March Madness

Last week, we took a look at how 76 Black basketball players attracted nearly 90,000 people to Las Vegas for the NBA All-Star Weekend, and generated over $100 million for the City of Las Vegas…on a $4.5 million investment, the fee charged by the NBA for Las Vegas to host the gala event. With the March Madness of the NCAA Basketball Tournament upon us, let us take a moment to reflect on the real madness of the tournament.

Nearly twenty-five (25%) of all Division 1 men’s basketball coaches are of color and 64 coaches will lead their teams into the NCAA Division I men's tournament. On the first Monday in April one will emerge with a celebratory strand of net and a national championship. Many more, if history holds, will cash in with new or considerably sweetened contracts. The coaches of six of the tournament's Elite Eight teams a year ago parlayed their success into new deals for this season. They'd have gone 7-for-8, but Billy Donovan of national champion Florida chose to postpone a discussed extension.

Their raises were substantial. At the five schools where raises are public — George Mason, LSU, Memphis, Texas and UCLA — the coaches got a collective bump of about $1.7 million, or about $332,000 each when they extended their contracts. With those new agreements, and others, at least 20 of last year's 64 tournament coaches are making $1 million or more this season and the average salary this season is nearly $800,000. In the six marquee conferences — the Atlantic Coast, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pacific-10 and Southeastern — that average jumps to $1.2 million, not counting benefits, incentives or any of the perks coaches routinely receive.

While 25% of all Division 1 men’s basketball coaches are of color, only Kentucky's Tubby Smith, who is guaranteed nearly $2.1 million, ranks with the highest paid. Texas' Rick Barnes, Ohio State's Thad Matta and Michigan State's Tom Izzo all are pulling down more than $1.7 million. Tom Izzo will also pocket a $4 million bonus if he stays on as the Spartans' coach through April 2010. That's on top of the $5.8 million in bonuses he received in 2006, when his take for the season exceeded $7 million — the highest single-season payout in history.

The rosters of all 64 tournament teams are dominated by players of color, and that 99% of the players of the top 4 seeds are of color. While we create the wealth…the NCAA recently announced a $6-billion, 11-year contract with CBS Sports, one of the largest in U.S. sports history, that will expand the network's exclusive right to televise the NCAA Men's college basketball tournament and include rights to game content of the Internet, and merchandising rights for tournament-related products….we remain outsiders when it comes to the business of college basketball...our share is peanuts in the scheme of things.

The new CBS deal builds on CBS's existing $1.725 billion, 7-year deal and runs through 2014. At about $545 million per year, the contract is considerably higher than expectations for about $400 million per year. People of color have taken no real ownership of the sport and, as a result, the families of color of the boys who will be working for the NCAA over the next several weeks find themselves having to struggle to raise money just to travel to see their boys play. When will the madness end?!

If you have questions or require additional information, please contact Everett L. Glenn, Esq. at eglenn@espsportslawpro.com or call 562.619.8460.