On “Last Week Tonight” John Oliver didn’t just poke fun at March Madness. He triumphed in a 20-minute full-court press of a rant against the hypocrisy of the NCAA Tournament and the suits who run it. Oliver took shot after shot at the NCAA’s refusal to pay collegiate athletes, a situation that, as he pointed out, becomes magnified during a “billion dollar sports enterprise where the athletes are not paid a penny.”…. He noted that everything is branded, that an education for some is fraudulent, and that most of these players are longshots to play professionally anyway. Thankfully, their role-model coaches are reaping the benefits with multimillion dollar contracts. Says Oliver: “Now before you get too shocked, remember that America has a long proud history of paying aging white men unconscionable amounts of money for screaming at people.”
It’s one of the most lucrative, exciting…and thoroughly hypocritical sporting events in America: the three-weekend long NCAA Division I Basketball tournament, or “March Madness.” It’s famous for it’s one-loss-and-you’re-out finality, it’s buzzer-beating shots, and exciting upsets. It’s also a cash cow for the NCAA, and it seems that virtually everyone is making money hand over fist during March Madness…except the athletes playing the games- you know, the whole reason for the 68-team basketball extravaganza in the first place.
Because they’re considered student-athletes and as such pure amateurs, they aren’t paid and are in fact penalized if they accept money, food, or other benefits. They can’t hold jobs while on scholarship, so most athletes live in a state of enforced penury. They on occasion don’t have enough money to buy food, yet they’re expected to perform at the highest level every single day. It’s the sort of thing so ridiculous you might be thinking that this is all made up…except that it’s not. While schools and many businesses associated with a school’s athletic program are free to make as much money as they can, student-athletes are expected to make due with scraps…because it’s all about protecting the “purity” of amateur athletics…in an environment in which the only amateurs are the ones actually playing the games.
The NCAA is a multi-billion dollar concern, whose chief role is maintaining the charade that Division I athletics is all about the “purity” of shamateurism- playing for the love of the game, not financial remuneration. This expectation is placed upon athletes by the NCAA, administrators, and coaches, some of whom pull down seven-figure salaries.
This month, the NCAA will generate additional millions through sponsorships of March Madness, some of which range from the sublime to the ridiculous. Yet somehow none of that money makes it to the players who fans and TV networks pay obscene amounts of money to see compete.
The hypocrisy is so ridiculous and self-evident that someone coming upon it for the first time might well have trouble believing that a system so unbalanced and unfair could even exist. It’s a hypocrisy the NCAA makes no effort to hide or camouflage, even to the point where using a players likeness without compensation is not considered inappropriate or dishonest…until that player files suit years later demanding compensation.
Millions of Americans will fill out brackets in anticipation of the excitement of March Madness. Most won’t think about the conditions that the athletes involved live under. None of us would think it anywhere near appropriate to be expected to work for nothing (and an education, such as it is, is wholly insufficient as compensation)…yet that’s what the NCAA expects of athletes on scholarship.
Who says wage theft is illegal in America?
