“The Most Important Article Ever Written About College Sports”

That's what Frank Deford calls Taylor Branch's manifesto in defense of paying college athletes:

'Scholarship athletes are already paid,' declared the Knight Commission members, 'in the most meaningful way possible: with a free education.' This evasion by prominent educators severed my last reluctant, emotional tie with imposed amateurism. I found it worse than self-serving. It echoes masters who once claimed that heavenly salvation would outweigh earthly injustice to slaves. In the era when our college sports first arose, colonial powers were turning the whole world upside down to define their own interests as all-inclusive and benevolent. Just so, the NCAA calls it heinous exploitation to pay college athletes a fair portion of what they earn.

The Dish did an extensive reader thread on this issue, which started here and ended here.