Michael Baumgartner Slams Current 'Unfettered Arms Race’ Of College Athletics, Urges Equal Opportunity

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During a House Education and the Workforce Committee hearing prior to the congressional recess, Rep. Michael Baumgartner (R-WA) spoke about the need to restore equal opportunity to college athletics.

Transcript

00:00The chair recognizes Mr. Baumgartner of Washington for five minutes.

00:05Well, thank you, Mr. Chair, and very much appreciate this distinguished panel and this

00:10hearing being held. Trying to restore college sports is one of the reasons I came to Congress

00:14and it's very interesting to me. I certainly don't believe that college athletes are employees,

00:22but I also think many of the aspects of collective bargaining should be brought to

00:26the results of what would happen with collective bargaining should be brought to the collegiate

00:31athlete system. College athletics are highly subsidized public goods and I think they should

00:38be regulated as such. What our goal should be is we have more money in the system now,

00:44but we have less athletic opportunities than ever before. What our underlying principle should be is

00:49to create new opportunities, both for the benefit of the student athletes, but in this day and age,

00:54as American society becomes more political and more partisan, there is an important piece of

00:59social cohesion and camaraderie and societal benefit that just comes from everything that we love

01:04about college athletics. And so I think it needs to be restored. Personally, I think the NCA is a

01:10defunct and derelict institution. I don't think it can be fixed. I think there needs to be a new

01:14institution put under presidential control and authorized by Congress for these public goods.

01:21I think there has to be a system of fairness and competitive balance across the system, both the

01:27athletes and the schools. And if all the money goes into SEC football and Big Ten football and a little

01:34bit to basketball, then the Olympic sport athletes are going to be the ones that are going to suffer. So

01:40if we can treat the system equally amongst all sports and all athletes, I think we will get the solution

01:46that is in the best public interest. I believe that coaches salaries need to be capped at 10 times the

01:55total cost of the average student going to college. Again, this is not free market, unfettered capitalism.

02:02This is a highly subsidized public good. There's not a lot of societal benefit of a football coach

02:09making over $10 million a year. What you want is competitive balance. All of us that enjoyed college

02:13football and I grew up watching Power Five football. It was just as much fun for the fans and the

02:18students when the coaches were making $200,000 or $500,000 a year than when they're making $10 million.

02:23It's this unfettered arms race and this nonsense like having slides and these ridiculous whirlpool

02:30baths and these special chairs in all the locker rooms so they can entice recruits. There's no benefit

02:36to you guys as athletes with that. And then finally, the idea that we would have transcontinental

02:42conferences where student athletes are a volleyball team is going from Eugene, Oregon to Rutgers in New

02:51Jersey midweek. That's insane. That's not what the public wants to pay for. So Congress has all the

02:57tools to put this back together. You know, I believe that we should put NIL into a pool and share it

03:02equally amongst all athletes. I think we should pool TV revenue for all sports so that your HBCUs are

03:09benefiting and we can create so many opportunities for the sons and daughters of American taxpayers

03:17and as we restore this system. You know, to my question, Miss Wine, do you believe, you know,

03:23the future young ladies like yourselves playing softball right now, I mean, what needs to happen

03:31so that there would be more opportunities for young ladies like yourself and not less? And do you worry

03:37when you watch all the money going into football and men's basketball that there's gonna be less

03:42opportunities for young ladies like yourself? Thank you for the question. I do worry about the future

03:49of my own sport. I worry about the future of all female sports in this conversation. I dreamed as a

03:58little kid that I would get to play at the World Series. And fortunately enough, I went to two.

04:02And I think that every young softball player now should continue to have that dream and not have

04:09to worry that those opportunities won't be created for them or still there for them.

04:16I can't give you the best solution in my opinion for this just because I'm here to talk about how I was,

04:28my experience as a student athlete. But I do think that there needs to be a balance.

04:33Well, you know, I hope we have a unique opportunity, I think, in a bipartisan fashion,

04:37you know, with this president. Again, these are public goods. If we regulate them in a public manner,

04:42highly sized public goods, we realize that if we could have a – and it rises, I believe,

04:47to the importance of a presidential appointee and then authorized by Congress, we can get the NCA

04:53out of all this business, put the proper role with Congress authorizing these things and have more

04:58money. Again, we can have – we have more money in the system and less opportunities than ever before.

05:02If Congress takes action, we can have more opportunities for our athletes and maintain

05:06the competitive balance across the system. And I yield back. Thank you.

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