Why Do We Even Have College Sports Anymore?

I f we’re being honest, the main reason we root for college sports teams isn’t that we enjoy seeing scholar-athletes succeed. It’s that we think the success of those athletes is a vindication of our life choices, specifically the decision to attend a particular school.

Surely when we cheer for our alma mater, we’re cheering for our own experiences. Those athletes wanted roughly the same college experience we did (granted, they had full scholarships and a professional sports career possibly waiting for them after graduation): They chose to take the same classes we once sat in, in the same buildings and possibly with the same professors. They hang out at the same taverns we once haunted and blast music out of the same dorm rooms. When our teams succeed, we, as alumni, get to credit all the college memories we made with producing a superior brand of athlete. (Even if you didn’t go to college, you probably root for the local team because you think it says something about your state or city.)

That’s the romantic version of the story. But recent changes in college athletics have blown that apart, leaving us to wonder what athletics really has to do with college at all anymore.

First came the U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing athletes to be paid for the use of their name, image, and likeness. Then came the “transfer portal,” allowing athletes to hop from school to school without paying any penalty. And now, the NCAA has agreed to a $2.8 billion settlement that will allow the largest schools to begin paying athletes directly.

Many have cheered the professionalization of college sports, pushing for a full free market in recruiting and compensating players. But a free market for college football, basketball, volleyball, and other sports is incompatible with those sports being attached to American universities. Capitalism in sports doesn’t mix with higher-education bureaucracy.

Of course, it makes sense for schools to want to be associated with their sports teams; athletics provide nationwide advertising for campuses, induce contributions from alumni, and give both students and graduates a reason to remain involved with the school.

But now that athletes are effectively professionals, the sports will be incentivized to break free of the constrictions of the university. The “amateurism” that provided the glue between sports and schools is now gone; college sports are now a professional league. (Athletes have long claimed they are playing for “free,” but just ask any parents who have written a six-figure check to pay their nonathlete child’s tuition — a full scholarship is real money.)

If the sports were to break free of the schools, athletes would no longer need to spend their time in class or doing assignments so that they could maintain a minimum grade-point average, giving them much more time to practice. Sure, players who wanted to go to school during their careers could do so if they wanted, but if they simply preferred to make a living by playing a sport, they could wait until their eligibility ran out before enrolling in classes. (And why would eligibility be limited to four years? If the team is not associated with a college, why couldn’t anyone play as long as they were able?)

In a true free market, players in the revenue-generating sports (in most cases, football), would be paid much more than players in those sports that generate almost no revenue (lacrosse, swimming, archery). In almost every case, the sports that bring in the most cash are men’s sports, meaning women would be making peanuts compared to their male counterparts. Let the lawsuits begin!

And of course, if the power-five sports conferences were to break off and form their own professional league independent of academics, they would no longer be restricted by federal Title IX rules that attempt to micromanage gender equality in sports. All the men’s baseball and wrestling teams that were mothballed because schools were forced to end the “gender disparity” between male and female athletes could soon return.

Naturally, in a true free market, the teams with the richest supporters will always be at the top of the standings, as they will be able to pay their players the most. Without salary caps and other competitive measures in place, what was formerly college sports will simply become a battle of the checkbooks, mirroring the European soccer framework. Before any English Premier League season, fans already know which five or six teams are going to finish at the top of the table, depending on which oil-rich family has decided to purchase a team as its plaything.

Regardless of what such a league would look like, it would be much better off financially if it threw off the shackles placed on it by the rules of higher education. Once players are paid by the athletic programs themselves, they are employees, regardless of the schools’ resistance to classify them as such. They are professionals working in an environment with only the veneer of amateurism. Once players achieve full unionization, that system will eventually break.

And that would sever the link that alumni and students have with their favorite school’s sports teams. For fans, rooting for your school could soon be a thing of the past; what was once college athletics will simply be a minor league for higher-level professional sports leagues, with the league’s champions all but decided before the season starts.

So enjoy your last few years rooting for old State U. Soon, your teams will be populated with paid mercenaries who share none of your late-night escapades on the quad but make a little bit of money playing minor-league football.