More Cost of Attendence details and what it means

CBS put out a huge article with survey results on the how the various FBS schools plan to pay players under the new Cost of Attendance program. Long story short, all the Power 5 are paying players and most of the non-power 5 will pay too. But even as the system changes, the whole Cost of Attendance program still leaves so much up to the schools and lacks any consistent rule or calculations. And BC is still caught between trying to do what's right financially, competitively and upholds the school's values.

If you remember, BC voted against paying players when the issue first came to a vote. At the time we all recognized it as a protest vote. But even now as BC rolls out its plan, it remains clear we are doing so begrudgingly. Look at how BC is complicating its own process:

Boston College, the only Power Five school to vote against COA last January, will hand out new scholarship money. BC said it's providing $1,250 for miscellaneous expenses plus an unspecified travel allowance if the player is from outside New England. Partial-scholarship athletes on a percentage scholarship will receive the percentage of their dominator, and athletes on a dollar-figured scholarship will receive the dollar amount. Boston College declined to say how much money it's budgeting.

Imagine explaining that policy to recruits.

This can't last. Not just at BC. But everywhere. Even though the stipends/payments are relatively low, the disparity between schools will be exploited in recruiting.

I understand why BC structured the pay this way. But I think they are going to up their budgets shortly to keep up with our rivals. I also think BC should lead the charge to bring uniformity so that we can continue to compete.

Problems with paying players

Chad Scott wrote a good piece on the head scratching math that goes into the NCAA's new cost of attendance policy. The money is supposed to be related to the cost of living in that particular area for a student, not related to tuition or already covered room, board and books. In the current world it is more costly to attend the University of Tennessee ($5,666) than Boston College ($1,400). In the spirit of the new rules, Tennessee would be able to hand out more than $4,000 to a student athlete than BC would be able to offer to the same athlete. How do you think that is going to play out?

Scott noted that these numbers were not cooked up by some scheming SEC Football recruiter, but by each university's office of financial aid and collected by the Department of Education. That explains why school that would seemingly be inline with one another (USC and UCLA) or (Auburn and Alabama) are so different.

The good news is that this calculation won't last. Forget the bad math and worse logic behind Knoxville being more costly than Chestnut Hill. The reason this won't last is that the SEC won't allow one school to have a leg up on another. I expect that eventually there will be a flattening of the cost of attendance stipend and all schools will offer the same thing.

When BC voted against the pay players plan, they never mentioned this issue. They were thinking big picture and where the paying players will creep, but they should have included this aspect of the issue in their protest. It might have generated a little more support and slowed the movement down.