Essay Sample: Why College Athletes Should Be Paid

Over the years, there has been a constant debate over whether or not college athletes should be paid.  There are plenty of points that are put into play when it comes to athletes being paid or not.  College athletes are practically working without pay under the league called the NCAA, also known as the National Collegiate Athletic Association.  This association makes an immense amount of money off these athletes who put in countless hours of hard work to make their team successful but get no money in return.  Student athletes in these colleges competing to win should be paid because they put in substantial amounts of hard work,  a large percentage of them have a hard time managing other things, and they are the reason the NCAA makes tons of money.      

College athletes put in a perpetual amount of work and hours to be the best they can be for their desired college.  These athletes are held to a higher standard than regular college and have to be way more responsible with making sure they are going to class and making good grades as well making team workouts and practices.  College student athletes are essentially working a job since they are managing classes as well as practices.  Some of these athletes are actually working a job with all this as well because in an article by Brandon Scott, he says “86 percent of college athletes live below the poverty line.”  This means that athletes are struggling to buy food and cover expenses that aren’t stated in their scholarship which is not good for the life of our beloved athletes.  Athletes have very little free time managing school and practices but with the little time they have, they have to get by with very little money.  As if not getting paid was not enough, most athletes also have to have and pay for their own medical bills.  These athletes go hours pushing their bodies to the extremities and injuries usually happen then.  As well as getting injured, they then have to find a way to pay for their medical bills.  This is outright not fair at all for these athletes.  Colleges now make sure they have medical insurance, and if not, they will not be allowed to play college sports.  In summary, college athletes put in too much time and effort to not be paid (Scott-Brandon 26).

College student-athletes, especially football and basketball, bring in millions of dollars in revenue for colleges when competing in tournaments, big games, and all the other normal game ticket prices.  Television rights for the most famous college basketball tournament in the world, also known as March Madness,  made a whopping $850 million dollars in 2021 (Bresloo-Jason).  Where does this money go?  More than half of it returns to the school for the school's own benefit, most of the rest go back into student scholarships but still doesn’t fit with the students needs “Where does the money go?”.  Even if teams don’t win in these tournaments they still make a ton of money, and the teams that do win and make it far every year, are getting millions.  These athletes are being used for sports fans and big companies for their own benefit and the athletes don’t get any revenue in return.  College sports are only getting bigger and bigger which means more money, and none of that comes back to the players who are working hard to do this for fans.  

Being a college student is very hard as is, especially at bigger schools like Duke and North Carolina.  So imagine the stress and fatigue added on when they decide to become a student athlete.  Athletes go through endless amounts of physical and mental health stresses, especially having to deal with academics, games, practices, finances, and injuries.  Mental health is a serious issue in the world right now, and is becoming an increasingly alarming issue with college athletes as of lately.  Thirty three percent of college students have dealt with some sort of mental health condition. With that percentage, only ten percent of college student athletes seek help with a therapist.  When dealing with a mental disorder, athletes start to suffer many symptoms like eating disorders, insomnia, and tragically some even ending their life.  Athletes put great stress on themselves by doing things such as putting stress on their muscles and bones from being in the weight room everyday and not getting enough sleep.  Athletes have to do this and push themselves in order to compete at such a high level, but continuing doing this everyday puts so much stress on their body leading to severe pain at such an early age in life.  These athletes endure all this pain and stress in an effort to win for their team and their effort generates wins which allows the school to gain more money but the athletes still get no money for themselves in return for all their hard work (Kuik-Robin).

An athlete who has experienced this struggle from hand to hand is none other than James Wiseman.  James Wisman was an all around star basketball athlete in highschool and early college days, now he is on the Golden State Warriors.  Wiseman decided to join Memphis University to play college there and was on the top tier freshman recruits in the country.  Wiseman helped the team a lot, scoring high points and multiple rebounds, but his reign at Memphis came upbrought after an investigation led that the head coach of Memphis, Penny Hardaway, a former NBA star,  gave Wiseman’s family thousands of dollars to help them move from one side of Tennessee to the other.  This was against the rules of the NCAA since Hardaway was a part of the team and that led to Wiseman’s twelve game suspension devouring his draft stock.  He was unable to play the rest of the season, so he left Memphis and declared for the NBA draft.  This suspension also demolished his confidence and mental health, stating in an article by Joseph Staszewski, with the New York Post, “That’s like the worst place you could possibly be. Just having the mental agony and the suffering, crying every night because I just wanted to get on the court so much.”  Although this suspension crushed his dreams of making it far in the NCAA tournament, Wiseman stil went on in the draft and was drafted by the Golden State Warriors with the second overall pick in the draft, which is still astonishing with the fact that he barely played in college (Staszewski-Joseph).

Many people might argue that student athletes are already getting money through scholarships and that bigger schools would be able to pay more to their athletes.  This point can be a valid argument, but these athletes should be paid money for themselves to spend on what they want for how much money they bring into the college.  A majority of college athletes go to college because they are required to in order to make it to the professional leagues and make themselves ready before the big show.  Some athletes are not focused on a degree, only their sport, so these athletes are putting all this time and effort in for a year or two and getting no income doing that.  The argument that bigger schools could pay more money can argue that the NCAA makes a significant amount of money to distribute to these colleges and each player can be paid for how they perform.  These arguments are valid points, but these hard working individuals deserve money for their own sake (Wood-Liam).

Concludingly, college athletes are the next generation for fans' entertainment in sports, they spend days on end putting in work to better themselves for whatever sport they play.  These athletes need to be paid for their hard work they put in.  It’s been a debate for years now whether they should be paid or not, now is the time to change that and let these athletes have their freedom with the money they will earn. Yes, some schools will make more money than others, but there are ways to resolve that issue, and yes, these athletes already get scholarships, but they can’t spend that money for their own benefit.  These athletes deserve something.