Paying NCAA athletes could be troublesome

                                                                                                                                AP
Texas A&M quarterback and former Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel
currently faces scrutiny for allegedly profiting off autographed memorabilia.

     With the start of the college football season right around the corner, speculative talks are heating up. Experts are now discussing who will play well, who won’t and who will win the Heisman Trophy, among other things. One topic, which will inevitably come up, is if the NCAA should take a look at paying its athletes.
     During a time in which Johnny Manziel faces scrutiny for allegedly signing autographs and receiving payment for them, perhaps no time is better for discussion than now.
     If the NCAA paid college athletes, would that not get rid of most of its rampant problems dealing with improper benefits and violations?
     It’s a question that the NCAA faces many times a year, and a question that may never have a clear answer.
     The only problem with that? College athletes do get paid.
     There’s no way critics can justify that college athletes don’t get paid when their respective universities provide full scholarships, room and board, book costs, lab fees and whatever else comes with being a college student. However, many advocates for paying players insist that the money the NCAA provides doesn’t cover the necessary needs of living.
     It would be one thing if Manziel or others accused of similar actions actually needed the money they received, but stories of athletes making money off of their fame rarely end in that player finally being able to eat that week.
     Instead, they end up making bad decisions over greed that hurt their schools and themselves.
     Two years ago, Ohio State was put on probation because some athletes from its football team were caught exchanging team memorabilia for free tattoos.
     The following year the Buckeyes went 12-0 but were not bowl eligible because of its infractions from the previous year.
     If the NCAA elects to pay its players, how do they determine how much? If they pay all colleges athletes the same, then what’s stopping someone from seeking even more cash from outside - and illegal - sources because they think they deserve to make more money than their teammates?
     Then again, perhaps the university will pay each player by his value to the team. How then do they reasonably justify paying the star quarterback more money than an offensive lineman, despite the two investing the same amount of time during practice and in games? There’s more trouble to be gained by paying college athletes than if the NCAA keeps the system the way it is.
     Also, critics argue that it’s not fair for players to have to attend college, go to class and adopt a student-athlete lifestyle in the first place before they can turn professional. What the naysayers don’t understand is that nobody is making these players do anything. If you’re the best high school basketball player in the country, there’s nothing that says you have to enroll in college. With the new age requirement nowadays, players can’t jump straight to the NBA ranks, but there are other options. Go play overseas, enter the NBA’s Development League or if being a student-athlete is so unfair, join the job force until you’re old enough to enter the draft.
     Don’t enroll in college and then break NCAA laws by taking money because you don’t think you’re receiving the proper reimbursement.
     Keep in mind, these athletes agreed to cooperate with NCAA rules when they became college students.      It’s not as if there was unreadable fine print that tricked them into that situation. They knew what they were getting into when they signed their Letters of Intent.
     Going to college should be a time in which students of every variety, including athletes, hone their skills and become better at what they choose to do in life.
     If someone wants to become a writer, then they choose to attend college because that experience gives them the best chance at learning how to write. They can find ways to puts words on paper without college and even become a best-selling author, but that’s unlikely to happen without some sort of training.
     For athletes, they should spend their time doing the same thing. Worry about getting better each day, then when their time in college is over, they won’t have to worry about money.