The one year wonders of college basketball.

College basketball season is upon us at last. Of the "major" sports in this country (the 4 major pro sports leagues and the 2 big money college sports), college hoops is probably my second favorite. It's probably in a 1a/1b type of position with baseball, actually. I've been a die-hard Duke Blue Devil fan since I was about 8 years old, and I really can't get enough of the sport as a whole. While a number of things have left me less enthused about the NBA in recent years, my zeal for college basketball has probably increased. I enjoy the style of the game (which remains predominantly team-oriented as the NBA moves to a more one on one oriented game), and the raw passion of the players and the respective student bodies, which is something that can't really be replicated at the pro level.

One of the bigger story lines in the first days of this college basketball season has been dominant performances by freshman, such as Indiana's Eric Gordon and USC's OJ Mayo. This comes after a season in which a freshman (Kevin Durant) was the national player of the year, and another freshman (Greg Oden) was the best player on a national runner-up team, and would likely have been his primary competition for that honor had not an injury taken a significant chunk of his early season from him. The number of freshmen making an impact is clearly on the rise since the NBA instituted it's age limit, forcing players who would have in the past foregone college entirely in favor of the NBA draft to at least spend one year in college

Many have hailed this development as a highly positive thing for the college game. While I'm going to withhold judgment on that until I get a larger sample size to view, I do concede that it is quite possible that adding these players into the college mix, even for only a year, will have a positive impact on the quality of the competition and the interest the sport generates. That being said, I continue to remain opposed to the idea on principle, and no amount of stellar play and compelling story lines that freshmen generate is going to move me off of that position.

Unlike baseball and hockey, which have their own well established minor leagues, basketball and football have for years used the NCAA as their primary talent development league. By establishing their age limit, the NBA has now joined the NFL in forcing athletes who want to pursue a pro career to spend at least some time in college, whether they have any actual desire to get an education or not. It is this practice that I am strongly opposed to, as I continue to see major college sports have less and less actual connection to an actual college experience.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of athletes, even ones who clearly have lucrative pro careers ahead of them, getting an education, but that's not what this rule is about. It's about the NBA believing that players coming right out of high school aren't ready for the pros, and not wanting to lay out their own money to develop them. The end result: You put kids on college campuses that have no interest in being there, wasting class space, and worst of all, taking a scholarship away from a kid who might actually use it to get an education he couldn't otherwise afford.

I've said this before in different forums, but baseball has this thing right, or as close to right as any pro sport does. They have their own development system, and you are more than welcome to turn pro upon graduation from high school. However, once you make the decision to go to college, you aren't eligible to turn pro until after your junior year. Ideally, I'd take it one step further and require a degree before you turn pro, if you go to college, but the baseball system would be good enough for me. The end result is that the kids that just want to play baseball can start their pro careers, and the kids that head to college do so knowing that they are there long term. I've often found it funny that no one ever gripes about the large number of baseball players who forgo college entirely, but we're almost constantly bombarded with gripes about the basketball players that do. It's probably one of the best proofs that there are motives for keeping basketball players in school that go beyond a commitment to their education.

Now, I'm not naive enough to think this will ever happen. Since major college athletics became cash cows, the current setup is mutually beneficial to the NBA and the NCAA. The NBA doesn't have to pay to develop players, and the NCAA rakes in money employ pro-caliber talent at amateur prices . But, if the powers that be are ever interested in giving more than just lip service to the idea that academics are a primary concern in major college athletics, they might want to put some serious thought into this kind of setup.