Let There Be Light wrote:
Big 10 (the conference with 12 schools going to 14 next year) commissioner Jim Delany says that athletes in football and basketball should follow the lead of major league baseball and be allowed to turn pro right of high school and skip playing college sports.

http://espn.go.com/college-sports/story … ll-changes

They already can.  They can join some adult league and in about 3 years, try out for the NFL.

Oh...that doesn't have quite the lucrative road to the NFL that a program from the Pac-12, Big 12, SEC and others can bring huh?

I guess the sound of a scholarship isn't all that cheap now is it?

SteeringWinds wrote:
Some talking about college athletes like they're slave labor.  What about the value of a free college education, room, and board? 

Granted, lots of the NCAA rules are total bullshit, but jeez.  They're getting for free what some people in this world risk their lives by piling into leaky rafts ...all just to have a CHANCE to obtain.

Fact is the vast majority of college atheletes will never make it to the pros, let along have a carrer long enough to be 'set' for the rest of their lives (on that note, the ESPN 30/30 show in pro athlete's financial management woes was amazing), while a pretty high percentage will wrap up their college careers with life-long injuries, so they really need something to fall back on.

You're absolutely right.  But, they should be allowed to try to fail!

Jerry Franklin wrote:
In basketball some have come out directly from HS and succeeded...some have failed. I don't follow baseball so I don't know what goes on there.
As good/big/fast as any HS football player is...even a #1 recruit...I seriously doubt they would have any success in the NFL straight out of HS. The NFL is another beast when it comes to physical size/speed/ability compared to HS.

Professional baseball teams in the Major Leagues are owners/partners with 3 lower level professional teams called the Minors.  Hence the terms, Single A, Double A, and Triple A.

Rarely will a high school player skip the minors and go directly to the Major Leagues.  I could be wrong, but I believe Dwight Gooden, of the New York Mets did skip the minors and pitched when it was 18.  Extremely rare.  Rare also is that a player that DOES go to a University/College ALSO skips the minors and goes into the MLB.  The only player that I can think of that did that was Jim Abbott for the Angels.

Right now the best player on the Angels, Mike Trout, didn't get called up until he was 20.  So he played at least about 2-3 years in the Minors.  And that dude is AWESOME through his first two years at the pro level.

Perhaps the NFL should do this.  Each of the teams start buying up adult league teams and grooming players.  For baseball, the minor league players are ALL PAID.  Not much, but they are paid.  Some will play out their entire careers in the minors and never make it. Might even be save to say, MOST never make it.