Nah, his argument is, at best, tangential to original point which was me talking about my preference for amateur college sports. That's inherently personal. It's fine if anyone else's preference is different.
I don't tune in on Saturday to watch the AD. I watch the kids play. Their amateurism is a part of what makes the narrative compelling to me, otherwise I'd watch pros play at higher level. The fact that others in the university are paid is entirely irrelevant to that.
It's a different discussion, but if you want I can talk about that.
The kids are getting their education, room and board paid for four (or more) years. That's a pretty significant nut these days. For kids who will go on to play professionally, they're getting world class coaching and training. For kids who won't they are getting a degree that makes them more marketable. That's the trade off, the quid pro quo that they get in exchange for playing a sport (which they likely love) for the university. Not a bad deal, IMO.
I'll respectfully suggest that the argument that someone in a supervisory position is paid more than people in a junior position is sophistry. You see it sometimes in business or publicly held corporations. Yeah you need both the mail room guys and board room guys to function but the market decides their respective salaries. So saying well a conference commissioner got a $20M bonus (who got that?) that should have been divided amongst the players misses the boat in capitalistic society.
(Ironically enough, exactly the same thing happens in Communist systems. "Some animals are more equal than others.")
