Let my people go (to another school)

I heard about this on Pardon the Interruption:

NCAA rules apparently allow coaches to decide where one of their scholarship players can or can’t go if they decided to transfer.

College sports has been under fire for the past few years. It’s the talent of the students that brings in tons of money for their schools. Top coaches pull down multi-million dollar contracts. Yet the athletes are forbidden to profit from their labor. I don’t know the exact figures but I’ve started paying attention to the graduation rate for student-athletes (Pat Summit, the coach of the Tennessee Lady Volunteers who just stepped down after 38 years because she is suffering from the onset of Alzheimer’s Disease, was praised on PTI for having the best rate).

So to hear that Bo Ryan, head basketball coach of the Wisconsin Badgers (the Chicago Bears’ rookie Gabe Carimi played football at that institution), went according to the rules and barred redshirt freshman Jarrod Uthoff from transferring not just to schools in their conference, but to several others as well, created a good deal of umbrage. One of those expressing a Jewish perspective was Rabbi Joshua Hess, who blogs at the FANatic Rabbi.

“I guess Ryan never heard about the 5th book of Jewish law; the law of derekh eretz, of acting fairly and honorably,” writes Hess. “Instead selfishness and arrogance have ruled the day.”

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Kaplan’s Korner on Jews and Sports © 2012 New Jersey Jewish News

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