I tend to see it both ways. Yes, I do think players need to be paid. I also think they should be covered with insurance that covers them, at the least, while they're doing football related activities (whether that's spring practice, summer+fall practice, games, etc). Football is a rough game to play and too often, player's lose their careers, whether that be completely to injury or they get hurt bad enough to where they're never the same, ala Dorsey, Sonic Sam Montgomery, etc etc. Those 2 injuries still suck when thinking about the before and after types of players they were. Sonic Sam was a beast before the injury, but never was quite the same. Or, someone like Glenn Dorsey before him - that one still sucks too. That bitch from Auburn deserved to be on death row for that one.
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Anyways, kind of went on a tangent, back to regular scheduled programming... The other side of me also thinks that some of these players are getting paid way too much now. I think there needs to be a cap or something. The way it is now with just this wild west type of scenario isn't going to benefit the players in the long run, especially when some of the most money is going to kids straight from high school, of which many will flame out in college going against the tougher competition. Because you can bet your arse there's still "$100 dollar handshakes" ($100k now days). I just think a lot of these kids are too immature to handle that kind of money at that age, but I guess that's why the coaches get paid so much. Not trying to sound messed up or anything, but a lot of football players come up in poor environments. It's just reality when you give most immature kids - who have never had anything - a crap ton of money before he even has to work for it and before he even accomplishes anything (especially if there's maturity issues as well), that's a recipe for disaster. I guarantee you we'll start seeing more players get in to more trouble for things that you would see once every few years before. I've witnessed and dealt with it first hand. When a player is used to being a star and getting all the attention from basically middle school up until college and then they go to college and fall flat on their face (usually because they're not used to putting in the effort it requires since before, they were just bigger, faster, stronger and more talented) you'll see often times they tend to turn towards things that aren't in the best interest of their futures. They start to feel lonely and struggle they're not the talk of town any longer. And some, they'll want to try and regain some of that back and they also want to turn that 50k they have left from NIL into 100k and feel a little more secure. That can lead down are dangerous path for some of them.
Anyways, I've just kind of rambled on, but the point was to say I see it both ways. I think the players generate way too much net income for these universities to only receive an education, that if we're honest, many will either never complete or never use. But I also don't understand why there can't be some guidelines to it. Why the hell did the NCAA leave it up to each state's lawmakers. It's like they've just completely given up now and are actively wanting and giving people reasons to hate them.
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