How did the Tigers do it? With an indefatigable quarterback and the most thrilling of game-winning touchdown passes; with a host of slinky, stretchy wide receivers and an unbending will; with a goal-line leap from a bull of a running back; and with Swinney in the middle of it all, screaming and shouting and cajoling and inspiring. Over the past six seasons, only one program had won more games than Clemson, and it was Alabama, which also defeated Clemson in last year’s national championship game.
(New York Times, January 10, 2017)
Well, turnabout is fair play. So here’s to Clemson for exacting revenge on Monday night, defeating favored Alabama to win this year’s College Football Playoff (CFP) National Championship 35-31.
I feel obliged to disclose that I am not a fan of big-time college Football. No doubt this is because I did not attend one of far too many colleges in America whose reputation is based more on athletics than academics. Therefore, I never have any bragging interest in the outcome of any NCAA championship.
Nonetheless, I have watched enough championship games to appreciate why so many sports commentators are hailing this one as the best in NCAA history. In fact, there’s no denying the thrill of watching an action-packed fourth quarter, during which Clemson overcame a three-touchdown deficit to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat with only one second left on the clock.
Apropos of this, it speaks volumes that the CFP Championship rivals the NFL Super Bowl – not just in popularity but also in revenue. This is why the primary reason I comment on this annual spectacle is to vent my abiding lament about college Football masquerading as an amateur sport. This excerpt from “Reggie Bush Forfeits Heisman Trophy,” September 16, 2010, crystallizes my concerns.
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There’s nothing amateur about college football. It’s a multibillion-dollar business for Christ’s sake!
More to the point, the people generating its revenues are not the university presidents, athletics directors, or coaches who, incidentally, make millions of dollars in salary and endorsement deals. Instead, they are the poor, mostly black athletes whose raw talent colleges exploit to pack 100,000 fans into their stadiums on game day.
I have always felt that it’s tantamount to modern-day slavery for universities to recruit poor and, all too often, uneducated athletes just to play Football and not compensate them for their services, especially considering they rarely get an education…
But this indentured servitude is made much worse by branding these poor players – who generate tens of millions for their respective universities – as cheaters for accepting a little cash on the side. Mind you, those offering the cash are often boosters just trying to make life easier for the players to enable them to perform better for their universities. Not to mention that, if the NCAA were to penalize all college players who accept such gifts, there would be no college Football (or Basketball) worth watching.
The hypocrisy inherent in this is beyond shameful. Universities should be required to compensate student athletes in direct proportion to the way owners of professional Football teams compensate their players.
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That said, the only redeeming feature in this respect is that most major NCAA teams are now featuring blacks as quarterbacks. They were the exception not so long ago. They are fast becoming the rule, so much so that three of the four starting quarterbacks for this year’s CFP were black, including Deshaun Watson for Clemson and Jalen Hurts for Alabama.
More importantly, this high-profile position greatly increases the likelihood of these black players making the first round of the NFL draft. This in turn guarantees multimillion-dollar contracts, which provide belated compensation for their years of indentured servitude.
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Reggie Bush…
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