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NCAA Player Reform: A Few Thoughts
many blessed with great talent are not so blessed with the simple parental influences
By Roger m. groves,
professor of law
florida Coastal School of law
T
he NCAA enforcement problem has festered beneath
the surface for decades, and allowed to grow into
a multi-institutional monster. I think its prob-
lems are too complex for a single simple solution.
There are root causes we still don’t dig down and
deal with. Some societal, some economic, some
just plain greed or ignorance. Nor can all the
issues be adequately treated in a single post. But
there are some issues that seem obvious to me
that no one seems to what to address. I have a few
suggestions or considerations. One seeks to inspire
players to do the right thing. The other is more drastic,
borrowing from criminology and technology. That’s for
those who still don’t get it. But I’ll save that for another
post.
First, we need an enhanced way of inspiring the at-risk
teenagers to do the right thing. The reason is because the
university setting is not supposed to
act like the criminal justice system.
We must admit that we are asking for
voluntary compliance by players to
comply with NCAA rules. The prob-
lem with getting at-risk star players to
conform to NCAA rules doesn’t start
with college. Grown-ups identify and
coddle those with superior athletic
ability at or before puberty. Then the
adoring community that loves to see
their schools win, including some
teachers, sends the subtle but consistent message that for
these youngsters, the normal rules do not apply. It should
not then surprise us that some of these mixed-messaged 10-
12 year olds become teenagers who are high risks for rules
violations. And then there is often family dysfunction where
too often the absent or incarcerated father is replaced by
AAU coaches or other sports pimps of sorts. The player
becomes more a commodity than the loved one.
Yet the essence of fatherhood is irreplaceable. The loving
daily presence gives a special standing and entre’
to the kid’s heart and mind. The father can then
penetrate the athletic aura and say, “Oh no.
You won’t do that!” Magic Johnson has
plenty of stories about how his father made
sure certain behaviors were put in check
despite his tremendous fame in high school.
He was blessed with that loving connection
and correction as part of daily living. Many
blessed with great talent are not so blessed
with the simple parental influences that many of
us take for granted or have forgotten.
We should remember too that there are plenty of studies
about the disparity –in rules and resources - between the
public schools in large urban areas and the schools most
college students come from. The vast majority of African
Americans in public schools are
from a dozen urban under-resourced
schools with challenges very differ-
ent from the suburban high per-capi-
ta cost per student schools. All those
factors among others bring tremen-
dous adjustment issues once these
players go to college. And college
itself is the first sniff of almost com-
plete freedom that has snared more
than just athletes.
I am not making excuses for bad
behavior, just reasons why it exists. If we don’t understand
the problem, we are less likely to find a solution. And unless
we understand what motivates and inspires the players, we
have little chance of knowing what buttons to push to cre-
If we don’t understand
the problem, we are
less likely to find a
solution
ate changed behavior among those likely to commit NCAA
infractions through their own choice. The separate and next
issue is what to do about it. One part of the solution is for
qualitative family circumstances early in life. But the past
links us to the present and that tragically will take far longer
to fix.
So we need to start with inspiring teenagers to transform
a past “rules don’t apply to me” mentality to the new and
very daunting set of rules found in the near-IRS Code level
NCAA rule book. Some of us with little appreciation for
this transformational issue act shocked as to why such play-
ers don’t instantly transform themselves.
Read the rest of this story online at www.theskanner.com
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September 28, 2011 The Portland Skanner page 7