It Begins: Texas to start paying athletes

[daneblazer]

University of Texas athletics director Steve Patterson announced the school will soon begin paying its student-athletes $10,000 a year apiece to cover cost of attendance and likeness rights.

The figure, set by U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken in her O’Bannon trial ruling in August, will be split evenly, so that $5,000 will go towards cost-of-attendance and $5,000 will serve as payment for UT’s use of the athlete’s name and likeness. In all, the school will be on the hook for about $6 million. "If we begin to [further] remunerate the participants, that’s going to break that model," Chris Plonsky, director for women’s sports at Texas, said. The school hasn't announced when it will begin to make these payouts, though next fall seems like a reasonable guess. Texas is the first school to announce it will compensate its athletes beyond scholarships following August's O'Bannon ruling. Presumably, all Power Five program will follow suit.

[sneakerhead]

his comments were misconstrued, it all depends on the NCAA appeals

[pavyracer]

If you put the hrs they put on for team each year this is less than minimum wage. I was a TA in college and made more than 10k a year. And that was when minimum wage was $3.25.

[Big Bear]

Who cares

[jjgold]

Yeah this is not big news and probably will never pass

[downsouth]

Whats so bad is they will be stuck giving more money to the non revenue generating sports where most of those athletes are just happy to be there and know the school and most of the student body couldn't care less.

[Big Bear]

Yeah this is not big news and probably will never pass

i just hope espn doesnt start giving us their opinion on this. Sooooo over this TMZ off the field bullshit the media wants to jam down own throats

[jtoler]

Once you start paying they will want more and more, especially if its chump change like this, 10k and youre making 10s of millions, just let the "free" education suffice or pay them right.

[Sledge187]

The term amateur athlete is dead.

[I/O]

Athletes will start going to schools that "pay" better. NW might actually be able to buy winning basketball and football teams. I would imagine their alumni make more than Michigan, OSU, etc.

[I/O]

The term amateur athlete is dead.

This is the first year I haven't paid any attention to college football. I've also been doing fine with bases and hockey. No need to muck things up. But I also don't have any interest. Had a friend ask me how many teams were in the Big Ten the other day? I was off by two.

[KiDBaZkiT]

Lol. If these schools start payin these kids they are gonna get burned and regret it. More than half of college football players aren't worth a shit.

[katstale]

For a few players, this will be a pay cut at Texas.

[manny24]

this will be a disaster

it will take 0.2 seconds to corrupt the payment schedules

HS kids will targeted for skills and discarded like trash for non-production

[KANSAS24]

Mite as well everyone else does!