By Aubrey Bruce, BlackPress USA
I must begin this column by putting all the readers on high alert because this is not, nor do I intend it to be, a Black History moment. On June 11, 2023, author Debra Bell posted an article on usnews.com titled: “George Wallace Stood in a Doorway at the University of Alabama 50 Years Ago Today.” The following quote is an excerpt from the article.
“In January of 1963, following his election as Governor of Alabama, George Wallace famously stated in his inaugural address: ‘segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.’ The staunch conservative demonstrated his loyalty to the cause on June 11, 1963, when black students Vivian Malone and James A. Hood showed up at the University of Alabama campus in Tuscaloosa to attend class. In what historians often refer to as the ‘Stand in the Schoolhouse Door,’ the governor literally stood in the doorway as federal authorities tried to allow the students to enter.”
On September 12, 1970, USC fullback Sam Cunningham and the USC Trojans routed the University of Alabama at Legion Field in Birmingham by the score of 42-21. The following year Alabama Head Coach, Paul “Bear” Bryant, featured two Black players, junior college transfer John Mitchell and Wilbur Jackson. According to Mike Puma’s biography of Bryant on ESPN.com “By 1973, one-third of Alabama’s starters were Black. That same year, Alabama went 9-0-1 and won its third national championship.”
On June 30, 2021, ESPN staff writer Dan Murphy posted the following on espn.com.
“The doors to a new era of college sports officially opened Thursday. For the first time, all NCAA athletes are now able to make money from a wide variety of business ventures without losing their eligibility. A mixture of state laws and NCAA rule changes have removed prohibitions that prevented athletes from selling the rights to their names, images and likenesses (NIL). The transformative shift comes after more than a decade of legal, political, and public pressure to give athletes access to a bigger piece of the billions of dollars generated by college sports each year.”
Recently, Texas A&M Coach Jimbo Fisher was awarded a $77 million buyout for his “lack of performance” as the head coach. It was also reported on cnn.com that:
“When Fisher was first named head football coach at Texas A&M in 2017, the university said he had agreed to a 10-year contract worth $75 million, adding no ‘state-appropriated funds’ would be used toward his salary. The finances behind the decision to fire the coach are ‘monumental,’ Ross Bjork, Texas A&M director of athletics, said during a news conference. ‘As the contract states, there is a buyout provision in coach Fisher’s contract and those details will be worked out”
Jimbo Fisher is being paid for not doing his job, whereas walk-on players must earn their scholarships. Who is going to emancipate our children from this indentured servant athletic system? Well, I guess we are going to have to wait and see.
Soul Stealers…Let’s be honest — college football is a business, with money everywhere appeared first on Atlanta Daily World
