College sports...free market, or free labor?

On another blog i frequent, the recent topic was the league mandates the NBA and NFL implemented that limit the opportunity for someone to enter the draft and declare themselves an athletic professional. I have concerns with these rules. The main one is this, a biased, subjective mandate should not determine whether or not an amateur athlete is ready to perform and get paid like a pro athlete. The determining factor should solely be the market. A free market system applies here as well. The market will, and always has, in the NBA and NFL, determined who is ready, willing and able to perform at that level, and subsequently earn the astronomic salaries that come with it.

The main reason this mandate occured is simply about greenbacks, not for the players, but the greenbacks universities with big time athletic programs would lose if blue chip players skipped college to go to the pros. The losses would be enourmous, so enourmous, that NCAA administrators need to go to the pro league commissioners and ask them to put in place a mandate to prevent, or at least minimize this from occuring.

Division 1 football players on scholarship are not allowed to hold jobs, they can not earn a penny. But the revenue these players generate for the university are enourmous. Game ticket sales, TV & radio revenue, concessions, booster support, corporate sky box seats, etc...So the universities have a vested interest in making sure their top blue-chippers stay put for as long as possible. Sounds like free labor to me.

But why is this mandate only in the NBA or NFL? Golfers, tennis players, soccer players, hockey players, surfers, skateboarders, bullriders, race car drivers, drag racers, track & field athletes, volleyball players, swimmers, can turn pro at basically any age they feel they're ready to. Think about it....

Fair Fair's?

I've been noticing alot of these job fairs and recruitment events being labeled as "Diversity Job Fairs", "diversity" has been the new corporate buzz word for a few years now, so things like Director of Diversity, or Diversity consultant, and Diversity Job Fair's have increasingly been popping up in the corporate world. The goal of inclusion and creating a diverse workforce should be applauded, but one of the things i found perplexing is this, what is the difference between a "Diversity Job Fair" and a Job Fair that isn't a "Diversity" Job Fair? Shouldn't all job fairs be diversity job fairs?

Jackie Robinson Tribute

Kudos to Major League Baseball in celebrating Jackie Robinson's landmark integration of pro baseball. Very few people could've withstood the turmoil Robinson endured and still maintain focus to perform on the field. It's also a commendation of Branch Rickey, a visionary strong enough to stand on his own to do what was right not only for baseball, but for society.

Imus Ignoramus

Don Imus, major ignoramus. What's really hurtful about Imus' comments is that despite the major accomplishments and achievements the Rutgers women's bball team overcame to have the best season the team has ever had in their entire existence, and the individual hard work that it takes to perform as athletes and students at that high level, has been dumbed down and completely ignored. Instead of a congratulations, the best kudos Imus could give them was calling them a bunch of "nappy headed hoe's". Of course he made it a point to only direct his negative comments to the black women on the team, the white women were spared for some reason.

Its also very clear that Imus has not one single black female friend. If he did, the value of that personal relationship would've trumped his voicing of his prejudices. Maybe Imus needs to associate himself with people who don't look or think like him, maybe he needs to just not be vocal about his prejudices, whatever his problem his, CBS and MSNBC did the right thing by solving his problem for him.

Big Mac Attack

This post is about my cult following of all things Apple (or Mac's when talking computers). In my opinion, Apple has developed into the 20th and 21st centuries' greatest companies. They seem to know what consumers want way before consumers themselves do. They've single handedly revolutionized the television and music industries. Among Apple's many achievements are the invention of the mouse, and the graphic user interface that all computer users now know today, even Windows users. Apple has revolutionized almost everything it gets its hands on, case in point, in the 90's it was the line of powerful desktop computers that were considered the Mercedes Benz of computers. Now in the 2000's they've revolutionized music with the invention of the ipod and iTunes. Next is the iphone. Of course 30 years later, they still have the Mercedes Benz of desktop and laptop computers.

But the thing thats really crazy is that despite its domination in digital media and high end computer systems, Apple has very little of the worldwide marketshare, i think its around 10%, the remaining 90% of course belongs to Microsoft. But Microsoft is always playing catchup to Apple and always has them on their radar screen despite having that huge marketshare. How do my fellow tech nerds weigh in on this phenomenon?

Racists vs Gangbangers wrap up

My racists vs gangbanbers post sparked alot of discussion about which one is more detrimental to society. Some of it was actually funny, particularly the posts about gangbangers who appearantly are out accosting many people who are enjoying the lakefront at 6am. Of course their were varying opinions but i think overall it was agreed that both types of individuals are very problematic for society. Thanks to all for the comments.

i'm back

Many apologies for my blogging absence. Work and a severe episode of the flu sidelined me for much longer than expected. Thanks to all of the well wishers too.