Is it an organized grassroots movement which will create as much change as debate or is it a disorganized group looking for attention but with no firm plan? A college athlete version of Occupy Wall Street, which will rally people, gain attention but not fully evoke change before citizens move on to whatever is next in their lives.
That is the question which arose this past weekend when the well organized National College Players Association (NCPA) helped rally players at some select and highly visible football programs…Georgia, Georgia Tech and Northwestern among them…to stage a quiet but visible protest by posting the call to action of All Players United or #APU on their gear during their televised football games this past Saturday.
The issue is NOT just about athlete compensation in money sports, according to the NCPA website…the protest is designed to bring change:
“The fate of college athletes hangs in the balance. Athletes and their supporters are uniting through the National College Players Association, which has spent years fighting unjust NCAA rules through public pressure, sponsoring new laws, conducting pivotal studies, and pushing for justice through the courts. Unity among athletes is growing by the day, lawmakers are introducing reform bills, and major players’ rights lawsuits are in motion. It’s urgent for college athletes and their supporters to do all they can to make sure things change for the better – not the worse.”
Now the main headline grabber is the continued non-compensation of college athletes in for-profit programs run by Universities…from apparel to video games to ticket sales…and whether those athletes, especially in revenue sports like football and men’s basketball…should be entitled to payment outside of what they get. While many agree that the compensation could be there as a result of the mega-dollars flowing into college programs via rights fees etc., the bigger question is who, how and how much athletes will get and what is fair and equal to all?
The few players who went to place the #APU mark this past weekend did so with little initial fanfare and were not accompanied by thousands of athletes…they were a select group of high profile football players? The result was buzz, but it has been limited in scope outside of its initial push, and by all appearances it has not moved off the select gridirons into the soccer pitches or volleyball courts not just at large universities but at thousands of small ones as well.
Now the NCAPA is not a fly by night organization. It is mature, pretty well organized and boasts 17,000 members, but it has not operated at the forefront of an organized protest of college athletes until this past weekend.
So what will be the reaction of brands and networks that have invested millions in elite college programs going forward to such a protest, if it gains strength not just among top football players but among all athletes? Will brands and networks start looking at an out…will they help embrace the cause or stand by silently and see if there are actual results that are quantifiable that come from such efforts.
Make no mistake there is a great interest in the college compensation issue, and much of it is emotional and extremely personal. There are also thousands of college student-athletes out there NOT involved in the fray, enjoying their experience and leveraging what they have for what comes next in their lives. Is this a random act which stirred the pot, or something bigger which can have tremendous financial implications on all involved? While not The Boston Tea Party or even Zuccotti Park, it is certainly a hot topic and one that has a built in national platform at least once a week in the case of college football, if not every day with the myriad of coverage and social media that college sports gets.
How it will expand, will government officials get more involved, and will organized protest invoke actual change that is fair and equitable for college athletes? What about the thousands of people on college campuses who think that sports is already out of control and want their fair say and access to dollars in programs like The Arts and Sciences? All that remains to be seen, but there certainly is more smoke for this collegiate fire than ever before.
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