Let’s See How Much Louisville and the NCAA Cares About Kevin Ware

Louisville coach Rick Pitino said the bone was punched six inches beyond the skin. The reference was to Kevin Ware. The game was not football as you might expect, but basketball in the first half of Louisville’s game against Duke in their battle to go to the Final Four.  His leg is reportedly broken in two places. Pitino shed tears. His teammates on the floor were crying. Yet Ware said “win the game”.   They did. They were already more athletic but from that point forward they were also more driven.  The Cardinals had 10 steals, 35-26 rebounding edge and had out-willed Duke by mid-second half. They won 85-63.  

We expose these mostly-teenagers for months when they fail or have weaknesses. Little will be said after next week about how character rises. Perhaps ESPN commentator Seth Greenberg said it best. While Ware was fighting his unprecedented pain he “was team-absorbed, not self-absorbed.”

For now the attention is on a young man that has at least a year of painful recovery and armed only with hope to a return to the sport he loves and the career he hopes to pursue. Let’s see whether the university and the NCAA are as passionate for Ware as the Pitino tears seem to indicate. Beyond the character Ware will himself have to show to come back, this is an opportunity for Louisville to show the best of medical care and support and insurance for required and additional needs. I assume that if necessary, Louisville will also pay the $75,000 or $90,000 deductible to access the NCAA’s Catastrophic Injury Insurance Program. That same fund even provides training for those who help him during rehabilitation.  Let’s see if Ware even retains his scholarship, which is not guaranteed by NCAA rules. And let’s see how much of the NCAA’s $1 billion in advertising revenue from March Madness will trickle down to Kevin, or super- freshman Nerlens Noel, who tore his ACL after hitting the support mechanism for the basket. Noel is already dismissed from the media spotlight.  After the NCAA championships, so will Ware.

But some are monitoring how schools treat players who face adversity, and will be reporting results so future players and parents can make informed decisions as to which schools have the talented teen’s best interests at heart.

 

 

 

How Parental Responsibility Will Radically Change College Football

Every year we have certainty about three things: death, taxes, and national signing day.  Early February annually, virtually every high school football player dreaming of playing in college on a scholarship signs a national letter of intent (NLI). His intent is to be one of the greatest in the world at this uniquely North American job, and it starts with his choice of a school to hone his craft. This time something was different. Alex Collins decided he wanted to play at Arkansas. His mother decided he should be closer to home in Florida. Collins initially verbally committed to Miami.

The NCAA, author of NLI, requires that any prospective scholarship athlete under 21 must have the signature of a parent or legal guardian. No financial aid can be received unless there is the parent signature. On national signing day, when the highly recruited Alex had his press conference to announce his much anticipated commitment to Arkansas, his mother appeared, but then left abruptly without signing.

The fact that the father of Alex has reportedly signed, and the mother has hired a lawyer is not the story. It may be a momentary media soap opera, but not the real transformative impactful story.  This was just a light hearted oh-by-the-way story when first reported by the major media. After all, though he was a prized recruit, Alex was not the top player in the college “draft”, or even the top running back in the country. And this was just Arkansas, not Alabama, Notre Dame or some other elite tall cotton program.  This was just a family feud about location for a very good prospect.

But if Ms. McDonald’s reasoning for her signing strike were for other reasons, I suspect it would be no laughing matter. What if she remained adamant and it was Alabama or Notre Dame that lost out on the next Andrew Luck, Cam Newton or pre-sentenced OJ Simpson? And what if the highly publicized reasons for her holdout were the result of her doing some homework – homework so sophisticated it is called due diligence? What if the result of her due diligence about the beggar school (and this is purely hypothetical) was the following observations, giving new meaning to the term “Elite Eight”?

1.      During the 5 years of the coach’s tenure, the school elected to withdraw, rather than renew the scholarships of every single player that had a season-ending or career threatening injury. This was despite verbal promises when recruiting the teenager that his scholarship was safe.  In fact, each school has the option to offer multi-year scholarships.

2.      During that coach’s tenure, every teenager that had the same range of SAT or ACT scores as her son had 3 times as much football tutoring than classroom tutoring.

3.      During that coach’s tenure, every teenager in that range of SAT-ACT flunked out of school before the junior season and the school has worst graduation rates among the schools her son considered.

4.      For those academically at-risk teenagers of which her son would join, the school has not initiated any plan to change the status quo.

5.      Her son is African American.  There are no coaches or administrators in primary thinking positions, (head coach, offensive or defensive coordinators, Director of athletics or Assistant Director, etc.)

6.      During that coach’s tenure, neither the school nor the athletic department had a mandatory training for how teenagers with a future as instant millionaires should handle their money, or how to carefully screen for agents, or how the school proactively pre-screened agents to protect the teenagers from the savvy but unscrupulous.

7.      The institution did not provide insurance for injured players; make a request to the NCAA for access to its insurance fund for injured players, never encouraged or helped NCAA’s own Student-Athlete Opportunity Fund, or provided gap funds for the difference between the scholarship and the true total cost of the education.

8.      The institution never contemplated or established a trust fund for players who lost their scholarship, so they could then upon certain conditions being met, receive a return on the considerable royalties amassed by the school from the merchandise sales from the numbers worn by those teenagers.

So imagine the press conference where Ms. McDonald stands at the podium stoic as Condoleezza Rice, charismatic as Michelle Obama, and says,

“I have convinced Alex to attend a school that not only promised to take care of him, but actually did the best job of teenagers much like him. They earned the opportunity – and here is my list from which I found the right fit.”

 She shifts to the other foot and continues in a near whisper, “My son grew up without a strong father in the home, and he needs that role model. I don’t see that from the school he chose first.”

Then with a smile she continues,

“But I see it at school X, from the administration down to the coaches that will spend more hours with him than I will from this point forward. My instinct tells me they have the mix of folks who are culturally connected influencers. And I know, the way only a parent can know, that he needs those influences more than he needs that little oblong piece of leather everybody wants him to carry for the next few years.”

Imagine the impact of a Rice-Obama mother, and those who helped and rallied around her due diligence.  If other similarly situated parents operated in kind, the paradigm of decision making would change for most of the impact players in college sports.

The impact would be profound too because of the underpublicized power of that NLI. The NLI creates a monopoly.  Once a teenager signs it, other schools must stop recruiting the prized young man. The youngster gains a guaranteed one year scholarship from his – and his parents – school of choice.  That is why prior to that fateful date of February 6^th, grown men hold up in hotels and driveways for hours on end, waiting for a return call and opportunity to be an influencer with a teenager. They want to stay in the hunt in hopes of the future monopoly. 

If the Elite Eight factors become a reality, I suspect all the top football schools will re-evaluate their promises and programs.  Some schools already pass the grade.  But all would have to consider their “ranking” in a wholly different way. For many, that new “way” is what would finally put their student-athlete mission statements in front of BCS ambitions. Perhaps at last there would be a near-uniform incentive program where all those who are paid from college football would have to align the best interests of the teenager with retaining their own salaries. Again, there are some already on board. And if the morally rich get the fruits, the sporting industries are better for it.

If the Elite Eight factors revealed a litany of verifiable facts about every school making promises to teenagers, and puts those promises under a microscope, it lead to an indictment against the transgressors that is far more curative than NCAA sanctions.  It would serve notice to other parents that they are indeed empowered to make decisions in what they consider to be the best interests of their child. And that they are not powerless against sports system in America.

We should remember the context. On this one day certain each year, the future best of a profession in the world are starting their journey. The teenagers are matriculating to two related industries, college and professional sports. Both are multi-billion dollar industries, with a lot of middle aged wealthy people very intent on exploiting their unique talents for their own personal profit. Those profiteers and millions of fans care more about their school, illogical rooting interests, than in what’s best for the gladiators they watch for fun and money. So who is left to care primarily for the players? Who but the parents have the plasma called love that makes people sacrifice for their children, and remain more purist about what is best for their child. It’s the love elixir that makes us say “I’ll forego that nice new Beemer so you can make ends meet at Yale”, when NW Nowhere U could do.  

The NCAA’s own website discussion of the NLI warns parents and their children that only 2 percent of high school athletes get college scholarships. The NCAA therefore makes the following admonition:

“…high school student-athletes and their parents need to have realistic expectations about receiving an athletic scholarship to play sports in college. Academic, not athletic, achievement is the most reliable path to success in life.”

So the NCAA advocates parental responsibility. In various political settings we talk about parental responsibility. But would we still advocate it if it meant we lost the best high school quarterback in the country?  If the Elite Eight factors dominated decision-making, sports bloggers and tweet-a-holics would create a social media mania that may bring more death threats than praise for a Ms. McDonald.  That’s because we have a priority problem in the industry. But that problem would only be uncovered by some radicalized movement where schools are actually ranked by a “best interests of the child standard” including an analysis of a school’s educational and financial support systems. Don’t shoot me, but I am working on it.

 

NCAA: 21st Century Exploitation?

By Contributor William Fife, Florida Coastal School of Law, JD Candidate (May 2013), and research associate at the Public Interest Research Bureau, Jacksonville, Florida.   

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            Nerlens Noel, 6’10” African-American shot-blocking star for the University of Kentucky college basketball team, was widely considered to be the 1^st pick of the NBA draft before he ever played his first game as a freshman this year.  This past season, he tore his ACL, and is now out for the year.  Considering the advancements in medicine and surgery, chances are he will get close to a full-recovery.  But what if he does not make a full recovery?  What about his financial future then?  Basketball players are forced to play in the NCAA before being eligible for the NBA (if they want to stay in the US and not play professionally overseas).  Other professional sports such as tennis, golf and hockey only have minimum age requirements—there is no “one-year minimum” requirement like there is for the NBA.  A quick look at the NBA shows the top players went straight to the pros before college; LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Dwight Howard, etc. However, basketball is certainly no more physical than hockey, and arguably less so. 

 

This begs the question: why is there a requirement for basketball players to play one year in college before turning professional, whereas those pursuing dreams of professional golf, hockey, and tennis do not?  The difference appears to be one of race and money.  The NBA is nearly 80% African-American, and one can count virtually on one hand the amount of professional black athletes in hockey, tennis, and golf combined.  Basketball is also big business; the NCAA has over $10 billion in TV contracts alone; that does not even factor ticket and apparel sales into the analysis.  Why are these black athletes denied pursuing their American Dream, while white athletes are allowed to pursue riches in other sports?

 

New Age Athletes Manage Themselves and Reduce Dependence on Agents. Andrew Bogut is Proof.

Andrew Bogut is a 7’-0” center for the Golden State Warriors. He earns $13 million annually. Like most NBA players, he has used an agent to negotiate on his behalf and handle the much of his business and charitable affairs. Unlike most NBA players, he did not grow up with the United States professional sports anesthetic of league, team, and agent dominance over the business and financial affairs of the player. He is from Melbourne Australia. And unlike many employees, he grew up inclined to challenge traditional authority figures, leading at one point to his dismissal from a high school in his junior year.

But there are various types of intelligence. Academia does not have exclusive jurisdiction over business savvy, though Bogut was a business major while at University of Utah.  At 27 years old, Bogut has now been in and out of the NBA, with injuries as a contributing factor over the past eight years. The recent NBA lockout gave him time to consider the business of being an NBA player. And perhaps the injuries unwittingly enhanced his sense of how fleeting the career can be. So during that break in physical action, his mind took center stage. Bogut started developing a plan to buy into his agent’s management company, One Management Group & Consulting (OMGC).

If that arrangement is successful, he can reverse the financial relationship, i.e. instead of the agent deriving significant income from him, he can derive income from the agent. More specifically, Bogut could then utilize his current $13 million salary to buy into the sports management business and use his current goodwill and market value to lure other players into the agency.  In fact, all those services his agent, Bruce Kaider provides in managing his affairs, he can now profit as the agent for others, unless there is an agreement to the contrary. So during the very short period in which he has player income and intangible assets, he should generate additional revenue streams beyond his physical on-court performance. 

And while his salary is individual income to him on which he must pay state and federal income tax, he can still have the for-profit business that generates deductions, and can still develop his own foundations with expenses and charitable contributions that can ultimately reduce his tax liability.  Instead of his agent receiving all revenue generated from setting up his business and charitable affairs, Bogut can take a share of the profits derived from his own labor as a player.

More importantly, by leveraging his current influence among NBA players, he potentially can negotiate an agreement where he makes money from existing firm clients, new clients brought in by others, as well as the clients he personally brought to the firm.  

And most importantly, once his playing career is over, his own agency can be his landing spot for a second career – a career that could have more long term stability, still high income, and still involving the game he loves, albeit from the sports management perspective. And as a part-owner, I suspect there is an understanding as to how he will be tutored so that he too can be an agent of others. Even while he plays professionally, he can learn how to do more for himself, essentially paying himself instead of others to manage more of his own affairs.



That self-help and empowerment over one’s own career is what I call the New Age Athlete. Bogut is positioning himself to learn as much about his own intellectual property rights as those who currently control them. I also suspect this is not an aberration but a future trend, as players become increasingly sophisticated in the business in which they perform.

If you want to comment on Andrew's efforts or want to assist with his current charitable ventures, acces his official website at http://www.andrewbogut.com/ 

Foundations -IRS Filing made Easy.

Required Forms for Foundations Now Available Online

Charitable organizations, including the foundations most used by professional athletes, are required to Forms 990 or 990 E-Z. Those forms have just been made available online for the tax year at: http://www.irs.gov/charities/article/0,,id=233830,00.html   

If your organization makes $25,000 or less, you qualify as a small tax exempt organization and can submit a very user-friendly Form 990-N.  

Your organization can file any of these forms online. If there is an undue hardship the IRS may waive the requirement of the electronic filing.

All forms are due on May 15 of every year but you can apply for an extension. To apply for an extension, you can request a 3 month extension by filing a Form 8868.

It is important to file. It is not overly burdensome, and at worst an extension request is worthwhile. Otherwise your organization is subject to a penalty. You may have to pay up to $20 a day for each late day of filing. However, the IRS will not charge you a penalty if you had a good cause for your late filing.

If the Center for Sports and Social Entrepreneurship can be of assistance, please feel free to contact Professor Roger M. Groves, rgroves@fcsl.edu.

jennifer@franceathletes.com

Jamal Crawford Giving Back

“I love basketball, but basketball doesn't define me” is Portland trailblazers guard Jamal Crawford’s twitter tagline.  So we look at the man behind the basketball.  Crawford has spent most of his off-season giving back to his hometown community of Seattle   He is involved in programs such as “High Tops and Healthy Hearts” a program raising funds to benefit Seattle Children’s Sport Health Program to him funding an all girl intermural team.  Crawford is committed to encouraging youth to not only strengthen their bodies but their minds as well helping them to become well-rounded adults.  We salute Crawford for not only being phenomenal on the court but for his Philanthropy.

Dominique Price, CSSE Contributor.

Kentucky Players and Coaches are Still Underrated.

If I asked you which team had the best scoring percentage
defense in the country and 10th scoring defense you might say
Michigan State, or Princeton or BYU or some other team not known for being
flashy. I suspect you would not say Kentucky, yet that’s the right answer.

The question is: Why are we surprised? The answer may be that we have biases not
disclosed to anyone – not even ourselves. The Kentucky team depends on freshmen
at several vital positions, particularly point guard (Teague) and center (Anthony Davis), and small forward (Kidd-Gilchrist). And the veteran go-to-guy is a sophomore (Terrence Jones).

We believe defense is all about self-sacrifice, discipline, work ethic, mental toughness, and technique.

If you are over 40 like me…OK over 50, then we may as well admit that we assume the youth, by virtue of youth, just don’t work as hard as our generation. We assume that youth, like our own children or those we know, have a level of immaturity, which means they may act without appreciating the consequences of their action. Therefore, they often act prematurely, and are
thusly prone to error. We assume they need more time to get the engrained techniques that must be taught, not natural. Examples include moving your feet to stop the opposition instead of your hands to reach in and foul.

We also assume the kids are more prone to “me-first-ness” which means they want to get the glory of scoring, rather than concentrate on the thankless task of preventing the opponents from scoring. We assume they do now know enough about sacrificing their body to take a charge.
And then there are some of us who probably don’t realize that when we see a fast paced run-and-gun style, we assume all they do is offense.

So we are surprised when a group of guys new to shaving can execute all those elements that comprise defensive excellence. The definition of excellence should include a high level of consistency in doing the right thing. Kentucky enters the NCAA tournament having earned those impressive defensive statistics over 34 games during the season, despite having the bulls-eye on their back, taking everyone’s best shot, saving their best effort and yes their best offense for Kentucky.

Credit, like blame, should be shared. Defense means mentally saying, “I may be outplayed but not outworked”. That mental toughness and technique building did not happen by accident. Coaches privately admit that no one coach has a monopoly on coaching methods. They share plays with each other in camps. They move from job to job and take their methods with them. What is unique is their brand of communicating, their personality, their judgment and wisdom about organizing a system and picking staff and player personnel.

For three years now, John Calipari has that combination of attributes to do something virtually unprecedented in modern college basketball. He has brought in the highest quality talent in each season to Lexington Kentucky. If we had not been previously shocked and therefore now
conditioned by Michigan’s Fab Five, the media and fans would be going crazy, claiming Calipari was inciting a riot in the sport and he cannot has “sustainability” without long term loyalty by players to the program. Each season he brought in an eye-popping collection of McDonald’s All
Americans. Each season therefore Calipari faced the challenge of downsizing All American egos, and creating a culture of sacrifice.

But before I say Calipari did all of that, I am not going to succumb to the underlying and
undisclosed assumption that the selected All Americans had bigger-than-necessary egos. It is entirely possible and frankly more likely probable, that these are just very good team players who were extraordinarily talented. I suspect there is already a willingness to sacrifice, and had some
good home training as an ingredient. Stated differently, I don’t think one coach completely transforms an entire group of players in a season, without a qualitative character within each of them to “buy in” to the coach’s system. Many scholars and social scientists have authored empirically based studies concluding that much of one’s personality and mental aspects are molded early in life. Each of these highly recruited players with super-sized talent brought a lot to Kentucky.

Yet sharing the credit means noting that Calipari convinced them to come. Yes, there is Kentucky tradition and resources, but the Wildcats have had plenty of other coaches before Calipari. I doubt any of them could have reached the influence level like Calipari. Calipari had to have something special. He had convinced them he was trustworthy with their future, honest and
tough-loved with them, and culturally attuned enough so he could communicate with them in a way they can appreciate. Not every coach can do that. Some coaches never get enough of the blue chip players. They soon have to put their house up for sale. Other coaches get the players, but have trouble connecting until they are juniors or seniors. By that time, the team suffers losses and/or transfer attrition.

So part of Calipari’s transformative coaching is his ability to blend all those intangibles, getting the player buy-in to the system harmoniously all in one year. And then Calipari has repeated that process the next year and now again this, the third year. When top players leave after one year, Calipari’s testimony has been clear, honest, and so resonating with players, that the next wave of blue chippers are as convinced as the players they adulate and now hope to replace. If the Calipari experience was not working, if Calipari was not the honest broker for them, believe me, players talk. And the youngest teenagers respect the opinion of the senior teenagers. Something very special is going on in the locker room, practices, and training tables we never see on the court. Calipari is indeed very special.

I trust all this player and coach-speak does not leave you feeling sorry for the university, being taken advantage of by these employees and students. Just like the Patrick Ewing/John Thompson glory years of Georgetown or Fab Five years at Michigan, I suspect the royalty revenues at Kentucky, already in the millions per year, is rising. In the two years of Michigan’s Fab Five, the merchandising royalties grew from $1.6 million to $10.5 million. Even after the scandal, U of M did not have to give any of itback. Applications to Kentucky by non-athletes too, I suspect, are also on the rise during the Calipari era. But as for the moment, we should at least takenote of something special. Calipari and particularly the players in each of these years comprise a shared success, defying our unwitting assumptions.