When the Wisconsin Badgers lost to Duke in the 2015 NCAA men’s basketball championship game, there was a sudden negative rush to judgment concerning one-and-done collegiate basketball players.
In a national semifinal, the Badgers beat a Kentucky team flush with players destined for the NBA after one year with the Wildcats. No complaints surfaced from anyone after that game, including Badgers coach Bo Ryan.
Following the title game loss two days later, Ryan blamed the refs – but even more out-of-line was his criticism of one-and-done players.
“All the seniors that I’ve had – hard to say the word. But every player that’s played through the program, okay, we don’t do a rent-a-player. You know what I mean?”
Yes, Bo, unfortunately, I think I do.
There is something that bothers people about young black men going to college for a year and then taking advantage of current NCAA and NBA rules – along with self-employment entrepreneurial skill – and cashing in.
Among those suffering from this affliction is U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.)
After the title game, McCaskill tweeted that she rooted for the team with “stars that are actually going to college.”
After she was immediately criticized, she responded a few hours later, saying, “I see I have stirred things up. Sorry, but I’m sad about the one & done thing. I understand why it’s happening, but I don’t have to like it.”
There was even talk of wasting the people’s time and money on Congressional hearings.
Why doesn’t McCaskill like it? Why doesn’t Bo Ryan like it?
Sports agent Arn Tellem wrote a telling article published in The New York Times last Sunday that rationally points out the bias displayed by McCaskill and others.
His article ran after eight one-and-done players were selected in last Thursday’s NBA draft.
“In most of this country’s other pro sports, prodigies are welcomed and their achievements celebrated. Hockey had Wayne Gretzky and Sidney Crosby; tennis had Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi and (Serena and Venus) Williams,” Tellem writes.
“Two years ago, Jordan Spieth dropped out of the University of Texas after his sophomore year to become a professional golfer. At 19, he won the John Deere Classic, becoming the first teenager to win a PGA Tour event in 82 years. At this year’s Masters, Spieth … finished as the youngest runner-up in the tournament’s history. How come no one has said Spieth’s decision to leave the Longhorns was bad for golf?”
Tellem reminds us that two of the most popular and successful players in Major League Baseball didn’t even do the “one” of a “one and done.”
“Major League Baseball allows high school stars to enter its draft, which is how, at the not-so-tender age of 19, Bryce Harper and Mike Trout became impact players,” he wrote.
Other players who began pro careers in their teens include Hall of Famers Bob Feller, Mickey Mantle, Johnny Bench, Brooks Robinson, Harmon Killebrew, Al Kaline, Ken Griffey Jr., Robin Yount and Babe Ruth.
“Mark Emmert, the NCAA president, has voiced no objection to the 500 ballplayers who annually sign pro contracts out of high school. A vast majority of them will never play a major league game, even those drafted in the first round. Most toil in the minors, where they earn minor league salaries,” writes Tellem.
Emmert and the NCAA should have much more to say about baseball than basketball, based on a lawsuit that was filed last week last week by 34 former minor league players.
The suit contends that most players in the lower levels of the minors earn between $3,000 and $7,500 for an entire five-month season, below minimum wage and in violation of state and federal laws. The lawsuit states that the vast majority of players never reaches the Majors and most of those who do earn the $500,000 minimum MLB salary.
For those who think leaving college after one season does not play out well for the “vast majority” of basketball players, the facts prove they are wrong.
Fifty-nine of the 82 college freshmen who turned pro since 1996 (not counting those in the 2015 draft) are still on active rosters, about 72 percent.
“Only a handful of players failed to pan out on the pro level, and one was seriously hurt before his rookie season,” according to Tellem.
One-and-done basketball players, for the most part, find success in their chosen profession and instant wealth. How could anyone who resides in America, the Land of Opportunity, have a problem with this?
