There's typically no requirement to finish college however. It's relatively common for athletes to move up to the pros and skip the last years of their academics.
The US's system is mostly due to history, but the current structure continues because it is worth an extraordinary amount of money. The schools with top athletic teams bring in revenues of 100 million or more. The governing body for college athletics generally prohibits significant payments to the athletes themselves, so all that income goes to coaches and other staff, as well as supporting businesses. College coaches are usually the highest paid people on campus. This continues to be a bitter political topic, because many people see it as unfair that college athletes are generating so much money for everyone but themselves. The other side points out that allowing paid recruitment and player endorsement/advertising would have a corrupting effect as well as make it difficult for smaller schools to be competitive.
As far as I know, our system is unique, and that's probably because we were televising college athletics earlier and more heavily than other nations.
From a marketing perspective, college sports are a minor league that comes with a built-in fanbase, the students & alumni at the universities (especially large universities). The top end of college sports teams are essentially the NFL's and NBA's minor league outfits, but compare how many fans and attention a Texas, Michigan, USC, Stanford, etc. game gets (in either football or basketball) to what a minor-league baseball team gets...
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._stadiums_by_capaci...
Not only that, in most states they are the highest paid of all public employees: http://www.fastcodesign.com/1672861/infographic-whos-your-st...
A typical public sector job, particularly a university job, is almost the closest thing you can get to lifetime assured employment (most often at a salary that's not great, but with very good benefits and enormous amounts of paid time off).
Coaches though are much more accountable for their performance. If they don't win games, they get fired.
Edit: also it's only the head coaches of elite revenue-generating football and basketball programs that are very highly paid. The coaches of non-revenue sports have much more modest salaries.
1. http://www.sbnation.com/college-basketball/2013/7/9/4505884/...
It's not just that it's televised, it's that sports are tied to schools and colleges at all. Netherland has tons of youth sports, but all in indepdent, often volunteer-run clubs. For many sports (football and hockey[0] at least) there's a youth league for every two-year age group, and after the last one, when you're 18, you move to the adult leagues. Those are generally amateur leagues, but professional football clubs have their own youth programs (playing in the same leagues) and recruit from all clubs in the vicinity (not to mention rival clubs and foreign countries).
[0] And here I mean the football where a round ball is played with the foot, rather than American Football; and the hockey that's played on a field, rather than ice hockey.
That is simply not at all how it works here. You of course have sports education in school, but it is not competitive and you can't choose either.
Most of the money goes to the university itself.
Here's my theory:
It all starts with Harvard and Yale wanting a leg up on each other in their football rivalry, which dates back to 1875. Professional football did not start in the US until many years later. Football, and to some degree basketball and other sports, came to represent a very serious way for colleges to express rivalries with each other.
Seriously: "After The Game of 1894, which came to be known as the "Hampden Park Bloodbath" and about which newspapers reported seven players carried off the field "in dying condition," the two schools broke off all official contact including athletic competition for two years."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard%E2%80%93Yale_football_r...
As such, each institution became hell-bent on defeating the other at football, which led to the relaxing of academic standards to admit superior athletes. Things have spiraled out of control from there. Many schools now face very serious pressure from alumni and other donors who demand athletic success. Recruiting top high school athletes is an extremely shady business, as both schools and athletes have a lot at stake.
Harvard, Yale, and the other Ivy League schools today do not do this to the extent that some others do and have policies against awarding scholarships based on athletics-- they are small and elite institutions that can't get away with admitting students who literally cannot read. But even the schools with these policies admit athletes who would probably not get in based on their academics alone.
College sports is all about money. Consider this map:
http://deadspin.com/infographic-is-your-states-highest-paid-...
Why are the mostly highly paid "public servants" in most states athletic coaches? Because the public universities make huge amounts of money from sports: the TV licensing deals, the ticket sales, the merchandising.
The players get paid nothing -- at most they get their tuition waived.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Football_League_draft#...
There were players in the past who have gone straight from HS before the rule was in place. Most notable, Lebron James.
I think you mean "promising athletes". I guarantee colleges do not care how these young people perform as students.
That's not why.
The coaches are paid a ton because were they to quit, they could be paid a ton somewhere else.
Why would they be paid a ton somewhere else?
Because other colleges want to win!
Why do they want to win?
Because without their football team, schools like Alabama and Texas and USC and and and would have ZERO credibility.
If football left it would definitely hurt these two schools. However, they have a LOT of academic credibility aside from athletics.
[1]http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-gradu...
Without the notoriety and prestige granted by their athletic programs, no one would respect their academics.
For a recent example, witness the transformation of USC from a joke of a school (academically) to a somewhat respected, some might even say moderately prestigious (!!) university. A transformation which coincided 100% with their successful football program.
The great team builds recognition. It builds respect. You graduated from a school which is a football powerhouse, people respect you. Even if you graduated decades before they rose to football prominence. Even if you never cared about football. People want to be affiliated with success, thus they want to be affiliated with you.
Some universities, such as UNC and Virginia Tech, have seen massive profits by selling merchandise thanks to these sports teams, and have made sports a higher priority than the actual academics. Now younger people are choosing to attend universities based on their sports team rather than the academics.
Anyone who disrupts this big business of college sports can expect to feel massive backlash from the university and the crazed fans of the sports teams.
They get paid more than even their most valuable professors!
Good professors hold chairs which are paid by endowments. So maybe a few million $ a year in donations. Good coaches can make a few million $ on a good weekend. If they make it to the bowls, 10-20 million $.
But in what universe could this be a good thing? What does sports do for the development of mankind? It distracts, it is just "panem et circensis"[1] and it is nothing more than a big business.
So the people trying to teach people the ability to better the world have to "fight for the scraps" while others reap the benefits of telling youngsters to run faster, kick harder or throw better?
I do think competition is a healthy and necessary trait for individual development. Meanwhile, education holds the potential of freedom from subjugation for all humans... The balance is disturbed.
Likewise, sports are fun! But if you need further justification, their play teaches us valuable physical and social skills - teamwork, graciousness, poise, coordination, fitness, and so on - that even if you aren't entertained by a particular sport, surely you can see its potential value in other dimensions.
I guess my point is that not all human education is intellectual. It is experiential, and it is physical, and social, and moral, too.
It's also more difficult to follow than say soccer to people not intimately familiar with the game.
Some consider chess a sport.
You've never read from people who genuinely frame things in a dismal light? I've read a lot from people that view a lot of social interaction as exactly "subjugation". The simplest example is materialism and acquiring status symbols. Some take it further to more intimate group dynamics. Does this mean that other people are trash that you should just avoid? No, and most people plain need social interaction in order to stay sane. But it can be a useful frame-of-reference sometimes, if only for the philosophical value.
> but I'd have to disagree strongly. Sports might be seen as some kind of ritualized conflict, I guess, but then how is that different than any other kind of gameplay?
Indeed. Some people think of any kind of structured competition as a sport, so all of what you said still applies. Playing videogames competitively, for example (e-sports).
> But so what?
Yes, why ever look further than the surface? Because it's sometimes valuable to look at seemingly innoucous (or not - hooligans) phenomenoms and trying to look behind the most apparent dynamics. Sports is a fun pasttime for some/most people, with some competiveness, but perhaps not enough to cause any harm at all. It is also an incredibly socially accepted - heralded even - way of channeling some of the more anti-social human traits. If I'm feeling jealous, I feel that there's something wrong with me. If I feel spiteful, I feel that there's something wrong with me. If I feel like physically dominating someone else, against their will? Just pick up some of the more physically demanding sports and be worshipped as a hero. Coax it in some fake humility and "sportsmanship", and you've got a show for the whole family. That's funny to me.
Some atheletes will get a bad rap when they are obviously being cocky and showing off. But being the best and feeling like the best was the goal all along!
It seems to me, in my uneducated opinion, that while humans are social creatures, they are too tribal to be altruistic on the larger, macro level. People are divided by nationality, culture, ethnicity and so on. Team sports? Yet another tribe for people to belong to, and to antagonize other teams from (sometimes in a more friendly manner than others ;) ). There is a lot of social dynamics when it comes to football supporters.
Sports isn't the only thing that is disturbing to me, at some level. Violent video games are really fun, but the implications are disturbing. Yet, from what I've read, people who play these games are less violent, perhaps because they (we!) get a way to channel our violent streak. (Which is also a disturbing thought.) Maybe it's the same for sports? Many more than me have been disturbed by the implications of violent video games (I haven't been disturbed by the violence - I'm too used to it), but practically no one things of any kind of sports as being anti-social.
But yeah. So what?
> Likewise, sports are fun! But if you need further justification, their play teaches us valuable physical and social skills - teamwork, graciousness, poise, coordination, fitness, and so on - that even if you aren't entertained by a particular sport, surely you can see its potential value in other dimensions.
Take any sport to a higher and higher level, and it will always distill down to one thing - being the best (that's what you are left with with the top athletes at the top). That's inherently a comparative quality, and than you are left with the only choice of "subjugating" your opponents. A high-level athlete will think nothing of sacrificing fitness, physical health etc. for being the best. Is this necessarily that applicable to most practicioners of a sport? No, but it is the top athletes who are basically worshipped, they're not simply people who have taken a "fun pasttime" and gone full-geekery on it - they are, in some circles, viewed as the ultimate expression of that sport. Not as, "geeze, man, get a life".
There you have it. I tend to disagree. I see this as one of humanities problems. These unquestioned ideologies.
I believe, that competition should only be with one self. I try to get better. Better then yesterday, last week, last year, last try. But I do not try, to rise above my pears in comparison to them. To feel better, by looking at everybody I leave behind from above.
The only one I try to beat am I. I try to do everything, to be a better person, every single day. I am still learning - and will hopefully do that for the rest of my days. I am human, I am fallible.
But my past performance is my personal yardstick. Not your performance, or anybody's. I do not need your example, as a motivation.
It's also the original "reality" programming, unscripted and unpredictable, with a constant stream of life-stories and morality-plays, which can be covered as 'news' relatively cheaply. It's not just 'bread and circuses', but actual moral instruction: modern constantly-refreshed mythology, always available for casual discussion with acquaintances and strangers.
The strong linkage with US higher-education isn't strictly logical, but tradition and economic symbiosis has entrenched the relationship. The large-audience collegiate sports help market and fund entire college communities, providing a focal point for common entertainment-outings, loyalty-displays, reunions, fundraising. In its absence, people might be relatively more parochially-aligned with just their hometowns, or faiths, or social class, or careers.
So, you have maybe 30 player learning those things while trying to get into paid adult league and the rest of students being fans learning essentially nothing.
Sure you do. There is nothing in the universe more important than money. Simply get past your belief that the American university system is about anything noble and realize it is just another money making scheme.
The education part is just a cover to keep the illusion alive. If you focus you can learn there, but you simply need to realize your worth to the school is as a paying fan. If you want it to be anything else, you're on your own to figure that out.
No. I don't. I do not understand, cannot grasp any such concept of "money is everything" or such concepts of state, borders and so on. I am a human. I have fellow humans. Some of them are nice. Most of them are idiots. These are my categories, in which I view the word.
There is no such thing as homophobia, islamophobia, money makes the world go round, or any other of these so called "normal" ideologies. No such thing as "this god" or that deity.
So no, I really do not have the ability, to understand these concepts. I can analyze them rationally, I can look at them, like sitting in a lab, examining them, but I can never understand these concepts on a basis of experience or to see things from the concepts's perspective...
That was, what I was trying to convey...
Well honestly there is nothing like a good football team to bring in funding for schools. That causes schools to focus highly on sports because at the end of the day they just want as much money as possible. It's really sad actually.
A few miles north of where I currently live, the high school football stadium seats 18,000 [0].
[0]: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagle_Stadium_(Allen,_Texas)
I was being conservative because I assumed nonUS HNers would assume I was making these numbers up.
http://ian38018.blogspot.co.uk/search?updated-max=2011-05-25...
Also, I couldn't help noticing that the Eagle Stadium is paid for by taxpayers.... :-)
Most good professors aren't in endowed chairs. Something like 1/3rd of the professors at the best schools are endowed. A state school like the University of Illinois has about 10-20%.
Nor do most of the professors bring in money through endowments and gifts. Much more is brought in through grants, like through the NIH and NSF, and from state funding. (That's a general statement. There are many exceptions.)
There's also tech transfer agreements. Consider this quote, about taxol synthesis developed at Florida State:
> In 1996, Florida State University was the envy of the tech-transfer world of U.S. research institutions. That year alone, the university's research foundation received more than $28 million in Taxol royalties. By decade's end, the university's Taxol revenue would top $200 million, among the largest patenting pay-offs for a single university in history.
That's one professor who brought in over $20 million per year, for a decade. (By comparison, the current FSU football program brings in now about $36 million in revenue, and $17 million in profit.)
And as for the coaches, very few college programs can bring in a few million dollars per game, and only the 6 playoff bowls have team payouts of over $10 million, so that's at most 12 universities with that success.
I have not done any extensive analysis of this. My comment was mostly to highlight that the previous poster was making statements that I could not easily accept as being true.
http://deadspin.com/infographic-is-your-states-highest-paid-...
In the US, its been driven even further in that there are billion-dollar industries behind the sports cult. Perhaps thats the ticket: sport is a cult because there's money to be made.
A mostly wasteful use of resources but to the majority this is a sufficient way to prove your city/state/country is better than another. I'd rather see who can fly the furthest into space but eh enjoy what you got.
Evolution ingrains cooperation. It is why we have come so far as a species, as we have.
http://beta.southparkstudios.com/full-episodes/s15e05-crack-...
So, even if you happen to have the physical aptitude to play professionally at age 18, you are barred from doing so.
(But I'm no American, and have only visited once. So take my explanation with a pot of salt.)
There do seem to be university sports leagues in Australia, they just aren't taken as seriously afaict, e.g.: http://www.aurl.com.au/
Who knows, it might catch on. Other American sports oddities have, like that annoying singing of the national anthem before each match and providing a role for athletic women in professional sports by making them cheerleaders...
The leagues have some rules about when players can be drafted, but those rules are more about simplifying and reducing competition in recruiting than they are about the players.
http://www.southparkstudios.com/full-episodes/s15e05-crack-b...