alameda and Santa Clara counties. And a fall spike in the coronavirus is a strong possibility.
Former Stanford athletic director Bob Bowlsby, now the commissioner of the Big 12, acknowledged the difficulties in a recent webinar.
“It isn’t a matter of when we’re going to have outbreaks, it’s a matter of how big they are and how we go about triaging,” he said. Wow. Sounds super safe. Yes, young, healthy athletes are less at risk for serious consequences of the coronavirus. But they still can get COVID19 and be very sick. They still can be carriers of the virus and infect the population around them. Discounting the ramifications of bringing together 100plus young men and dozens of others (who might be more at risk) is to ignore their humanity. To treat them like, in the words of one White House adviser, “human capital stock.”
That’s the way college athletes too often are treated. As fleshandblood capital, used to make a profit and who don’t have a union and don’t have a voice.