‘he national A. A. U. must look to its own house before i goes
barging into the colleges of the country.

The men at the top of the A. A. U., nationally, are honest
enough, goodness knows. The fact is they are so honest in their ...
_own rights that they know little or nothing of the world in which
they live. Men, for example, like National A. A. U. President L. .
di Benedetto, the New Orleans playground instructor, and his
assistant, J. Lyman Bingham, once of D. U., cannot conceive, thru
training and background, that there are men who would see a little
kid all but get his brains knocked out for the lone dirty dollar paid
to the manager of a winning boxer in an amateur bout.

When, as mentioned by Allen, baseball faced its “Black Sox” scandal,
it didn’t go into the playgrounds and colleges for a “czar.” It went into
the courts—the courts where life as it is actually lived is on daily parade.
It took for its chief a man who knew all about life on the other side of the
college and playground fence—a hard-boiled, plain-spoken, wise and un-
derstanding jurist that nobody can fool—and nobody tries to fool, either.

mK. * *
E DC not think Allen has overstated the situation. He has not as
far as basketball in Madison Square Garden is concerned. This is
not intended for, nor is it a reflection on, Ned Irish, the Garden promoter,

@ man who has done as much, or more, to make the cage game popular

as any individual you can name. It is simply that basketball, in the

Garden, is more than a sport. It is a gambling enterprise, just as Allen

states. }

Let us look at the men involved in this gamble. Let us look at them ,
- from our own local viewpoint, for we of the Rocky Mountain west are
sending two teams into the Garden this year—Wyoming and Utah.

Out here we are frankly a bunch of hypocrites. We say we are
playing college games purely for the love of sports, and for the good of
the kids taking part. We go around with pious faces making rules and
regulations “designed to keep our sports pure.’ We, on the quiet, give
athletes free tuition—somezof them thelr booxs, others just their school-
tug. But we deny the kids a training table or a place to live. That, we |
of the Big Seven say with solemn looks-upon our faces, is done.in the

interest of “the purity of athletics.” Phooey!

: For we, in council meeting as we draw our schedules—what
do we talk about? The gate, brothers and sisters—the gate. The
gate means how many cash customers we can expect for this con-
test or that one. Then of a Saturday we send these kids out to play . ~
befere these cash customers. The kids down there on the field—
many of them—haven’t had a square meal inside them all thru the
football season. I know and I can name names. I can tell you the
names of kids in the Big Seven who lived on hamburgers because
they were unable to hold down jobs that would pay them sufficient
money to keep themselves decently. The reason they couldn’t hold
down such jobs is that their school work plus their athletic drills
took up every waking minute.

Well, sir, this hungry kid, of a Saturday afternoon, looks up in the
stands and counts some 10,000 or 20,000 customers who came there for
what? To see him play. That’s what they came for. The kids may be
young. But the kids can think. And the kids are human. You put
those elements together and you have a kid who, unless he’s made of ;
some mighty wonderful stuff, could very well lend an ear to some gam- |
_ bler who showed ‘him a sheaf of greenbacks in return for not playing
quite as hard as his alma mammy—that’s starving him—expects him
to Play.

* * *
7E DON’T believe this has happened as yet. The wonder is that it
hasn’t—that we haven’t had the scandal Allen predicts. But with
money like it is—well, that remark of Allen’s about the coming period
being “a golden age of sports because there won't be anauEe silver to
pay off the athletes” isn’t just wise cracking.

This department is, and ever has been, against “buying” and “pay-
ing” college athletes. ‘But by the same token it is high time that the
colleges of this nation—of our own section, especially—treat the athletes
like human beings, giving in return for their services as boxoffice attrac-
tions, honestly awarded and openly acknowledged scholarships, plus the
training table, with quarters, during the periods of competition.

If we need a national commissioner to bring this about, well and good.

This department believes that just a little common honesty ean do
the job unaided.