What the Headlines Don't Say About Student Athletes

Student athletes today are popping up in news stories all over. Georgia tailback Todd Gurley was recently banned for allegedly seeking money for autographs. Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany’s next goal is to get insurance for Big Ten athletes. There’s even more pressure on the college sports stars to start thinking far ahead into their future regarding how their actions now will affect their economic future. The debates about whether student athletes should be paid or not continue as well.

And while we wouldn’t mind being paid for our efforts, the focus of paying student athletes goes to the football and basketball stars. That’s the unfortunate truth for the rest of the sports or even football and basketball programs that aren’t as nationally recognized. For most other sports, there’s barely any revenue, if any at all. If NCAA made rules requiring student athletes to be paid, sports programs would not have the revenue to sustain the programs or as many student athletes.

The complicated, confusing politics behind NCAA rules for student athletes is often out of the athletes’ control. Most of us are too busy worrying about making it to practice on time and getting our full 8 hours of sleep while balancing a full course load to be protesting and keeping up with rule changes that don’t affect us immediately.

So while the big names of college sports debate, argue, and fight for whatever rule change they’re wanting now, we, the student athletes, will be over here busting our asses at practice, eating as much food as possible (even though DII and DIII still don’t get free, unlimited food), and napping. Mostly just lots of naps. Below are some of the struggles on being a student athlete that aren’t in the news headlines, as told by 21 Jumpstreet.