Only football and men’s basketball are revenue positive at most schools. So let’s agree that this conversation only applies to a minority of college athletes. The rest clearly don’t bring in millions. If anything, they cost money.

As for football and men’s basketball, it is true that universities make good money here. But most of these athletes are replaceable. People aren’t coming to see Player X, they are coming to see their favorite school. The fan loyalty (and therefore the revenue) is much more closely tied to the name on the front of the jersey than the name on the back of the jersey. There are exceptions of course, but they are exceptions.

And let’s see what the university provides for these athletes...

- Free education
- Free food
- Other perks (financial and otherwise)

Those ones are obvious, but I think miss the bigger point. Universities also offer...

- World-class coaching that the player would not have access to otherwise
- World-class training staff
- World-class equipment and facilities
- Unparalleled exposure (in massive stadiums and on TV) to potential employers (e.g., NFL) that the athlete could not generate on his own

How much do universities pay to provide athletes with these services? Millions. How much do the athletes pay to consume these services? Nothing but their involvement in the sport.

Not many millionaire athletes would be making as much money today if they didn’t get all these perks from their university (free of charge) when they were 19, 20, and 21 years old.

I recognize that most college athletes don’t go on to become millionaires. But these are the same athletes who aren’t really responsible for the university making millions in the first place.

The argument that universities exploit college athletes is overstated and one-sided.