Paul Finebaum scalds NCAA after likeness ruling
The NCAA continues taking steps toward allowing athletes to be compensated for their name, likeness and image.
The NCAA’s Board of Governors announced Wednesday that they support athletes being allowed to appear in advertisements and reference their sport and school; however, they can’t wear any school or conference logos. The proposed rule changes must be voted on by the NCAA membership in January.
ESPN’s Paul Finebaum has been an outspoken critic of the NCAA and president Mark Emmert, and his latest comments on the network’s show Get Up pull no punches.
“The rich are going to get richer,” Finebaum said on ESPN’s Get Up. “In relation to the NCAA, the NCAA needs to be put out of business anyway. It’s a sham organization. I think the power-five commissioners are slowly moving toward more autonomy. This is the NCAA’s last stand. They had to do it. They had a gun to their head. It was way too late. Hopefully, let’s be aspirational here, the NCAA won’t exist in a couple of years and players can do whatever they want. They’re going to do it anyway. Coaches are going to continue to cheat. They don’t care what the NCAA thinks about this. I think we’re all going to be better off…I think they are moving toward (the power five conferences breaking away). It’s not easy to do because of the NCAA basketball tournament but we are certainly moving in that direction.”
There’s been much discussion over the years about schools breaking away from the NCAA; however, it’s never really been this close. Finebaum thinks the NCAA’s hands were tied and felt things slipping away. Thus, the Board of Governors ruled in favor of the student-athletes.
Yes, this is good for athletes, but it makes things very complicated.
You can watch Finebaum’s full comments below:
These comments seem pretty short sighted. Every sport in the world has a governing body of some sort. If the NCAA goes away, some other organization will have to replace them. What would really be different?
Exactly. They’ll play games by themselves, basically and nobody will watch because the size of the “league” is 10 teams. And why does this moron single out the NCAA? It’s the conferences that get the major TV deals. Or did he forget that his show is aired on the SEC NETWORK? Biggest hypocrite on the planet.
Heck, this is quite a little rant.
I don’t know what this moron is really even talking about. It’s the conferences and bowls that get all the money. The only NCAA sport he has any experience covering is FBS football, which is about as close to operating without the NCAA as you can forget, or did he forget it’s the only sanctioned sport in which the NCAA is not the body awarding trophies? I’ll tell you what happens if you kill the NCAA. You go back about 40 or 50 years. There’s no uniformity on a national champion, so multiple teams claim titles. Why is this better? I know in Feinbaum’s mind there’s no world outside of the SEC but that’s just patently stupid.
Seriously SDS Staff, why do you keep posting articles regurgitating what this @ssclown says? On the one hand, it’s annoyingly you continue to draw attention to this guy as if he’s really any authority on college football. They give Skip Bayless a microphone too, but at least we don’t have to see you post articles about the moronic things he says. Secondly, are you all seriously that pathetic and untalented that you can’t create your own original content so you have to keep posting stories about what some other “journalist” has to say?
Here’s what I see happening. Some rich alumni says to the kid before he’s recruited, “If you come to Pay U to play football, I’ll make you the lead spokesman for my company and give you lots of money just to make commercials.”
Exactly. I see the NCAA having a very difficult time enforcing the arms length standards as well.
While they voice some legitimate concerns, it was evident they had not read or comprehended the ruling.
He’s going pretty far with his charade against Emmert. Everyone knows he’s the third guy in the hot tub with Saban and Emmert.
I believe this “Profiting off one’s Likeness and Image” began when an obscure football player at Northwestern filed a lawsuit…a number of years ago…then California passed their law, then Florida. It’s kinda like the little ball spinning round-n-round while playing roulette…”Where it ends up…nobody know”. It cannot be good for something that is called Amateur Athletics.