Public statements from college athletes are continuing to emerge. The Mountain West’s athletes made a statement this past week. Our friends at Mountain West Wire had the story on the Mountain West athletes’ campaign, #MWUnited.
Friday, Sports Illustrated reported that it had received a document which had been circulated to at least four schools in the American Athletic Conference. There is a question about the pervasiveness of athlete support in the conference, meaning that the document could be the product of athletes from one school, UCF, or a small amount of schools within the conference.
While we wait for more clarity and details on that particular point, the document did unearth one revealing component.
Most of the demands made by the athletes overlap with what the Pac-12, Big Ten, and Mountain West athletes asked for. There is a lot of material related to health and safety protocols plus a demand to address questions about eligibility and scholarship status. Interestingly, the AAC athletes — like the Pac-12 athletes — asked for a revenue share. Pac-12 athletes wanted 50 percent. AAC athletes came in at 20 percent.
We said, however, that AAC athletes broke new ground. Here it is: They asked for — and this is a quote from the document as reported by Sports Illustrated — “hazard pay.”
It isn’t a mistake for groups of athletes to omit or include specific proposals. As I have said to anyone who asks me about this larger topic, we shouldn’t view these demands by athletes as mistakes or missteps. This is a very new (if not entirely new) process for most of these athletes. Judging them the way we judge political candidates (this was a good tactic, that was a bad move, etc.) isn’t helpful.
Letting the process play out is the biggest thing. Let these athletes learn, and let power brokers learn how to adjust to them as well.
That said, AAC athletes asking for hazard pay represents an important development. AAC athletes (even though they might not be represented by a majority of AAC schools — that’s a separate detail worth examining in a separate piece) have tapped into the idea that college football players are being viewed as essential workers by university presidents, conference commissioners, athletic directors, and other administrators who want to have a football season.
If administrators are going to make such a sustained effort to play football in a pandemic, that means college football players are very important. AAC athletes — by asking for hazard pay in a pandemic — are making a request a lot of people can identify with. Let’s see how the AAC and other conferences respond to this particular request.
Stay tuned.