Why you should support the union drive by NCAA athletes

To college football fans everywhere:

I am a former Northwestern college football player. I have two titanium rods in my legs: one in my left tibia and one in my right tibia. Living with these foreign objects in my body is something that physically bothers me on a day-to-day basis, and I am only 28. I didn’t get into a car accident, or break my leg playing ball, the way Louisville college basketball player Kevin Ware did during his team’s quarterfinal match-up in the NCAA Tournament against Duke last year. The rods in my legs are a result of surgeries that I received in college at 19 and 20 from serious stress fractures developed from playing football.

I am writing this article to explain why the College Athletes Players Association (CAPA) union effort led by former Northwestern quarterback Kain Colter is a good thing for college sports.

Medical protection and continued post-career health care for former athletes is one of the union’s main goals. Former college athletes like me, who have suffered devastating injuries during their athletic careers, are expected to cover what may be lifelong expenses from those injuries on their own. In my case, having an annual MRI and CAT scans on both legs can easily cost thousands of dollars out of pocket. By joining a union, America’s future student athletes may free themselves from worries about the potential cost of continued medical bills after they leave college, including, as in my case, the cost of further surgery.

Critics might object that we athletes know what we sign up for — education in exchange for athletic contribution — and that sports injuries are an unfortunate but known risk. This may be true, but such hardships don’t cross the mind of a young athlete seizing the opportunity to play at an elite level, go to college, experience a new environment and achieve a newfound status in life. We put it all on the line for the love of the game and for you, the fans. Although there is risk involved in playing, we do not expect to be all but abandoned after we leave college.  

There is no written policy within the NCAA that requires university athletic programs to cover medical expenses of players after they graduate. Like Ware’s fracture, my bone has healed, but complications and chronic pain from the incisions of the rods continue. This suffering, along with the long-term cost of treatment, is something I will deal with the rest of my life, but it is not something I signed up for. This is why I completely agree with the formation of a college athlete union that will have the ability to negotiate for extended medical protection and other rights. 

“Big time” college football is a job, something that the NCAA’s preferred phrase “student athlete” obscures. According to the official document from the groundbreaking March 26 decision by National Labor Relations Board Regional Director Peter Ohr, “Northwestern Football players dedicate 40 to 50 hours per week to football-related activities during the football season.” This is a bigger time commitment than the one given by the professors who are teaching on campus. Such labor by football players and other athletes produces $1 billion annually for the NCAA. While the NCAA calls us “amateurs,” a more accurate description would be employees who aren’t fairly compensated.