College players should get paid for playing sports because college students and athletes can be seen as equals.
Both college athletes and students are eligible to receive scholarships for their abilities. However, college athletes are also students, meaning their athletic scholarships put them through school, and they dedicate their time to a program. But even though the program gives them these scholarships, they aren’t enough for some student-athletes.
Athletes earn their scholarships, but just like scholarship students, some athletes struggle to live on them. Not all college athletes have a full scholarship and not all college athletes have academic scholarships to add on to their athletic scholarships.
The real argument is, do they get paid enough? Athletes may do more than most college students, but athletes live a double life as a student and as an athlete. They get scholarships for being an athlete, but they don’t get paid to put their bodies on the line. Athletes get scholarships for their athletic abilities just like college students do for academics, but what do athletes get for doing a little more than normal students?
With the danger these athletes put themselves in, they should get paid. Athletes such as the Louisville Cardinals’ Kevin Ware or the University of South Carolina’s Marcus Lattimore suffered horrific injuries at the risk of playing a sport they don’t get paid for.
Football players sometimes suffer injuries to their spines, which could leave them in wheelchairs. It is their choice to play, but if you had the ability to do something great, wouldn’t you take the risk?
Paying players would be an incentive for them to put their bodies, and even their lives, at risk.
College athletes do not get paid for their teams going deep in the postseason, and college conferences have plenty of money to pay college athletes. According to usnews.com, athletic conferences make millions of dollars when a team makes it deep into the playoffs. That money may go to uniforms, facilities and transportation, but what does a college athlete get to live off of?
On National Collegiate Athletic Association video games, the NCAA doesn’t use the players’ names, but they put their numbers. Any college football fan can find Tim Tebow on an NCAA Football game by his number and team.
If a fan can type the number of the player in the game, should the players get some of the money being made off of their characters on NCAA Football games? College athletes are used for advertisements but aren’t allowed to get any money from them, even though they can easily be identified.
Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel can’t sign his name and make any money on it without getting in trouble with the NCAA. When you see Manziel score a touchdown, he puts his hands up, and with each hand he rubs his fingers together, representing him and other college athletes saying “pay us.” College athletes know a paycheck is overdue for them.