Paid for Play... The real problem in the NCAA

Some of you may or may not know about it, but there is a storm brewing in this thing known as the NCAA. To be short College sports is on a precipice, because of the concept of:

Paid for play

With billions coming many people feel that the NCAA is exploiting these athletes under the current system.

As it stands student athletes cannot get outside jobs and cannot profit from their athletic success on the field. So while many of these players are Gods of campus, with tuition, room, board, meal plans, and tutors covered, they can not profit off of signing autographs, making T.V. appearances or even holding outside jobs.

Jerseys with these players numbers fly off the shelves. Video games with their likenesses sell millions of copies and the players are not allowed to get hair cuts for free?

Listening to sports analysts and fans discuss this inequality for months has led me to writing this piece. Personally I do not feel college athletes should get paid for their time on the field for many reasons, however with this said I understand the other side's argument and have found the true underlying issue the talking heads are actually discussing: there is no freedom of choice for these players.

When we think of the NCAA, the violations handed down, and our idea of players getting paid, we do not think about golfers, swimmers, baseball, hockey, volleyball and the vast majority of sports that make up the NCAA. No we almost exclusively focus on Men's basketball and football.

The reason paid for play is such a big deal here is for three reasons.

1. The sports are popular
2. it is commonly thought that these sports bring in the most revenue to the school
3. IWhile both the NFL and NBA have some sort of developmental league, college is understood as the only viable and reliable way to break into the professional sport.

Without a minor league system (NHL, MLB) or being able to go directly to the sport players have no choice about the route that they can take to the NFL or NBA. A scholarship kid who chooses to play college baseball usually also has the choice to go directly into MLB's minor league system. A talented athlete that wants to go into the NBA or NFL must go to college to succeed.

This is the heart of the issue.. These kids do not have the choice of a minor league system to develop in instead. This is why people believe the kids are “exploited” (a loaded term), because the NCAA is the only way they can make it to their end goal.

With this said paid for play is not the solution to the problem.

What happens when the star-quarterback is getting paid an extra $40,000 a year and the offensive linmen who make him a success are get nothing?

How do you deal with the fact that someone who may be marginally better than you is making thousands because he is the starter and you get to ride the bench?

How do you control the larger schools from simply buying the best players?

What happens to the player who under performs? What do you do when the school and the fans turn on him for not living up to his “bonus?”

Money corrupts some of the oldest and wisest of us. Professional athletes have a hard enough time managing money. Now you want to give impressionable college students this same responsibility.

By paying players we open up a Pandora’s box of issues and challenges. And while the system is not perfect, everyone choosing to go into it knows what they are signing up for.

As it stands many student athletes get a well subsidized education. They do not have to worry about tutors, meals, room, board, tuition. And while these are just part of the college expenses they are a major part.

If kids are so strapped for money in school: take out a loan. Almost every student in America has student loans and uses them to get through school.

I understand the frustration out there when people hear about the billions of dollars that the NCAA makes, but we have to remember that they reinvest 96% of that back to the schools. I know that there is probably some corruption at the NCAA, but that does not change the fact that most college athlete departments run in the red.

With all of this frustration we lose sight of the fact that if the kids want it, if these young adults want it, they are getting an opportunity that most can not afford. In the end the heart of this issue lies at the simple truth that we feel these athletes do not have the freedom to choose their own path to success.

Unfortunately that in itself is a fallacy. No matter if it is a single school offering the student the opportunity to play they still have one choice to make: to play or not to.

So when you watch these athletes play and fill your heart remember that they made that choice to play and that they knew what they were getting themselves into.  

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Steroids or Lying

Performance Enhancing

Performance Enhancing: Part Two 

Food for thought about change.

Understanding the times.

I sit here wondering. Wondering what is going on in the United States of America. I am not normally one to question this. I am not one who says that this country is past its glory days or going to the dogs. That’s not it, but I watch what is going on and I sit here wondering.


Another shooting. Another sad day that we do not know how to react to, what to say, or what to offer grieving loved ones. When I look at what happened in D.C. I wonder why we have so little to actually offer the loved ones and I think I know.


It happens too often and we know deep down that there is no actual reason for all of this. We look at the people who were able to obtain the firearms and we know that they shouldn’t have been able too.


If you continually apologize for a habitual behavior then it is not an apology, it is simply lazy. Apologies only hold meaning if you actually intend to change and considering the number of mass shootings, the amount of gun violence, this obviously is not the case.


We hide behind the second amendment. People in favor of less gun support hide behind it as a Holy Grail of freedom. Those fighting for gun control hide behind it as the insurmountable demon hindering their noble efforts. This is only cowardice. If we want our apologies, our word to mean anything then we have to step out from behind this veiled excuse.


People stand behind the second amendment as canon. And I wonder why? The constitution may be the cornerstone for our country, but it is only a few hundred years old and parts are becoming outdated. It has been changed for generations and now we find it too holy to change. We find it too sacrilegious to change our constitution, while at the same time Catholicism does not find it sacrosanct to make monumental strides for the church in the name of progress and understanding the world as it is today.


Our new Pope, Pope Francis, has reached out to the gay, atheist, and agnostic communities. He has reached out in phone calls to his practitioners and is even looking at changing the rules regarding clergy celibacy…


Pope Francis has done this because he understands that time changes what is and is not acceptable. He understands that these ideas were holding back the church and were in themselves sacrilegious to the tenets that they were meant to protect and uphold.


I understand that things take time and that gun control and Catholicism are different. I understand that the methods to change the infrastructure of a faith and our country are different. I understand this, but still have a question for all of my readers, for everyone out there.


If a two thousand year old institution can evolve with the times then why can't a three hundred year old document do the same?


Can we change a document to make it so a mass shooting (a shooting of four or more) does not occur daily in this country.

Lesson not learned update

To all my loyal followers, sorry for the hiatus, kinda, I have been working on a few projects and am really excited.

I am working on a new chapter for the thirteen state reunion. And will be working on a new article soon. With that said though I am really excited for what I have coming.

I have one more lesson not learned for you then the collection will be released. Yes that is right you will have another lesson not learned created for you and then they will all be available through amazon.

This will give you the opportunity to have the lesson not learned short stories where ever you go and to share them however you want.

More importantly though at the end of the collection is a bonus story entitled:

A lesson not learned: Moral war.

This story is one of a kind and brings the entire collection together.

If all goes according to plan they will be available in paperback and digitally through amazon.

This is by no means the end of the lesson not learned series and I can not wait for you to have it to enjoy.  

Chapter Two of a thirteen state reunion

Sorry for the long time between posts. I have been out of town alot and am doing my best to finish the novels. With that said though the blog is still in development and I can not wait for the changes to be finished.

Without further ado though I would like everyone to take a minute and enjoy chapter two of a thirteen state reunion.

Chapter Two: At the table.

“I ain’t going on Hopra’s and neither are the Lina’s. Don’t get me wrong we love her big, old, jovial nature and would love to get a new car/kitchen/dishwasher/ bbq grill,  but there ain’t no way we are goin on there. She’ll want to know bout the Lina’s relationship and we ain’t brigin that up again... Last time we talked bout that the Gazette ran that headline bout “Northy always being on top.”

“All right Georgia, but Larry Ringer is out too..”

“Come on it...”

The room erupts yet again into inaudible babble. George and Penn have been at each other’s throats since they got here and as far as I can tell nothing has changed.

Maybe Mary was wrong about all of this. Nothing has changed and now that we are sitting in board room on Capitol Hill that is painfully obvious. Lanta has been trying to take off Philly’s head since we got here and none of the other kids are getting along.

“Do you folks need anything?”

“Go on your own way, you self serving as....”

“Language, Yorky. No sir we do not need anything. Thank you though.”

As nice as Youky’s father is I think Yorky Jr. has a point. I mean the congressman, the aides, and the dammed lobbyist will not leave us alone. I know we are using a room on Capitol Hill, but this is a little ridiculous.

They stop by every few minutes to check on us and I am beginning to see why nothing gets done around here. I thought the press was going to be bad, but I never thought our civil servants would be acting like pre-pubescent teens trying to get insiders.... Wait what am I saying of course they would be, they’re Congress.

“You want to bring this thing outside.... huh?”

Fourth time today Georgy has offered to bring Penn outside. It has been years I have seen Georgy so fired up about something, of course the last time he got a little grab happy and we had to cut him down to size. Sometime I wonder if we were a little harsh considering how Bamma and Missy turned out. Course if we didn’t he would probably stretch out from sea to shining sea.

“Sure. Why not? We’ll deal with you two again just like we did last time. Can not wait to have little Savannah all to myself again,” Philly speaks up before his father can respond.

*Crash*

I wonder how much drywall costs here in D.C. I mean I am sure they have someone on retainer after the coffee clubers came to town. Of course Lanta looks angry and his chair is in the hall now. He may be different than his father, but no one hurts his sister. Not after what Sherman did.

“I know you are all busy, but Loca-Col….”

Another chair files at the lobbyist as the room collectively yells at him to get out. It is a shame we had to destroy another nice chair and had to put another hole in the wall. I mean this room, these chairs, it is beautiful. Expensive, but beautiful.

The chairs are bejeweled with rubies and diamonds and other jewels, senators’ names on the back. The room itself has sayings like “you’re the best!”, “everyone loves you!”, “agreement is weakness.”, “I before e except after c,” on the wall in gold leaf. Luxurious antique Persian rugs are underfoot and the table itself I think was taken from Camelot.

“Everyone calm down....” Marry yells over the group. Trying to keep the group on track after they had united against the lobbyist. “We need to remember why we are here. We are not here to fight, but to bring America what it desperately craves and calls for: mindless entertainment from those who are supposed to be the oldest and the wisest.”

“Georgy you need the money as bad as any of us considering how many school superintendents you are going through. And Philly considering how much you pay those “sports” athletes you think you could dust the seats of fix that dammed bell.  We all have something to gain, so let’s stop bickering and go back through these network proposal letters.”

It is too quiet in here for my tastes. Virginia is brooding in the corner and I have no idea what’s on her mind. We never do and simply have a hard time figuring out if she is part of the North or the South. Deley and Hammy never have anything to say. Deley may be the oldest here, but his Napoleon complex is the only thing that comes in first.

“What about “The Learning Network?” TLN?” Penn speaks up, holding up a letter from one of their director’s.

“No way. Did you even read the letter Penn. They will turn the South into backward hicks who are completely ignat. They call themselves the lernin’ channel, but we all know it is more about weird stuff like seven hundred pound man, family with 25 kids, sex, god, and everything else. They will make me an’ the Carolinas look so bad that honey foo-foo looks mature.”

I hate to say it, but Georgy is right. Every family that goes on the learning channel breaks up and considering how fractured we are we can’t take anything else. Let alone a special on the cultural explanation for why Jersey has a cropped top, takes steroids, and wears a tank top.

“What about NPC or 123?” Deley excitedly exclaims. Hoping everyone picks one of the two networks he watches.

“Both have too much going on and will not lower their standards. Knowing NPC they would release the results of our series weeks before they even reached the air.”  Virginia spits out to dismiss NPC

“And 123?” Deley persists.

“Since none of us are single or part of a murder mystery yet they will not have a place for us in day or prime time. Can you imagine Marry handing out flowers and watching us get eliminated one by one?”

Sitting in silence we are all imagining Marry handing out roses in her red dress. Younger than the rest of us, but still a decade old that would not work.

Daylight burning, I am starting to understand how our civil servants can work so hard and get nothing done. Today has not been a total waste: we got lunch, decided we all deserved more money than we had thought previously, and decided that Loca-Cola could be our sponsor after they bought us lunch and gave us some killer hats.

With little time left though I hope someone has something, because we all have to jump on flights tonight, we all have to get back.

“What we need is a network that has few morals and no qualms about making light of  serious situations,” Marry begins to speak up.

“Exactly Marry.” Yorky agrees for everyone. “We need a network that can manage our story into something newsworthy while ignoring and not covering any facts. We need a network that can overlook our problems in education, public safety, health care, transportation, and public services and focus on the nonsensical stories that lie underneath.”

“We need someone to spin a useless story lines, news, and conflicts into cash,” Jersey adds in to support Yorky. Checking his hair, making sure it looks effortless while he does.

“We need a network that everyone watches, but never admits to watching. A network that is so much of an unwritten joke that we can do our show and everyone will know it is not real or serious simply based on the network.”

Money Money Money

Alec Degnats

Profits: Money... Money... Money....

Second quarter over, third quarter beginning, reports are coming out and the speculation begins. “Profits down” “growth up” - these words dot the headlines as we discuss company earning reports and what they mean for the country and “The Economy” as a whole.

Reading these headlines I wonder, when did a “profit” become a bad thing? How is it that making 1.5 billion instead of 1.7 is a negative? I understand that missing two hundred million is a big thing, but isn’t the 1.5 worth something?

I feel like the path companies are on is unsustainable. Some speculate that it is an evolutionary glitch, others think that the passion for profits and growing them is all that is important. When I look at the culture I see something that in its very nature is corrupt.

Working in the retail culture you get too see corporate thinking and the ideas behind it. Corporate America and upper management spends millions doing studies on how to fix and how to streamline their business and increase profits. How backwards is this when to fix most problems they could simply go work a day on the floor to see the real issues. Work a week and they would understand it all.

I personnay asked one of my supervisors about this when I worked in retail. I asked her, “Why don't our own managers work a day on the floor to truly get an idea of what we were going through?" I asked her, “Why they did not know anything about the products that they themselves were supposed to be managing?”

The answer I received was, “ It’s a good idea, but it’s not going to happen. Remember they all started where you are now on the sales floor.”

My supervisor's statement may be true, but most mangers have not been sales associates in ten or fifteen years. When they were sales men smart-phones were not even an idea. MLB was still more popular than the NFL.

This is where the heart of the problem lies with corporate greed. The people in charge are unwilling to understand where their profits come from and at what cost. All they see are numbers, not people, not what is going on, but the statistical data that circumstances create.

When all you see are numbers you detach yourself from the project at hand, the consequences and what those numbers actually mean.

We let bankers on Wall Street do it and they crashed our financial institutions. We let oil companies do it and the Gulf became a wreck. We let corporations do it every day even though the quality of life drops as a result.

The problem with minimum wage, social disparity, and our own ecosystem stems from this mentality. Cutting corners where ever you can trying to turn the projected profit creates hazards that many refuse to see. The easy way has consequences and unfortunately people seem to forget that. In my mind this system is leading us to our doom. I just hope we catch it and find something better before this culture consumes everyone and destroys us all. 

Please also check out

A Lesson Not Learned: Declaration of Wall Street's Love  

Reflections of a Flag

Living Expenses

Eight Chapters

That is right... I am sitting on eight chapters left to edit. That means that if all goes well beta books... thats right beta books and chapters on the blog should be up by the end of this month, we will say beginning of September to be safe.

After that on to "Trial" and if things stay on track you may just have my first to novels to give as stocking stuffers :). 

The next evolution is here.

To all of my followers thank you for everything. I am very excited about the path my career is taking and would like to update everyone.

First, jumped is two weeks away from beta reading, cover, and is on pace to be released this holiday season. IF you want to become a beta reader email me at: degnatshowell5@gmail.com with beta reader in the subject line.

With that said a thirteen state reunion is on its way with chapter two and the site itself will be getting an update soon.

I also recently have started a new book project with a friend of mine in Tennessee. More details on this project will come soon.

With all that is going on please come back often to keep up with everything as my career starts to take flight.

IF you haven't checked them out you need to:

A Fifth Lesson Not Learned

Chapter one of: A Thirteen State Reunion.

Practice: thoughts on how we grow

The New Lesson Not Learned is here

For my loyal readers here is the next Lesson Not Learned. Enjoy

Alec Degnats

A Lesson Not Learned: Snowed In at a Global Half-Way house

This place is a little odd. We have all lived together in this house since we were little. Mom, well the person who runs this half way house, used to keep a watchful eye on us, however as we grew up she let us spread our wings even if it was at her expense.

Dad, he’s not around much and likes to take his time watching us develop from afar and see how things grow.

“Get up... Come on Get up...”

That’s Sammy, all high and mighty. He used to be the runt and now Sammy’s the bully in this house now. He’s just pushed Juan down again. It seems like that’s all he does now, beat up on Juan and his friends.

“Come on tell me where that snowball came from. Who threw it?”

It is winter. And everyone laughed when Sammy was blind sided, makes me wonder why he is taking it out on Juan.

                                                            .           .           .

Sammy used to be the small, quiet one. Juan, Sammy, and Olivia were part of the last group to join our house.

When he first got here Francis and Elizabeth fought over him, both wanting him to stay in their room. That may sound friendly, but they wanted to have their own little butler for their own needs. Possibly even some of his allowance.

Elizabeth won and took Sammy in while Mom and Dad were worked on his room. Before they could complete it Sammy broke out and created his own space.

At first it was the couch, then a tent in the back yard, and before long he converted the shed into his room. Sammy’s ingenuity and drive have never been in doubt and that is the problem because that drive mixed with a taste of power became a problem.

Sammy stayed humble for a long time, slowly building his reputation until he became the turning point in the massive fray between Hans and Elizabeth.

This particular fight was over rooms, but was no different than the ones that have plagued this house for years. Sometimes we argue about rooms or allowance. Other times our battles are over books and more often than not over petty differences in the telling of the same tale. We can not share our toys and it seems we will fight just about anything.

After those battles Elizabeth and Hans, were tapped out leaving a hole of power that Sammy filled.

                                                                        .           .           .

Sammy’s in his room now brooding over the fact that none of us will play with him. Juan, Olivia, and Nikita were making paper air planes with Lin and Sammy would not stop swatting them down. He wouldn’t stop and so they ignored him and now he is in his room isolated, crying about his situation.

Why should we? Sammy sees himself as a Sixties Americana man, who is loved and adored by everyone. In reality he has become an arrogant thug, who does not think anyone can touch him.

It’s sad  because Sammy doesn't understand what he’s doing. Most bullies know they are doing wrong, but Sammy is in that delusional dangerous stage that Elizabeth, Hans, Isis and Cesar were in before him. They think they are looking out for the greater good, when in reality all they are doing is looking out for themselves. 

                                                            .           .           .

“So it is decided. We are all going to knock him down a peg.”

Muhammad is tired of Sammy and has connived this little meeting. Lin and myself are here because Muhammad thinks we are ready to be the big dogs in the house. No one trusts Hans anymore and Juan, Muhammad and Olivia think they need us to make their plan work.

It seems like the people in this meeting do not see that they are creating a new Sammy with their plan. Lin recently gobbled up tanker toys Sammy assumed were going to be his. I’m worried that if we do not stop this circle we will destroy everything we hold dear.

Sammy is in the same place Elizabeth, Cesar, Hans, and Athena were in before him. They were all the top dogs, they all became bullies, and they all fell. They all started from the bottom and all thought they were doing what was best.

The house is crumbling away, the walls are pealing, the floor boards creek and since Sammy is the big fish it is his fault. We have mother tapped out and can not see that we need to help her instead of blame each other.

Sammy is not solely responsible for this house we all are. And while Sammy may steal most of it’s resources Lin and the rest of us are right behind him.

Dad can barely keep up with us and seems to be content to watch it unravel in time. He seems to have reserved him to the fact that he and mom will go on even if we destroy this house. They will rebuild, but we will not be around or invited to enjoy it. 

Looking around this house each picture we have is a deception. We do not have a “family” portrait because we have never gotten along well enough for long enough to take one.

Hans and Elizabeth are together with Francis in the den and I’m worried they know what Muhammad is planning. Part of me wonders if they agree with him or if they will support Sammy. Either way if something does not change World War Three will be brought upon this house.

The only hope is that Sammy will see the writing on the wall and apologize. He can give up the snowball incident and realize that we are all snowed in here together, that we are all family and this it is his choice if we are going to destroy ourselves.

                                                                        .           .           .

I guess this is where you should leave us, before whatever is going to erupt does. Even alone Sammy is the strongest, so all I can hope is that nothing does. 

I hope that we will here an apology soon, but fear that we will hear shouting. This house cannot stand another war and I hope we realize that before its too late.

I hope that we can save this house together and hope we realize that while we may not be related we are all a part of the same family.

“Rupel. Dinner.”

Mom’s calling, got to go and hope that our world does not become the rubble of a lesson not learned.

If you enjoyed this you will also enjoy:

A Lesson Not Learned: Dog Days

Chapter One of A Thirteen State Reunion 

A Lesson Not Learned: Reflections of a Prisoners Lament 

Practice

 Alec Degnats

Practice

A young tourist lost in New York walks up to a local and asks him,“How Do you get to Carnegie Hall?”

The man looks back for a second, takes a deep breath and answers: “Practice, Practice, Practice...”

It is an old joke that I hope a few of you have heard before. However with that said this old joke along with a thing called Camp Jam really got me thinking about practice and how it is important to everything in our lives, not just sports or music.

When was the last time you heard a professional athlete, musician, or entertainer say that they got where they were through being lazy, stubborn, and an unwilling to work? I'll give you a minute if you want, because to be honest I never have.

LeBraun James, arguably the best basketball player alive, dedicates his off season to studying with people he feels have mastered a part of the game that he needs to improve upon. World famous jazz pianist Chick Corea once said, “I practice at least four hours a day because if I did not I would not be able to perform at the level I am expected to.”

We often forget that everyone practices all the time and that most likely the people that we consider the best of the best are that way because once they got there they never stopped getting better.

With this in mind though it is important to understand that we are always practicing and creating our own reality and more importantly who we want to be. Every action that we take is a practice step towards what we are going to become.

Whether it is music, sports, writing, sales, accounting, politics, religion, exercise, etc... we are always practicing the person that we are and the person that we are becoming. How we view and interpret the world is all done through experience and how we interact with it.

With this in mind I ask all of us to find our Carnegie Hall. Think about where you want to go, who you want to be, and what will make you happy. Then I challenge all of us to start practicing in an effort to reach those goals.