College sports at their finest!

After high school almost every 18 year old kid has two options. They either attend college (or some other form of higher education) or head out into the work force. I don’t know what percentage of students choose which option. Frankly, it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that there is one distinct group of high school seniors that don’t get that choice. That group is elite high school basketball and football players.

This select group of students is not allowed to pursue their trade right of high school. By rule of the respective professional leagues of their chosen sports they must be one (NBA) or three (NFL) years removed from high school to participate. The effect of these rules on the talent level and graduation rates of college athletes has been debated for some time and no consensus has been reached.

That’s not the debate I want to have here. I want to talk about simple fairness. How are those rules fair? Not only is this select group of students not allowed to enter their respective professional leagues right out of high school, but when they were allowed to (NBA), if things didn’t work out they had to choose an entirely different profession.

Let’s break this down.

For those non-elite athletes who graduate from high school and decide to enter the work force the results are often not that appealing. If they spend a few years trying to make it in their chosen profession and are unable to compete they have the option of going back to college and spending some time making themselves more marketable to their potential employers. Then they head back out into the job market to try again.

If the rules of NBA and NFL were not in place, the NCAA still prohibits athletes from joining a professional league and then returning to college in that same sport (Chris Weinke’s situation shows that you can return to college in a different sport).

If a high school senior, who happens to be an elite athlete, decides they want to try their hand in chosen profession without the benefit of college, why should they not be allowed to return to college to make themselves more marketable when that attempt doesn’t work out? How is that any different from any non-athlete doing the same thing?

There are those who claim it wouldn’t be fair to allow a player with years of professional experience to return to play against amateur athletes. I would ask those people what is fair about allowing an individual with years of professional experience in the work force to return and compete against amateur students. In today’s economy academic performance is vitally important to potential employers.

Let’s look at this example. A high school senior goes to work in a fast food restaurant when they graduate. They work in this restaurant for five years. During that time they work their way up to assistant manager. They are responsible for scheduling the regular employees, managing inventory, and preparing various accounting reports. After a few years they decide they want to be a general manager but they have to have a college degree to get that position. They go back to school to get a business management degree. How fair is it going to be to those college students who are 18 years old with no work experience to have to compete academically with someone who has five years of business knowledge coming in?

So my question is why does the NCAA apply different standards to athletes?