Brief and to the Point ...
Apropos of nothing more than having spent the weekend on Tobacco Road with the Pitt wrestling and basketball teams, I've got one thought to share above all after witnessing, up close and behind the scenes, all the work they do:
Pay these kids.
At least pay the ones who bring the most money.
It's one thing to watch Pitt and North Carolina wrestle in front of a couple hundred at Carmichael Arena, and there might -- that's might -- be justification for a full scholarship sufficing as fair compensation in their cases. Chances are very good that most of the wrestlers aren't aiming toward a full career in wrestling or, really, any level beyond the current one. Most will leave their shoes on the mat with the final match, then move on.
Not so with football, obviously. Not so with hoops.
My goodness, there were 21,750 paying customers jamming every corner of the Dean Dome, as well as a national audience on ESPN that pays more than it likely realizes, with all of that cash going to Jamie Dixon, Roy Williams, their assistants, the respective schools and, of course, the NCAA itself.
The players themselves make less than the students selling smoothies out on the concourses, and yet, I'm watching the Pitt basketball kids get up at sunrise at their team hotel for an early workout, then dragging themselves to the team bus, then getting jeered and taunted by a hostile home crowd, then engaging in two hours of cutthroat competition before flying back to Pittsburgh in time to study for Monday morning classes.
Really, step back and ask: Who thought of this?
Better question: What is this, 1965 or something?
And how in the world, for that matter, does the NCAA take all the heat for this when the NFL and NBA are equally culpable by all too happily obliging so that they don't have to pay the cost of minor-league development, unlike the NHL and Major League Baseball?
Paying student-athletes will happen sooner or later, even if it's just in the revenue-generating sports. Someone will win a lawsuit, or someone will come to their senses, but it'll happen. So it might as well happen at the initiative of the NCAA and its member institutions rather than being imposed from the outside.
Do it within reason, and do it within what's fair to colleges, too. According to the noted sports economist Andrew Zimbalist, fewer than two dozen of the 350 collegiate athletic departments in the U.S. make money, so the well isn't bottomless. I get that. I also get that profits from football and men's basketball help fund other sports that have no hope of making money. It's a worthwhile distribution, and the worst-case scenario here is that colleges would keep the revenue sports and start slashing non-revenue sports.
But when the University of Michigan can find room in the budget -- or from alumni and other donors -- to pay $7 million to Jim Harbaugh to coach football, no one can convince me these student-athletes couldn't receive a healthy, fair cut.
• The Penguins went on the road to play two contending Eastern Conference teams, trailed in both games and came away with three of four points. No shame in that. If anything, it's quite the positive.
Actually, no, it's a continuation of the positive that keeps building and building with this group that -- remember -- is playing without Evgeni Malkin and two other centers.
They'll keep getting better.
• It's great to see and hear Rick Tocchet so full of life again. Mike Johnston brought a lot of people down around him, but maybe none quite as much as Tocchet. The Penguins are a much healthier outfit with assistant coaches allowed to be themselves, and both Tocchet and Jacques Martin clearly are relishing it.
• It's become uncool in some circles to play up the local angle in professional sports, especially when it comes to a local player being with the local major-league team. Witness the cynics who mock those genuinely saddened that a community treasure like Neil Walker was traded to New York. Or the cynics who mock those genuinely disappointed that Ray Shero and the Penguins passed on all the Western Pennsylvania kids now shining around the NHL.
It's not just Brandon Saad. It's Vince Trocheck with 17 goals for the Panthers. It's J.T. Miller being ablaze for the Rangers. It's John Gibson as one of the league's best young goaltenders with the Ducks.
Never mind that all of the above would, to varying degrees, be able to hugely help the Penguins. That's one issue, and it's got more to do with Shero's drafting, which was, astonishingly, even worse than that of Neal Huntington.
The other issue is that it's cool to have a local kid on the local team. And I can't begin to understand why anyone should feel uncomfortable about acknowledging that.
• Gary Bettman has pledged to keep the NHL in North Carolina, but I can tell you that the mood in Raleigh didn't reflect anything resembling optimism. Small wonder, too. The Hurricanes' attendance is the league's lowest at 11,889, TV ratings and monies are minimal, and the franchise is believed to be bleeding upwards of $30 million a year.
For all his flaws, the commissioner has done mostly well at keeping franchises put, especially when compared to the NBA. But Bettman has a hard balance here, in that the 30 owners will benefit big-time from expansion fees while they won't get a penny from a relocation. And with the wish to expand to Las Vegas and Quebec City, any relocation would slash that loot in half.
At the same time, having a failed franchise in Raleigh or Sunrise or Glendale drags down broader revenue streams already set.
My reasonable proposal: Expand to Vegas. That die's basically been cast, anyway. Move the Panthers to Quebec, where there's already a new state-of-the-art arena. Move the Coyotes back to downtown Phoenix, where they were a big hit in a more central location, by joining the NBA's Suns in a grand plan to upgrade there. Our nation's fifth-largest market is just too big to abandon.
And from there, at least try to save the Hurricanes. That might require a new building in an actual city -- they currently borrow North Carolina State's basketball arena out in the middle of a bunch of trees -- but the growth in population and younger demo and the history of winning the 2006 Stanley Cup could still all make it click.
If not, fold them and expand to Seattle.
• Goals per game are up dramatically -- from 5.18 to 5.83 -- since the All-Star break last month, when Bettman was vilified for the sagging scoring almost as much as for the John Scott fiasco. And none of that, obviously, is a coincidence. It couldn't be any clearer that a directive came from the commissioner's office to call more penalties.
Which is swell and all, but it's also unsustainable.
This pattern's been in place since dog sleds were NHL teams' preferred method of transport: The league tells refs to call everything, and they call everything. Then they fade a bit, thinking the directive was, what, two weeks ago? Then coaches and players yell at them for not calling stuff they were calling two weeks ago. Then refs stop calling everything again.
Real solutions are needed for the lack of scoring. Solutions that are black and white.
Jeff Locke might have to compete with Juan Nicasio for the fifth starter job. -- DKPSFrom what I'm told only tom Brady likes the head coach so no thank u I'm happy where I am https://t.co/WILRq6FbSu
— DeAngelo Williams (@DeAngeloRB) February 15, 2016
