The Disillusionment of College Sports in America - Essay Example

This paper will depict the fact that college sports are disillusionment as they seek to benefit the colleges and not the college athletes. The film, “Hoop Dreams” depicts the lives of two African-American teenagers, William Gates and Arthur Agee as they pursue their dreams of becoming NBA stars. Indeed, they want to use basketball as a leeway to their financial and social woes. Fortunately, a scout from St. Joseph High School, which has a magnificent basketball program and great basketball alumni, like NBA.

However, the film negates the idea that college athletic is a game by asserting that William strived to please everybody’s expectations when his knee is shot just when he had immense passion for the game. Notably, St. Joseph High School did not give the two teenagers full sponsorship but partial scholarships because they wanted to relate the sponsorship with the benefits that the double will bring to the school. Ideally, William was more gifted than Arthur a they joined different basketball teams in the school.

Indeed, Pingatore, the coach compares William with Isiah Thomas, the NBA star who was also a recruit of the same school. Notably, Arthur was both slow in class and on the court. As a result, the coach drops Arthur from the squad where he consequently lost the scholarship. This manifests the disillusionment that the school wanted to accrue benefits from Arthur and had to drop him since he could not advance to a perfect basket baller. Indeed, Arthur had to go back to public school. Unfortunately, he would still not graduate in the public school without transfer credits from St.

Joseph's who had already withheld his credits due to accrued tuition arrears. In fact, had the school not offered him a scholarship, there would not be any arrears and hence the schools did not seek to benefit Arthur recruiting him to their basketball program. Indeed, it is clear that the school was only looking for looking for a basketball player and not for tuition fees. We can thus ascertain that the school did not aim at helping worthy students but at finding good basketball players who they drop if they fail to make the target.

At the same time, the article by Taylor Branch, “Shame of College Sports,” defines college sports as a real scandal aimed at generating financial revenue for the for universities and private companies as the college athletes earn nothing. Indeed, the article presents the case of a civil-rights historian seeking for the payment of college athletes. Indeed, the film portrays the lack of concern for the scholars after suffering injuries that jeopardize their progress on the court. However, the two lads survived the setbacks and continued with their pursuit where colleges recruited them.

Actually, some college athletes suffer lifetime injuries and do not earn anything for that. The article claims that commercial interests buy schools and buy coaches to the disregard of the college athletes. In fact, Sonny Vaccaro told a closed hearing at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., in 2001 that they seek to put their materials on the athlete’s’ bodies by buying their school or their coach. Specifically, the Knight Foundation has interest in college athletics where it guards the interests of the likes of Vaccaro. Moreover,