[Genetic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DrBenway /img/forum/go_quote.gif Thousands of college athletes leave school with zero pro prospects, no diploma, and virtually no marketable skills. This is the rankest sort of exploitation, but, as I said it's an industry. I think the average Olympic athlete has roughly the same prospects.

Since they will have so much time to rebuilt their live, this is the best reason to enroll 14 years old kids.....

Amicalement

PS
Investing all your energy in sports as a way of managing your life is in general a realy poor choice.

 

[oicdn]

Why do you think may of your college athletes have a major in something and use their sports scholarship as the ticket to an education? I know SEVERAL athletes on the Florida Gators that are like that.

Endorsements, OK, the number is minuscule, but you can't argue the kind of values this instill in children to keep trotting along. Just because you don't have huge endorsement contracts doesn't mean you can't make a living off of it. Hell, one of them opening a gym already gives them LOADS of credibility.

I'll use myself as an example. Some of my friends are known as some of the best breakdancers in the world. They're featured in commercials, music videos and are flown around the world with all expenses paid AND pocket money just to breakdance and compete. They just came back from France and are soon leaving to go to Germany. Funny thing is, when I was breakdancing, they were the little brothers and friends on the couches at a buddies house about 4-5 years younger than me watching...now look at them. I KNOW if my parents would have pushed me to keep dancing, it would be ME on that stage, and ME making money just dancing. Even if I would have HATED practicing, I would somewhat be a better person for not quitting, and kicking myself in the butt. One of them has a SICK job of $600 a week on a cruise ship. He performs 3 minutes a night and gets free food and free cruises. Not a bad gig considering I would have been dancing 5 years longer than any of them.

Funny thing about talent is, you can either use it (even if you don't want to), or let it go to waste. And letting it go to waste is about the same as throwing money out the window. You will almost always kick yourself in the arse in hindsight for not capitalizing on it.

 

[DrBenway]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Genetic /img/forum/go_quote.gif Investing all your energy in sports as a way of managing your life is in general a realy poor choice.

For a lot of underprivelidged kids with very limited prospects in life, success as an athlete can seem like a way out. The movie "Hoop Dreams" painfully illustrated that. So many kids see someone from a poor family rise to unimagineable wealth and fame, and they think they can do the same. Except they can't.

To me it's like the lottery. They hold those press conferences during which some working stiff gets handed a fifty million dollar check, and the next day people are spending their food money on lottery tickets. The problem is, as Fran Leibowitz once pointed out, "Buying a lottery ticket does not increase your chance of winning."

The sports industry is just another form of the lottery.

Quote:

Originally Posted by oicdn /img/forum/go_quote.gif Why do you think may of your college athletes have a major in something and use their sports scholarship as the ticket to an education? I know SEVERAL athletes on the Florida Gators that are like that.

Several out of how many hundreds of thousands nationwide? Anecdotal examples don't mean very much. If colleges and universities made good faith efforts to see that most of their athletes paid attention to their studies and graduated, I'd be all for it. But they are too busy pumping alumni for donations and negotiating multi-million dollar TV contracts.

 

[marvin]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DrBenway This is, to me, just like the college sports industry, and I do mean industry. The number of kids who play college sports and go on to the NBA or NFL is miniscule. We are talking about single digits. The colleges, particularly the sports mills, squeeze every drop of revenue out of these young people, and graduation rates for most big-time programs are appalling.

Most of those athletes have no business being in college in the first place, and graduating them would really only demonstrate how lax the school's academic standards are. God may have blessed all of them with superior athletic abilities, but brains? Not quite as often.

The appalling part of collegiate sports is that it's illegal for the athletes to see a dime of the money they're generating for the school.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Genetic /img/forum/go_quote.gif Since they will have so much time to rebuilt their live, this is the best reason to enroll 14 years old kids..... Amicalement PS Investing all your energy in sports as a way of managing your life is in general a realy poor choice.

Given the way the Chinese system works, it might be better to remove the age limit in sports like gymnastics. A shorter career would lessen the number of years the athletes spend in the brutal athletic systems that ComBloc Olympic efforts tend to create.

 

[Genetic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DrBenway /img/forum/go_quote.gif The sports industry is just another form of the lottery.

The most disturbing fact is that the ones who are buying those tikets are the parents.

Amicalement

 

[DrBenway]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Genetic /img/forum/go_quote.gif The most disturbing fact is that the ones who are buying those tikets are the parents. Amicalement

So true. I mean, if a teenaged kid has a dream, and wants to pursue it, that's one thing. Waking up a six-year-old at 5 AM to get her to the gym by 6 is another matter.

 

[Genetic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by marvin /img/forum/go_quote.gif Given the way the Chinese system works, it might be better to remove the age limit in sports like gymnastics. A shorter career would lessen the number of years the athletes spend in the brutal athletic systems that ComBloc Olympic efforts tend to create.

In a former life I was a tennis pro/coach and I saw so many young aspiring kids transformed as their parents long term business projects. After all these years, I'm still shocked by the remembering of this kind of unwised parental ''dedication''.

A shorter career perspective could only rise the level of stress on the kids. Kids must remain kids.

Amicalement

 

[ClieOS]

Nonsense, parent alway want the best [size=xx-small]for their kids[/size].

Didn't any of you hear the story about how parent are doing what they can to give their children a chance for a different life [size=xx-small](read: nightmare)[/size] that they themselves didn't have?

 

[oicdn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DrBenway /img/forum/go_quote.gif For a lot of underprivelidged kids with very limited prospects in life, success as an athlete can seem like a way out. The movie "Hoop Dreams" painfully illustrated that. So many kids see someone from a poor family rise to unimagineable wealth and fame, and they think they can do the same. Except they can't. To me it's like the lottery. They hold those press conferences during which some working stiff gets handed a fifty million dollar check, and the next day people are spending their food money on lottery tickets. The problem is, as Fran Leibowitz once pointed out, "Buying a lottery ticket does not increase your chance of winning." The sports industry is just another form of the lottery.

Those comments are so skewed, especially the "doesn't increase you chances of winning" comment. Hell if you don't buy a ticket, you don't even have a chance! Common sense ensues there as to your skill level, dedicated, etc.. I can't be the next Michael Jordan if I never touch a basketball....that comment is such BS propaganda.



Quote:

Originally Posted by DrBenway /img/forum/go_quote.gif Several out of how many hundreds of thousands nationwide? Anecdotal examples don't mean very much. If colleges and universities made good faith efforts to see that most of their athletes paid attention to their studies and graduated, I'd be all for it. But they are too busy pumping alumni for donations and negotiating multi-million dollar TV contracts.

Your example is just about as anecdotal as mine if that's the case. Difference is, I happen to KNOW some of those players. Many of them complain about having to keep a GPA to even play, hell, to even be on the bench. The problem isn't in the sports arena, it's in the schools itself and some of the Professors who DO let things slide due to social or peer acceptance of the other professors and faculty.

Urban Mayor is a HUGE advocate of putting out "smart players". Don't blame an industry based on what little knowledge you know which is based upon what the media portrays. I have good friends actually PLAYING and on the team this year (some of them benchers too), as well as people highly involved with college sports in general who would definitely like to tell you a thing or two about the view the public media and pop culture has on NCAA football students. It's a HORRIBLE stereotype which needs to be fairly viewed and squashed. You don't think many of those players know they're not NFL material? Gimme a break.

*edit* I see you're a "Dr." So I don't know if that means your a professor or not, or if you're really a doctor. But the examples you gave may be indicative of YOUR college, but most definitely NOT of UF. I definitely don't know if that's the case for other schools, but again, definitely NOT UF.

 

[oicdn]

Same can be said about Fraternities/Sororities "only partying"...yet, most of those comments made, are by people who have never been in a frat or sorority. Nobody ever mentions the amount of mandatory study hours they have per week, or the mandatory philanthropy hours per week, or campus participation, or the fact that on top of that, collectively must maintain a GPA to even remain chartered, as well as individually just to be in the Frat/Sorority. Non-Greeks refer to them as "elitist college snobs" for a reason.

Pop culture media is so skewed, it's amazing. And this is coming from a guy who the majority of the time, dislikes frat guys and sorority girls (granted I do have friends in them). I give them credit for being able to party like they do AND keep up the grades....cause God knows, I failed at doing it, lol.

 

[DrBenway]

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[ericj]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ClieOS /img/forum/go_quote.gif Nonsense, parent alway want the best [size=xx-small]for their kids[/size]. Didn't any of you hear the story about how parent are doing what they can to give their children a chance for a different life [size=xx-small](read: nightmare)[/size] that they themselves didn't have?

No, many parents want what is best for themselves.

Most parents want what's best for the kids. Not all. Many are borderline psychopathic in their drive to get their kid to compete and succed.

And then there's the subject of female infanticide in china. But I'm sure you don't want to go there.

 

[scompton]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oicdn /img/forum/go_quote.gif Nobody ever mentions the amount of mandatory study hours they have per week, or the mandatory philanthropy hours per week, or campus participation, or the fact that on top of that, collectively must maintain a GPA to even remain chartered, as well as individually just to be in the Frat/Sorority.

This doesn't sound anything like the fraternity I was in. We didn't have mandatory anything. I don't know if there was a mandatory collective GPA, but that wouldn't have been a problem anyway.

There was an incredible amount of partying.

This was 30 years ago. Maybe things have changed now.

 

[nysulli]

Drbenway, the thing is, the vast majority of colleges do see that their athletes graduate, I know, I was an athlete in college, 20 hours of mandatory study hall every week unless you were over a 3.0 gpa, coaches are typically up your ass if you aren't holding up to your end of the deal with classes, if for no other reason then professors or the athletic director asking why X work isn't being done, of why your GPA has fallen dangerously close to the minimum to play (not that this happen to me)

sure there are some cases that are made public where the kids are pushed through because of their ability, but its like anything else in life, you get out what you put in, and for every person who for one reason or another is allowed to skate through college as an athlete without doing the work, there are 10 who use their ability to get into a school they otherwise were on the edge of getting into, or to help pay for school, or simply for the love of the game. As a whole, college sports are beneficial in many ways, even to some of those who do skate through without doing the work, think about the fact that some if not many of them wouldn't have gone to college in the first place if it wasn't for their athletic ability.

 

[ClieOS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ericj /img/forum/go_quote.gif No, many parents want what is best for themselves.

Thought I was trying to be a bit funny and sarcastic on that reply, but I guess I fail at the account.
Quote:

Originally Posted by ericj /img/forum/go_quote.gif And then there's the subject of female infanticide in china. But I'm sure you don't want to go there.

The problem still exists in the very rural area, but it is much better now. Both the publics' attitude and the government policy has changed since they realize they have less girls than boys these days (like vintage gears, people value more on things that is less in quantity).