Student-athlete unions a wrong move

The men’s basketball team at Dartmouth College made national headlines last week in a way it couldn’t do on the court.

The players voted 13-2 to form a union and, essentially, become employees on the Dartmouth campus in Hanover, N.H. Ivy League school. Smart guys, right?

But I’m not sure they fully understand what they’re getting into. The players want to be paid $20 an hour, like members of the cafeteria staff and other essential workers who keep things going on campus. But as school employees, they’ll be subjected to disciplinary action and even termination if their work is deemed insufficient.

As basketball players, Dartmouth is really, really bad at their jobs.

Dartmouth has not had a winning record since going 14-12 in the 1998-99 season. Dartmouth was so bad this season they finished 6-21 overall and last in the Ivy League standings with a 2-12 record.

Collectively, they are barely Division I quality players.

So, as school employees, what would stop the Dartmouth coach or athletic director from firing this bunch and holding tryouts for anyone in the area who wants to play? Better yet, what about renting a van and bringing back to campus some of the great athletes playing pick-up games on neighborhood courts in New York City?

I worked third shift in a factory for a few years and saw people walk out the door after being fired for even the flimsiest of reasons. Do you really want this, guys, where you could be replaced at the snap of a finger?

This sounds ridiculous, I know. But it wasn’t long ago paying college players big bucks and allowing them to move freely from team to team without penalty also sounded ridiculous.

Now, it’s the reality in college athletics.

There’s nothing of any substance coming out of Washington, D.C., these days. But there was a round-table discussion where Nick Saban spoke intelligently and with passion on the current landscape of college athletics.

Saban favors revenue-sharing for college athletics, but he is against making them school employees.

“All the things that I believed in for all these years, 50 years of coaching, no longer exist in college athletics,” said the longtime coach who retired from Alabama after the 2023 season. “It was always about developing players and helping young people be more successful in life. My major concern now is about the combination of pay-for-play, free agency, and how that impacts development. Each time you transfer, you reduce your chances of graduating about 20%.

“I had two NFL coaches tell me that players come to them less developed, with more entitlements, and with less resiliency to overcome adversity.”

Not only are guys transferring two or three times, JT Daniels finally used up his eligibility last year after playing quarterback at four different schools.

Saban is the perfect person to talk about college athletes, and I was surprised at some of the negative feedback he received for his comments last week. Most of it came from the national media who cover professional sports and obsess over LeBron James, Tiger Woods and Aaron Rodgers like the British press obsesses over the Royal Family.

It is true much of the changes in college athletics were brought on by the insane salaries top coaches like Saban were being paid by their universities. There’s no doubt, absolutely none, that the young people doing the work that generates millions of dollars should share in the kitty. But you rarely hear the squawkers in the national media suggest paying anyone but the football and basketball players in college.

If you pay the men, you’re going to have to pay the women who play sports that do not generate revenue in college. It’s called Title IX and it’s the law.

There’s no question college athletics is a mess right now. There has to be some parameters placed to rein in the abuses. But simply reclassifying student-athletes as school employees is not the answer.