Being somewhat of a former student-athlete, (the term athlete being used loosely) and being around friends that were true student-athletes, you cannot do anything but feel for the football players at Grambling. They met with administrators last week, for apparently not the first time, about having to travel by bus to and from their away games, Grambling facilities and football equipment that the players use and the coaching staff. While the Coaching staff in my eyes is outside of the scope of what the players should actually be worried about, all of their other complaints was justifiable due to the contract they sign with the school and the athletic department, better known as the National Letter of Intent (NLI).
While the coaching issues might be outside the scope, the team’s facilities and equipment, the health issues stemming from the deterioration of their equipment, and poor transportation guidelines would go directly to the crux to what a football player signs with his (NLI) contract with the school. Just imagine starting a job as a writer at a newspaper company and not having any paper or ink. You are not going to be able to do your job very well. Getting a staph infection from molded equipment as a football player presents the same outcome. Regardless of what is in talks now, Division I Binding (NLI) contracts with financial aid agreements are on a year-to-year basis, which means a player could lose his scholarship at any time after the first year due to standards setup by the coach and/or athletic director. If other schools are flying in to play a neutral site game, why not Grambling? They are a historic HBCU, and probably have the 2nd most NFL players coming from their state besides LSU. Being gone four days out of the week during the middle of the season cannot help the student part of being a student-athlete; (which is also part of the financial aid/scholarship agreement). Therefore, by boycotting practices and games, the players put the onus back on the administrators and directors to allow them to perform (basically their job) in playing football on a more level and healthier field as their opponents. I totally agree with the student-athletes move to protect themselves and to their credit, their stance made national news, ESPN and every other media outlet, and has gotten them a sit down with administration to address these issues on a higher level.
However, there are some people that are saying that this stance from the Grambling student-athletes will have an effect on a bigger level for all college athletes; ex: to get NCAA to start paying athletes, players from bigger DI schools sit out televised games. However, what these student-athletes must remember that doing that could be a violation of team or coach rules, slipping down a roster spot or bigger, losing a scholarship and a shot at finishing for a degree or making it to “the league” possibly. Many of these athletes would not be able to attend these colleges if not for the sport that they participate in. However, players must remain eligible to participate in their sport if they sign the contract. Therefore, by making a stance so powerful, the athlete could come at a loss.
So what could be an answer to some of these problems other than boycotting games or sitting out televised games possibly ending exposure to scouts at the next level? Some solutions I think that would be beneficial would be changing the language in some of the NLI agreements to better suit the athletes in performing their jobs better. This could potentially be huge if students in the DI landscape all joined the All Players United (A.P.U.) group and force some of the language in the contract for every school in Division I. This language could include that the administrators keep equipment and facilities up with some of the revenue from tickets or television deals. What about possibly having an additional amount of trainers or medical personnel on staff? These are just some of the ways as a collective unit that athletes can make sure that coaches and athletic personnel are doing their job as well when working with these NLIs. (Until, of course, the NCAA makes serious consideration of four year scholarships and paying players).
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