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Article Abstract: Publisher Fact Sheet This book suggests that American college sports is a massively commercialized industry based on activities that are often irrelevant & even harmful to education. Annotation "Even for the best-intentioned coaches and athletic directors, the landscape of big-time college sports is increasingly treacherous. Is any part of the 'ideal' of college sports salvageable? Andrew Zimbalist's book makes a valuable contribution for the consideration of that question."--Bob Costas "In the straightforward, analytical manner that is the trademark of his work, Zimbalist clarifies the contradictions inherent in the paradoxical marriage between higher education and big-time college athletics. He challenges the NCAA to come to grips with some of the less appealing by-products of the organization's phenomenal growth and success."--Billy Hunter, executive director, National Basketball Players Association "It's impossible to read this unsparing examination of the tension between the noble ideals of the academy and the base reality of the athletic-industrial complex that the academy has created, and not wonder: Why do we put up with it?"--Alexander Wolff, senior writer with Sports Illustrated, coauthor of Raw Recruits "Zimbalist has executed a masterful analysis of how and why colleges and universities have increasingly commercialized athletic programs. He unmasks the dichotomy of the 'student-athlete' and reveals the reality and shortcomings of their compensation systems. His insightful look at the economic and government pressures compounding this schizophrenic system and his recommendations for either changing it or more effectively coping make for 'must' reading by any student or fan of sports."--Donna A. Lopiano, Ph. D., Executive Director, Women's Sports Foundation "Through hard-headed investigation, detailed analysis, and lively storytelling, Andrew Zimbalist confirms the truth about major college athletics: that commercial motives and rewards give lie to the very ideals that define higher education. Unpaid Professionals is the starting point for all readers interested in knowing how we reached this sad state of affairs, and how we can get beyond it."--Tom McMillen, Head of the President's Council on Physical Fitness, and former NBA player and US congressman "Andrew Zimbalist's book shatters the myth of the purity of college athletics and exposes it for what it is, big business. This insightful look into college athletics should be required reading for all incoming student-athletes."--Jim McIlvaine, center, New Jersey Nets, NBA "In the coming decade, as big-time college sports and the NCAA are increasingly attacked, particularly in the courts, you will often see Professor Andrew Zimbalist as an expert witness. No economist understands intercollegiate athletics better, nor can explain the greed and avarice of its proponents more coherently. Unpaid Professionals is Zimbalist's masterful summing up of the history of college sports, its present predicament, and its uncertain prospects. If every American interested in this subject read this book, real reform would come to big-time college sports."--Murray Sperber, author of Onward to Victory: The Crises That Shaped College Sports "This is a superbly researched book, as might be expected from someone with Zimbalist's reputation and accomplishments. It contains more information on the history and inside workings of the NCAA than anything I have ever seen in print."--James Quirk, coauthor of Hard Ball and Pay Dirt Annotation Big-time college sports embodies the ideals of amateurism and provides an important complement to university education. Or so its apologists would have us believe. As Andrew Zimbalist shows in this unprecedented analysis, college sports is really a massively commercialized industry based on activities that are often irrelevant and even harmful to education. Zimbalist combines groundbreaking empirical research and a talent for storytelling to provide a firm, factual basis for the many arguments that currently rage about the goals, history, structure, incentive system, and legal architecture of college sports. He paints a picture of a system in desperate need of reform and presents bold recommendations to chart a more sensible future. Zimbalist begins by showing that today's problems are nothing new--that schools have been consumed for more than a century by debates about cheating, commercialism, and the erosion of academic standards. He then takes us into the world of the modern student athlete, explaining the incentives that, for example, encourage star athletes to abandon college for the pros, that create such useless courses as "The Theory of Basketball," and that lead students to ignore classes despite the astronomical odds against becoming a professional athlete