Amateurism in college football? HA!

The co-chairs of the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics want us to believe that college football is amateur sport. To which I say: HA!

In their op-ed in the LA Times, Chancellor William E. Kirwan of the University of Maryland system, and President R. Gerald Turner of Southern Methodist University, write: This week also marks the start of a new era in college football, one in which fantasy leagues run by commercial entities exploit college players as their virtual game pieces. These online fantasy leagues, which use the real names and statistics of collegiate athletes, raise a crucial question for higher education leaders: Is it amateurism in college sports that has become a fantasy?

In case they did not know, amateurism became a fantasy a long, long time ago. Remember Robert Maynard Hutchins as the University of Chicago president? Here is a reminder: "In 1935, senior Jay Berwanger was awarded the first Heisman Trophy (which is proudly displayed today in the Ratner Athletic Center on campus). Just four years later, however, Hutchins abolished the football team, citing the need for Chicago to focus on academics rather than athletics." To paraphrase Don McLean, that was the day that universities recognized that amateurism in college football was long dead.

The cynic in me thinks that Kirwan and Turner, and the NCAA, are merely upset that others are making money from college football--perhaps they think that only universities can make money from it. HA!