Athletes: Be Cool Stay In School

I fully believe College Sports and an education should be related. I am sick and tired of these athletes who go pro early in their college careers and make millions of dollars, while the rest of us are stuck in school for the next few years working our tails off. When the rest of us finally graduate we struggle to find jobs, then we spend the next 10 to 15 years earning what these pre-graduate professionals make in one year. Do not get me wrong I am an avid sports fan. I watch sports for at least 2 to 3 hours a day and I could not live without sports, but I believe these athletes should have an education just like the rest of us to be allowed to make the money in which they do. I mean we are talking about these players making 2 to 8 million dollars a year right out of college at 18 to 21 years old. What these young athletes do not have though is something to fall back on. Okay, say this wonderful athlete wants to go pro early and says screw school where is my money, and he goes to the combine or training camps and get seriously injured. Where is the fall back? There is not one because of leaving school early. This is a huge problem in College Basketball, but not as big in College Football. The NCAA rules state that an athlete in Football has to attend the College in which they play for at least three years before these athletes are able to go pro. In Basketball though, these athletes can go pro after just one year of school. This rule is outrageous, and this rule has just been instituted for six years. Before this rule was instated basketball players could go pro before attending college. Simply needing an education as a fall back was my first example on why these athletes should not go pro early, but my second is these players leaving early really hurts these designated College Sports, especially basketball. I know that this number of pristine players which can get into the pros early is low, but it just does not make a difference. These players are the best athletes in their designated sports, and when these players come and go so quickly it hurts their teams tremendously. When a player comes in as a superstar in college basketball and plays superbly for one year and gets their team a high ranking as well as a good tournament run this is great. But, then these players leave these teams after one season destroying any team chemistry they have created and make this team fail the next season. I just do not understand why their just cannot be a rule stating that players have to stay in college and play for four years. I understand these players could get hurt and ruin their pro careers by staying in college, but I also know that leaving early decimates a fall back, and hurts these collective sports. My third reason for these athletes to stay in College for four years is that College is the time of most people’s lives. The parties, the girls, the crazy nights, these are things these athletes are missing out on if they leave early. Come on, these guys are the superstars of their schools they could do anything they wanted at these parties. One also meets lifelong friends in college, which is a hard thing to do when you are traveling around for a professional sport from team to team and training 12 hours a day 7 days a week early in a career trying to put your name in the elite group. Basically I believe staying in college is simply the way to go for these guys. First of all they can get an education and have a fall back for injury. Secondly, they can help these college sports prosper in which they play. Finally, they can just live the college life. Be cool stay in school.