Since some folks are wondering why we refer to the NC$$ with the double-
dollar sign, here from "Undue Process" is a list of some of the benefits
enjoyed by some employees of the NC$$ (note that in the last year reported
in the book, 1989-90, the NC$$ grossed more than $98 million in revenues):
 
* No-cost rented cars
* No-interest or low-interest home mortgages
* Free legal advice, cost built into the organization's $1 million-plus
  annual legal tab
* Free entrance to NC$$ championship events
* Flying first class to meetings, accommodations in expensive hotels and
  treatment to free entertainment by sports-related interests
* $100 in extra travel expenses if committee member elects to fly coach
  in addition to $30/day annual meeting expenses
 
In addition, a couple of years ago, the NC$$ took a $1.75 million loan to
buy its own jet, then sold it to a private company which leased it back to
the NC$$.  It then hired a director of aviation and budgeted over $250,000
for aircraft maintenance.  The price tag of the plane is 4x larger than the
entire athletic dept. budget of some DivI schools, says Yaeger.
 
And, in 1989, the NC$$ spent over half a million dollars to hire lobbyists
and work in Washington to ensure that a bill (eventually passed) in
Congress that made public the graduation rates of student-athletes would
not include any reduction in the NC$$'s authority to regulate collegiate
athletics.  It also provided a huge buffet reception at the Final Four in
Seattle for a number of members of Congress who it had invited there, as
part of that lobbying effort.
 
The author adds that the NC$$ also has (or had, I don't know their
status now) two for-profit subsidiaries, the National Collegiate Realty
Corporation and the NC$$ Marketing Corporation; the first controlled more
than $7.4 million in land and property at the end of 1989.
 
At the end of its fiscal year in August 1989, the NC$$ had more than $21
million in the bank.
 
Yaeger notes that "these are benefits being enjoyed by employees of the
NC$$ [$$ mine] - a not-for-profit organization formed to govern college
sports.  All while the rules say student-athletes must be limited to room,
board, tuition, fees and books." (page 108)
 
One final comment, this mine: It does appear that a body such as those with
the principles which the NC$$ was founded upon, which truly acts primarily
in the best interests of the student-athletes of US college sports, is
something desired and probably even needed.  The question being raised is
whether what we have now actually accomplishes that and does so in a fair
and equitable manner.
 
I submit that what is listed above and the other things we know of the NC$$
are simply an extension of a principle that has permeated college sports
and even colleges themselves: that collegiate athletics, and college itself
to a degree, is actually a business not much unlike any other in the US.
By itself, that is not bad.  The problem that arises is when this business
represents itself as something that it is not - and I'll refer you to the
quote I gave above.  I tend to think the NC$$ would enjoy a higher degree
of respect if it ceased this amateuristic posturing and admitted that there
is a lot of money to be made out there, and it is out to grab its piece of
the pie.  Given the NC$$'s mission, that should also mean turning some of
that pie back to the student-athletes - not necessarily by paying them, but
perhaps by cutting out some of these perks and returning the profits to the
schools themselves, to be used to benefit them more directly.
 
But in the end, it really comes down to the schools themselves to make this
happen, doesn't it...
---
Mike Machnik    [log in to unmask]   Color Voice of the Merrimack Warriors
alternate address days: [log in to unmask]             *HMN*  11/13/93
(Any opinions expressed above are strictly those of the poster.)