Tyson Hartnett
Tyson Harnett, a writer of the Huffington Post, wrote an article called, "Why College Athletes Should Be Paid." In the title of his article his readers can already determine where he is going with it. Harnett thinks that College athletes should be paid. He brings a unique prospective to this matter because he was once a former college student-athlete, playing basketball for Maine. He counters the argument that student athletes shouldn’t be paid by saying, “Division I athletes are receiving full scholarships, and that is enough” (1), by stating factual evidence that shows on average, Division I athletes only receive $25,000 dollars per year. Although that aid is a tremendous amount of money that helps pay for student-athletes' education, Hartnett believes that it’s fair for what they bring to the institution such as, “hundreds of thousands of dollars, increase enrollment, and if they do well, provide a recruiting piece for generations” (Hartnett 1). I believe that Hartnett, a former student-athlete, knows how difficult it could be to manage both school and competition. He adds a deeper sense to why student-athletes should receive some sort of other compensation for being a Division I-student-athlete because he was there and was once in the shoes of a student-athlete. Like Hartnett, being a Division I student-athlete, I can agree with his statement that, “Contrary to what all the opponents believe, being an athlete is a full-time job” (Hartnett 1). We spend hours on end with our athletics and it is equivalent to full-time job. Hartnett also includes, "Top NCAA executives are getting $1 million per year while an athlete can't earn $50 from signing a few autographs" (1). All the rules that the NCAA make are very constricting on student-athletes and think that they could loosen these up a little bit. The NCAA shouldn’t have as many restrictions on athletes like they do. Not only because certain athletes don’t follow the rules, but because it’s hypocritical for them to be making so much money and put as much restriction as they do on the athletes. Athletes dedicate countless number of hours towards their sport that in return helps the NCAA. I think that it would benefit both he players and the NCAA if they loosened up their grip a little bit. If they were to loosen up I don’t think there would be as much controversy as there is on whether athletes should be receiving a salary or not. I believe that all the rules and restrictions fires up this debate.