WORTH THE WEIGHT:
Weighing the Decision of High School Athletes on Whether to turn Professional
"...and the Washington Wizards pick Kwame Brown from Glynn Academy."
The 2002 NBA draft has come and gone but the controversy of high school basketball players entering the draft in lieu of attending college has heated up again. Why are so many people upset at the decision of a few high school athletes who are trying to emulate what Moses Malone and Daryl Dawkins did many years ago? The answers are not so simple.
What troubles me the most is that so many people seemed concerned with the future of five or ten high school basketball players when there are countless other high school athletes who have far harder choices and far fewer opportunities. While only a handful of students will go straight from high school onto successful careers in professional athletics, there are many athletes who face greater problems. There are high school athletes who cannot afford to go to college, those who are not academically ready to go to college, and those who have no time for college because they are working to support their families. You don’t see people up in arms for kids that are sacrificing their college education and joining the Army or the Navy, or to be an auto mechanic.
If people want to be concerned with high school athletes they need to look no further than the situation that high school baseball players are put in. Each year, hundreds of high school baseball players are drafted in the Major League Baseball draft. Each individual player is faced with many tough decisions. If a player is drafted high (somewhere in the top 5 or 10 rounds) it is unlikely that attending college for 3 or 4 years will improve their draft position and improve their signing bonus. There have been rare instances when an average high school player who may have been drafted in high school has gone on to become a phenomenal college baseball player and become a first or second round draft pick. However, history shows us that pro teams want young players so that they can be molded and taught within their own farm systems.
Although some high school baseball players who get drafted may be offered lucrative incentives (signing bonuses, etc.), they often live an exhausting life-style in Single-A ball that involves constant travel on buses coupled with a small salary and a paltry sum for meal money. Of course some players will move up into higher levels of A-ball and some may even have a shot at the Majors, but most will only stay in the minors a few years, endure the 12 hour bus rides to cities and towns they have never heard of, then realize, despite their best efforts, they will never achieve their boyhood dream. Now you are left with a 24-year-old adult with little money in the bank, no college education, and very few transferable work skills.
As a former Division-1 college athlete, I have first hand knowledge of both the physical and mental stress that come hand in hand with college athletics. There were many nights when I found it difficult to balance my time between education and athletics, as I would be forced to miss a class in order to travel to a particular game. Lets face it, many of these college athletes are not getting a quality education at college if they are participating in a top-notch college athletic program. Education becomes secondary and school work is simply completed for the sole purpose of being eligible to compete in the basketball program rather than serving as a means to educate the mind. Coaches can’t hide it, students can't hide it, the Institutions can’t hide it. The graduation rates are plain as day and some are utterly embarrassing.
There are no simple answers for the high student who ponders the question, "should I go pro?" Many athletes who choose college over turning professional may not get the quality education they had hoped for even if they stay four or five years. For others it may be the perfect decision. Every athlete’s situation is different. Staying in college and getting a degree does not guarantee success in this world, you have to want to be successful and you have to want to work hard in college and you have to want to work hard at whatever profession you choose.
One thing is certain: a gifted high school basketball player has many options. Assuming they have not signed with an agent, they can enter the draft and see what happens. If they do not get selected or get drafted at a number that they deem as too low, they can still go to college and improve their basketball skills and still have multiple chances at future NBA drafts. If they get drafted, they will most likely sign a short-term contract that will pay them more money than most of us will earn in our lifetime. If they get hurt or fail to succeed, then at least they can pay for a college education, even if their college basketball eligibility has been lost.
Attending college and participating in college athletics was one of the best experiences of my life and I would not trade that experience for anything. It’s not about getting a degree, it’s about learning who you are, learning how to think on your own and learning how to communicate and work with other people. These are invaluable skills that everyone should learn and skills that college can provide. I would recommend that anyone who has the chance to go to college do so once all options have been explored. But if five or six kids want leave high school for the NBA on their own accord, who are we to tell them that they should deny their dreams!
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