The double standard for going pro

It’s okay to tell a black kid from the projects that he needs to at least start his education before he is eligible to play in the NBA, but doing the same to a white baseball player from Middle-America is completely unheard of. That much is made clear every June when hundreds of high school students are selected in Major League Baseball’s First Year Player Draft, forcing teenagers to make the decision between a lifelong dream and more school.

All too often, reality takes a backseat.

Or at least it becomes distorted. Getting drafted is a big deal. It means that somewhere along the line, a scout saw you and decided you have the ability to play professional baseball. But what isn’t made clear is that pro ball isn’t necessarily Major League ball, and in a game that measures statistics better than any other sport, the odds of even a top draft pick making it past the 8-hour bus rides in the minors to The Show are slim-to-none.

That’s what people are missing when they focus on playing guidance counselor for urban basketball players. The majority of basketball players who don’t cut it are weeded out long before even thinking about a major D-1 school, much less the NBA. Even in the early part of this decade, when making the jump to the league became trendy, only a handful of high school seniors ever actually declared for the draft.

In this year’s baseball draft, 15 high school seniors went in the opening round. But that’s not even the scariest number. Assuming they make the right decisions, those kids will benefit from the million-dollar signing bonuses they receive, even if they never come close to the majors. But what about the hundreds of 18 year olds who are going to receive the $1,000 or $2,000 bonuses that come from being selected in the later rounds?

Those kids won’t even be guaranteed a full-ride to college and even for the ones who are, how many will actually decide they want to go to school following years of making slightly-above minimum wage in the minors? Think about the number of everyday people, not just athletes, who decide to go work right after graduating high school. How many of them ever end up with a degree?

Talk about your ultimate double standard. While we’re okay with a rule that prevents maybe six high school basketball players each year from going pro, we’re allowing over 400 baseball players to make a decision that makes them far less likely to ever be qualified for a job that doesn’t involve hitting or pitching.

But god forbid we ask baseball players to attend freshman math.

If they did, they might learn that the numbers aren’t in their favor.

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David Stern should lift NBA age requirement

Getting an opinion out of LeBron James can sometimes be more difficult than stopping him as he takes off on one of his patented blasts through the lane, but on Friday night, the MVP candidate made one thing clear: He is against the NBA’s minimum-age requirement.

While providing color-commentary for the NBA Rookie Challenge, a game which featured seven one-and-done players and just two who played college basketball for four seasons, James suggested that guys who plan on only being in school for one year are wasting both the university’s and their own time.

“What’s the point if you don’t want to be in school?” James asked.

It certainly won’t help you become an All Star. That much was clear on Sunday night at the official NBA All Star game, which had six Americans who made the jump straight to the league from high school. The top players from the game only strengthen the argument against Commissioner David Stern’s mandatory minimum rule. The leading scorers were Kobe Bryant (27 pts), James (20 pts) and Amare Stoudemire (19 pts) and none of them needed a year off before going pro.

In fact, you could argue that for the best players in the world, college might actually hinder their development. College athletes are only allowed to spend 20 hours a week working on their skills with their head coaches as opposed to the unlimited amount time they could practice in the NBA. There’s also that whole student part of the student-athlete, which forces players to attend class. And while I’m as big a fan of Western Civ as anyone, if your major is basketball, most of your time ought to be spent in the gym.

The lack of talent that surrounds an elite player is another problem. Think about it. These kids spend their entire lives playing in AAU tournaments with the best players in the country, but how many times per season does the top player in college basketball face any type of decent competition? Maybe a handful? A future lottery pick on some college campus is more likely to end up in a picture partying with Michael Phelps than he is to face a challenge on the court.

When it comes down to it, the NBA’s mandatory-minimum age requirement feels more like a punishment to future pros than anything else. And they aren’t that far off. After all, there are very few things that we can absolutely force upon any American. I can think of two: Jail, if they commit a crime, and college basketball, if they want to play in the NBA.

So when James asks what the point is, he’s actually making the best point of all. Going to college is a dream for millions of people all over the world. So is playing in the NBA.

But one shouldn’t have to happen to make the other a reality.

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