In spite of this subjective streak in college football, few aficionados and analysts would deny that Johnny Manziel was the best player in the nation when the dust settled on the 2012 season. Manziel, a redshirt freshman who emerged from third-string obscurity to lead the Texas A&M Aggies to an 11-2 record, won the Heisman Trophy after a stellar campaign that was punctuated by a stunning win over the vaunted Alabama Crimson Tide in Tuscaloosa. Manziel’s meteoric rise mirrored the stunning progress of the Texas A&M program, which in the span of one year morphed from a middling Big 12 team into a Southeastern Conference powerhouse. While the Aggies’ reversal of fortune was due in no small measure to the outstanding coaching of offensive wunderkind Kevin Sumlin, the emergence of Manziel stands as the primary reason for Texas A&M’s football renaissance.
Texas A&M’s victorious season on the gridiron was reflected in the program’s financial ledger. By the time the 2012 season ended, the Aggies had raked in nearly $120 million.[1] For his troubles, Coach Sumlin earned a healthy raise that bumped his annual compensation to $3.1 million.[2] As for the players who were primarily responsible for turning the dream season into a reality, well, they got nothing. Nothing for dedicating themselves year-round to the task of sculpting their physiques in order to withstand the physical punishment of a football game. Nothing for waking up in the early morning for meetings and tape study. Nothing for attending interminable practices and mandatory study sessions. Nothing for ensuring that their broken bodies would be mended in time for the next game by visiting the training room. Nothing for an 11-2 season and a Cotton Bowl victory. Nothing for wonderfully representing Texas A&M University under a spotlight that outshines the one under which the university’s highly-paid administrators labor.
Well, not really nothing. A free education is certainly something. So is access to an expansive and influential booster network that could facilitate an outgoing player’s quest for employment. Moreover, one cannot adequately valuate the privilege of playing in college football’s best conference in front of hundreds of thousands of rabid fans. So the players received some compensation.
However, some compensation does not equate to adequate compensation, especially in the case of Johnny Manziel. According to one estimate, Manziel’s Heisman season produced $37 million in media exposure revenue for Texas A&M.[3] This figure does not include the profits from the university’s merchandising operation, which included the sale of Manziel jerseys (er, #2 jerseys- gee, I wonder why that number is popular?). Rather than receiving a reward for his sensational season, Manziel has instead been saddled with a heavy burden: he has become the “beneficiary” of an insane level of media attention.
The ESPN network, which played a significant role in cultivating the “Johnny Football” ethos, now seeks to exploit the new sports hero whose pedestal it created. Gone are the days when Manziel could commit the common college student sins of oversleeping, underage drinking, and shortsighted tweeting under the cloak of anonymity. Now every one of Manziel’s actions is scrutinized and inanely “debated” on ESPN shows like "First Take." Articles are written on ESPN’s website about the “questions” with which NFL evaluators are contending as they analyze the “controversies” that surround the quarterback.[4] The most recent scandal involves an NCAA investigation of an accusation that Manziel was paid in exchange for autographing memorabilia. According to ESPN Sports Business reporter Darren Rovell, if the NCAA substantiates the allegation it could deem the quarterback ineligible for the infraction of “accepting money for promoting or advertising the commercial sale of a product or service.”[5]
One can safely bet that ESPN’s coverage of this imbroglio will avoid the touchy issue of the NCAA’s obvious hypocrisy on this front since the network just secured a twelve-year television contract for the BCS playoffs (set to begin in 2014) for the princely sum of $500 million per season.[6] After all, it’s uncouth to attack a business partner. If ESPN did revert to a journalistic approach in covering this investigation, perhaps its reporters would ask the NCAA why the organization continues to enforce the principle of amateurism on its student-athletes while the other members of the college football landscape profit like bandits. Why are the student-athletes compelled to play for free, for “love of the game," when the game has been commercialized by the NCAA and its member institutions? Even the sacrosanct bowl games have been adulterated by the presence of corporate sponsors (Discover Orange Bowl, Rose Bowl Game presented by Vizio). While coaches drift from one job to the next in search of the highest payday and athletic directors move their universities from one conference to another in search of the highest television rights payout, college student-athletes are left twisting in the wind. Their destinies are shaped and contorted by the influence of money, but the foolish and self-serving enforcement of the amateur ideal prevents them from accessing the wealth that they create.
Alas, no one should expect the network, or any sports “journalist," to ask these questions. Everyone is too invested in the narrative of a star quarterback who could not handle the pressures of fame, who selfishly put himself ahead of the team by accepting money. As reporters myopically focus on Manziel, a bigger scandal remains unexplored: namely, the absurdity of the college football business model, which generates hundreds of millions of dollars for universities without distributing any of the spoils to the laborers. And that is just an objective fact.
[1] http://collegesportsblog.dallasnews.com/2013/05/texas-am-one-of-13-schools-that-made-100-million-revenue-in-2012.html/
[2] http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball/blog/eye-on-college-football/21786912/kevin-sumlin-gets-extension-salary-raise-to-31-million
[3] http://www.thebatt.com/a-m-football-season-manziel-generate-37-million-in-media-exposure-revenue-1.2973571#.UgMGoxXD_IV
[4] http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/9542030/nfl-eye-johnny-manziel-wrong-reasons
[5] http://espn.go.com/espn/otl/story/_/id/9537999/otl-ncaa-investigating-johnny-manziel-profiting-autographs
[6] http://collegefootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/11/21/espn-lands-12-year-agreement-to-televise-playoffs-bcs-bowls/
