These college athletes to pros arguments are near and dear to my heart. Having sucked in college and having spent the majority of my time stapled firmly to the bench, I wish I had the problems OJ Mayo is sifting through while he drinks Henny and Hyp underage on some beach awaiting his call to go play for the Clippers...or whoever. But who's fault really is it? If I drop 30 Gs in your lap, are you running for the hills saying "no, that's just WRONG?" Not if you're sane. It's high time the NBA starts fixing this issue, and it's just not that effing hard to do.
1. Abolish the age limit. Truly one of the most ignorant happenstances in sports in my time of living. And when I'm 104, I think it will still be near the top. I had a friend in high school. Named Robert. Decent student, easily could get into college. Really could work on cars though. I mean he could do anything. Well, we graduated and Robert decided that instead of going to college, he'd marry his (questionable) girlfriend and start a life. People knew Rob was up to snuff working on cars. They didn't need him to spend one year picking his nose at the locale Uni to verify it. So he got a job working at a place down the street. Not changing oil at the JIffy Lube, either. Robert didn't have anyone telling him "I know you're good enough, but you're 18, so no dice until you're 19." This is how stupid the NBA has become. And on top of it, look at the guys the league markets. LeBron. Howard. Kobe. T-Mac. Garnett. Some of the biggest names in the damn sport are straight outta high school. Sounds like hypocrisy to me.
2. Work with the NCAA to establish a system where, if high school players don't get drafted, they can go back to college but must stay 2-3 years. Either length will work. Clearly if the kid didn't get drafted, he made a bad "business" decision. So let him go back and learn. The NBA wants to "preserve the game" by not letting these young kids in (you know, unless they're as good as LeBron) and claims to care about the kids (not the product, which is BS in and of itself) and college basketball is suffering from an identity crisis where freshman come in, run the show, and then leave sorority girls for groupies. Both systems are flawed. Letting undrafted kids back into college with the stipulation that they hafta stay there for awhile makes more sense for you, me, and the 19 year old who thought the Blazers would draft him but now works the graveyard shift at the BP down the road.
3. Put recruiting restrictions on coaches. At some point, there needs to be an age limit on how early these kids can begin being recruited. OJ Mayo...we knew about him when he was 14. When I was 14, my voice hadn't even cracked and I was still 2 years from my first part time job. I don't know who polishes their rod to middle school basketball talent, but it ain't me. Even having high school games nationally televised is a joke. No wonder these kids think they're bigger than the system. Not allowing colleges to send letters or recruit until kids are in their junior year would at least help quelch things a bit. We wouldn't know how good someone is when they're 14 if coaches aren't capable of caring enough to get them into their programs prospectively.
What woulda happened if Greg Oden's knee condition came out against Xavier instead of the Nuggets' summer league scrubs? How many millions woulda been lost b/c Greg Oden needed that one year of never going to class before he was deemed prepared for the NBA? His mom said she'd have sued the crap outta the NBA. And I bet she'd have won. Name another profession short of bartending that says as a legal adult, you can't apply for a position. Not necessarily get it. Hell, I can apply to be head football coach at Alabama. I won't get it, but there's no one telling me I can't do it. It doesn't exist in our society other than in pro sports.
What happens when some 5 star blue chipper can't read enough to get into a D-1 school, but sure as hell can shoot silky smooth 25 footers, dunk from the foul line, and block shots into the 4th row? He goes to community college for a year, falls of the radar, and goes from lottery pick by the Bobcats to late 1st round selection...likely losing millions. All because he's "smart" enough to average 25-15 in high school, but can't pass algebra.
These are the issues that face the NBA. As far as college goes, the product sucks now, and will continue to suck as long as kids are forced into one year of school they don't want to even attend. Now it comes out that basically, to keep eligible these kids hafta go to one semester of classes. Does that make you an NBA man, David Stern? 12 credit hours is all it takes to increase your product? The theory was that forcing some of these kids to college would keep them in a few years, realize that the NBA can wait. Instead, it's just made everyone more antsey to get to the league. With the NBA at a high since the retirement of it's watershed core of players, mostly by marketing use of guys who...came right outta high school (by the way, 3 of the top 4 MVP vote getters...straight from high school).
Robert's divorced now. He's moved up in the world though. Didn't take a single college class, yet went from one garage, to lead mechanic at another, and now works on some race team (for people who like such things, somehow). He gets paid well. More than me and my pretty, shiny BA sitting on the wall collecting dust. High time the NBA gets rid of the age limit, before next year some kid does a lousier job hiding the 5 figures than OJ did and misses out on millions because he has to play overseas one year, banned from college hoops. The only thing more un-American than this is Barack Obama.