Colleges can earn an unending amount of profits from their student athletes long after they stop playing game, via video games, jersey sales, TV broadcasts, and more. The students, despite all their hard work and training, make nothing. This incensed former UCLA player, Ed O’Bannon, who is suing the NCAA[1]. If he wins, it could force colleges to give current and future players a cut of the profits schools make from television broadcasts, ticket sales and licensing deals.
Bannon, who played for UCLA in the 1990s, also took legal action against video game company EA Sports for using images of former athletes in games. The company, along with Collegiate Licensing Company, settled the case for $40 million.
O’Bannon’s attorney, Michael Hausfeld, explained the importance of the lawsuit on NewsOne Now with Roland Martin[2][3]. An education isn’t enough compensation when the schools make billions, he said. “There is a hypocrisy, a fraud, being perpetrated by the NCAA and all the conferences and schools. In turn for an education, these players give us their rights.”