Potential Records for Stories

Potential records for individual story:

Team present rosters
Team past rosters
Data on foreign athletes playing for Division 1
Data that could show patterns between athlete’s nationalities and the sport they play

The records that would answer some of the key questions about recruiting patterns would mostly consist of team rosters and maybe some data over years. I think this information would be fairly easy to gain access to. I could look on school websites and get a roster for every single team. Usually online team rosters have it set up where you can click the player’s name and read their bios that state where that player is from. Although this would be tedious and time consuming work, it’s fairly easy that involves little effort outside of open my laptop. Getting data on past recruiting habits, however, may be a little more difficult to find. But I’m sure the NCAA’s website or some other record keeping site would have some of this information.

Potential records for team story:

Rosters of teams
Transfer roster
Data that shows the percentage of football transfers a particular county gets a year
- Or going deeper to how many transfer a school receives a year
Percentage of these transfers that have made it to D1 colleges

The records that would answer key questions for the team story will be more difficult to find than those for my individual story simply because high school records are hard to get a hold of. Jordan has done a great job of compiling a list of local transfers that will be great for contacting sources. Finding the data and percentages will just take patient work, but once the information is compiled and organized, it could present some interesting facts.

Open Records questions

Two go along with what Morgan said for our group project, I don’t know how much we will be able to get through open records especially having to deal with academic records. I am pretty sure that falls under FERPA laws and I just don’t know how much information will be released to us if we ask for it.

I suppose we could look at how the school budget changes and how much the schools give to the athletic department. To go along with that, we could see what booster clubs give to the athletic programs.

As far am my individual project goes I want see how much money in the athletic budget went to the lacrosse program when the program was introduced to the school and what sports could have lost money to support a lacrosse program.

Open Records to Get

For your topic and your team’s topic, make lists of potential records you might need to explore your questions. Write up a blog post discussing those records and how you might go about retrieving them. Summarize in the individual storyboard linked above Post in the appropriate category using the tag “open records to get” by Oct. 5

Team Project:

Look for open records that have any information about transferring schools in GA. Hopefully to answer some of these questions:

-What are the rules

-how many kids are transferring a year

-Where are they coming from / which schools are they going to

-Are more girls or boys transferring?

Individual Project:

Look at different open records laws in different states and see how the laws differ from state to state and see how that impacts the SEC

Open records and our group project

Group:

Alex and I are working on the academic implications of transferring for high school football. While working through the GHSA rule book on transferring, I think an interesting part to look through would be how public schools allocate the funding to the athletic department of the school. I think another interesting thing to look into is the development of these booster clubs and how much they give to the athletic department. I know at my own high school, the scoreboard was funded by a single family in the community and it was a heft project, therefore public funding could go to other entities in the football program.

In terms of the project a more focused open record to request would be:

The official transfer forms and transcripts of athletes that have transferred.
Transcripts of students that go from private to public and vice versa.
- Some academic requirements have interesting transfer credits such as Military Science as a course at Riverside Military academy.

Individual:

Allocations of how schools are funding girl’s programs compared to boys
Allocations of how schools are funding girl’s basketball, soccer and track and field as the largest sports in the GHSA.

Jenkins

This case pits the NCAA against its student-athletes who say that they are being exploited in just the pure practice of them playing the sport and everything that comes out of it. As others have said, there are some anti-trust laws potentially coming into play, and while the NCAA wasn’t established under the same pretenses that others who must follow these laws, the argument is there and at the center of the case that it operates like one of these organizations.

Story ideas:

I’m always interested in the people aspect of any story, so I’d talk to Jenkins and Johnathan Moore as well as the other plaintiffs to learn about and detail their personal exeperiences, why they feel spurned, and the origins of the lawsuit and what it means to them in their own words.

The legal aspect and ramifications are obviously a big part of this, as they are with any high-profile case, especially where an establishment is challenged.

The lawyers arguing on behalf of the NCAA are in a very interesting position, and I wonder if you could get them to at least see the other side on record, or if they are steadfast in pushing the NCAA’s cause regardless of any beliefs or feelings they might have.

A research on legal precedent for the case would be prescient and provide a good backdrop as well as peel back whether or not the plaintiffs have a case at all and under which statutes it could be ruled under as well as any that might changed should the case be ruled in their favor.

On Jenkins, NCAA

The gist: A group of college student athletes filed an antitrust suit against the NCAA to challenge the limits placed on athletics aid.

The players: Former Clemson football player Martin Jenkins and two current Wisconsin athletes: basketball player Nigel Hayes and football player Alec James (and they’re reppin’ football and men’s basketball players in the power conferences). The group scooped antitrust/labor lawyer Jeffrey Kessler — the same dude representing the NFLPA and NBPA in his spare time — to handle the case.

The quirk: Jenkins & Friends are not arguing that student-athletes should receive athletics aid up to the full cost of attendance. They claim they’re entitled to a paycheck and the athletics scholarship model is a price fixing restraint on athlete compensation.

TL;DR*: Jenkins seeks to end all financial restrictions on college athletes.

Losing Jenkins could mean that the NCAA could no longer enforce scholarship limits or the amount schools could pay for scholarships. It would be an open market, and the finances could change considerably.

Story Ideas:

How could the NCAA set up a ‘lockbox’ with funds for student-athlete to receive after they’ve graduated, or gotten drafted to the NFL?
- Would such a lock box also apply to other sports besides football, even if they don’t receive TV attention?
If players were payed, would there be a fraction allocated to tuition to help fund the athletics department?
Only a slim percentage of college athletes actually are ‘worth’ a full scholarship — would there a pay grade and ‘cap’ set on the amount student athletes could receive?

*too long; didn't read

Jenkins v NCAA

The case centers on the issue of paying student athletes. This is obviously an issue that has been prevalent for a long time. It’s even more so now because of TV deals. The argument is that the players are basically signing on to the stipulations of the universities profiting off athletic ability. However this violates antitrust laws.

The compliant said that the NCAA makes billions off the hard labor of college football and basketball players who perform “services” for the University. The notion that players are exploited has been well documented. Only a slim percentage of college athletes actually are worth what colleges provide for them.

Possible Stories:

At what point are college athletes worth more than the benefits they receive from scholarships? How many athletes actually reach this threshold?

How do non-revenue producing athletes feel about this issue?

If more athletes attempted to unionize, how would they go about doing it differently than the Northwestern football players did?

If college athletes got paid, how does this change the integrity of collegiate sports?

Jenkins vs. NCAA

I’m no legal expert, but it seems to me the root issue of the Jenkins vs. NCAA case is the classic argument that the NCAA is exploiting its athletes. The four athletes who serve as plantiffs in the class-action lawsuit claim that they should be compensated because they generate an extreme amount of revenue for the NCAA and that the NCAA holds little interest in maintaining their amateurism as STUDENT-athletes. The case then goes into defining the terms, allegations, etc.

I think there are a lot of interesting stories that could stem from this. Should college athletes be paid is an age-old debate that always sparks interest, but that is the obvious route. This case could call into question the rules set for playing in professional leagues. To enter the NFL, players must play in college for three years. If an athlete does not have the financial means to do so, they could be missing out on an opportunity, likewise with basketball players.

Another interesting discussion that could stem from this case is whether the NCAA or the schools should profit the most from ticket sales, television deals, etc. If individual schools profited as much as the NCAA did, many schools could afford facility renovations, more staff, etc.

Jenkins v. NCAA

Summary:
- Martin Jenkins, Kevin Perry and William Tyndall are suing the NCAA and it’s conferences based on the claim that college athletes are being exploited and not compensated for the amount of money they’re bringing to the school and athletic program. They are not seeking damages, but rather an injunction that would allow a free market for college athletes to get paid. The plaintiffs’ argument is that these young athletes are bringing in so much revenue for their schools, but are not receiving any of it. In other words, Jenkins is suing the NCAA for exploiting athletes. One very important point that these plaintiffs made was that one of the vital reasons the NCAA is working to keep amateurism is because the amounts of money that they would have to hand over to a student who’s only 18, 19, 20 years old. But no matter how much, it was still that player or those players’ who generated it.

Potential Story Ideas:
- A story about how college sports would be if athletes were getting paid
  - Would they stay in college longer? Draining talent in the NFL
  - How would you decide who gets paid and how much?
  - Would it kill the nature of college sports?
  - How would college students spend that amount of money?
  - Would they still get full athletic scholarships?
  - May create tension on a team if player(s) feel they aren’t being paid enough or if they feel as if their teammate is being paid too much
- A story about why college amateurism is important for student athletes
- Another good story idea would be to hypothetically estimate how much college athletes would get if they were allowed to receive compensation
  - Ex: If college athletes could get paid, Nick Chubb would be making ______ a week.
  - It would take a lot of extensive research and data collection
  - A good way to measure one players’ worth vs. another

Jenkins v. NCAA and potential stories

The Jenkins v. NCAA case centers itself on the hot-button issue of compensating student-athletes for their participation. Early on in the complaint, Jenkins brings up the point that these athletes, such as UTEP’s Kevin Perry, have their remunerations restrained by “artificial restraints” that are dependent on the athletes’ school of choice. What’s not restrained, however, is the financial benefits these particular universities or schools see as a result of the athlete’s play on the court or field. The argument is that these players have essentially signed on to “cartel agreements” and therefore violate antitrust laws.

I think it’s important to also remember that it’s not just football players involved in this case, as Rutgers basketball player J.J. Moore is also named as a party involved.

Potential story ideas

A look at how much the schools of the specific players mentioned in this complaint made from their respective sport
Catching up with those involved in Northwestern’s attempt to unionize. What would they have done differently? Do they foresee any change that will allow a team to successfully unionize?
A profile on a current athlete such as Perry and Moore that features a log of their hours during a typical week in a season. How much time is left for the academic aspect of their lives?
In basketball, how many athletes would forego college basketball if the NBA allowed? How many athletes in that situation cite financial concerns as a major motivating factor?