and you have no idea who I know

and yet presume to tell me how much these athletes (stars and non-stars) are working and how much they deserve (in your opinion) to be compensated.

You know what? I think that you might have a point. I pay my support staff too much. I need to find a way to lock them out and prohibit them from working anywhere else for at least three years. I will handsomely reward them with some cheap meals, some decent dorm rooms, and some sweat suits and sliders that you value at about $1000/year (snicker). Once they're done working for me for 3 years, I will give them a valuable diploma and a reference and they can go work anywhere for however much they can get; if they did a really good job for me and outperformed expectations, they will likely be able to get fantastic jobs with major firms and earn a 6 figure income. That is a handsome reward from where I sit. And in the meantime, I will go ahead and keep all the profits and divert them to good causes like the church, jobs for my family members, etc.

There is a reason that the judges laugh at this argument, Irishdog80. There is a reason that Notre Dame guys like Jenkins, Swarbrick, and Smith are appealing to Congress.