NCAA starts the season with an airball

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By: Jacob Freehart

Staff Writer

NCAA Basketball

The National Basketball Association season is now in full swing, which means that the 2018-2019 college basketball season is now starting too.

Like most years, fans of the college sport await in anticipation, yearning for the regular season and the infamous March Madness.

Teams like the Duke Blue Devils, North Carolina Tarheels, Syracuse Orange fill up ESPN’s highlight reels as they feature some of the top prospects of the nation.

These athletes are the very best amateurs in the sport and are a huge reason why the NCAA is so popular.

Each year, college scouts constantly monitor and watch the very best high school basketball players: looking to recruit them to their school and basketball program.

In today’s sports, athletes are looked at from a young age and are scouted from sixth grade, having their games filmed and their highlights spread all over YouTube. This is a reflection of how competitive the college process has become and how these programs are willing to go to whatever lengths to get the best players on their teams.

Most will agree that this is a little much, but it’s fine because these college programs just want the best players and their teams to be successful, but others will argue that this has been going on for too long.

The NCAA March Madness is one of the most popular sports tournaments ever and each year a large amount of people to watch it. In 2017, the NCAA made over $1 billion in revenue and continues seeing a significant spike in their earnings and TV ratings each year.

The NCAA owes much of this to the top-rated freshman athletes because they are the reason why the game is watched so much. This has been a long-running controversy. The NCAA makes millions of dollars, while the athletes get no return off of their value.

This issue has been going on for almost four decades now, and gained national attention in the early 1990s, due to the emergence of the Fab Five.

This group of five Michigan Wolverine basketball players were all freshmans and they all elevated the program and the popularity of the Michigan Wolverines.

Another reason why they ended up to become so popular was because there were reports of star player Chris Webber taking money from outside parties, which broke NCAA amateur rules.

In later years, Webber came out and stated that he struggled to pay for gas and food, often times having to take extra loans out or borrow money from people to help himself out. He said that this angered him because he would walk by sports clothing stores and see his jersey being sold for $75 and have countless fans pay good money to see him play.

This constantly happens to various college athletes, especially star freshman.

The NCAA has been under constant scrutiny for this. With increasing backlash, they are slowly changing their rules, but not fast enough to help out these athletes.