Now on the other hand, it seems as if Derrick Rose isn’t much of a student. This isn’t me saying this but what the NCAA alleges.  They claim he had someone stand in for him on his SAT because he couldn’t manage to make the relatively meager score he needed to play college ball at Memphis. Then, as the Chicago Sun-Times reported, one of his high school grades was changed from a “D” to a “C” in order to help his college eligibility chances.

Now let’s take a quick peak at the facts…

We know his scores and his grades
We know he has to deal with some embarrassing questions
Another young star is caught in a scandal
The institutions involved are running to the hills for protection

In no way am I trying to say the people involved at every level didn’t bend the rules and look the other way to get this great commodity on their campus or in their league, but I do pose a question: it’s not that Rose cheated on the SAT it’s why in the heck did he have to take it in the first place?

This is another one of this blunders the NBA has put in place and now it’s biting them ever so slightly on the butt. Now, let’s say if Rose served up and hit a ball over 135 mph, would he have to take the SAT?  What if he could hit a fabulous curveball from both sides of the plate? Not to mention if he could sing or dance, or even developed the next Google, his SAT scores wouldn’t matter.

They do in basketball because NBA commissioner David Stern wanted to control long-term labor costs and use college ball to market his young stars. In 2005, his league began requiring American players (but not Europeans) to be at least one year out of high school to be drafted.

That essentially sends them to college ball, where outdated and hypocritical amateurism and academic rules exist not because they have any moral basis, but so the NCAA can avoid billions in local and federal taxes. College sports are one of the biggest free labor enterprises ever created. I know, some of you are going to argue, they are receiving top-notch education for playing sports… this is true but have you ever seen those stadiums on Saturday afternoons? Did you notice the crowds during March Madness? What about right now during the stretch run of the College World Series? Not to mention apparel sells, and television rights. So, you tell me, I’ll provide you with a $35,000 a year job to pack my stadiums where I’m making upwards of $1million a weekend. Which is fair? Then we criticize players when they do a one-and-done routine, or skip their senior year to go stack their dollars in another country.

As a result, young players have to play pretend before they can play ball. They have to pretend that amateurism rules can stop the wheels of capitalism. They have to pretend that an arbitrary thing like a minimum SAT score – which is never how the test was designed to be used – is a fair hurdle they need to clear to pursue their professional aspirations.

In short, these players have to pretend because the NCAA long ago figured out how to use its rule book as a tax haven. And so into this round hole gets slammed the square peg of young players – Rose, O.J. Mayo and pretty much every other one-and-done star who lit up the college season before bolting to the NBA.

Another important point is for the most part, athletes are not in school to get a degree, they are their so someone can see them go to the next level. They are in school for one of the longest job interviews.

And, too often, they wind up with the NCAA slamming them for potentially not following rules that have no real world validity.

A semester or two in college isn’t the worst thing, but it also has nothing to do with playing basketball, being a good citizen or the ever-stated “protecting their futures in case of injury.”

There is no statistical evidence that players are better on or off the court after a stint on campus. There is, however, a century of win-at-all-cost proof by coaches and boosters that the NCAA’s “high standards of honesty and sportsmanship” are a complete joke.

For the sake of argument let’s assume Rose did have a high school friend stand in and take his SAT. He was desperate to qualify because the clear path to his dream and the fortune that comes with it was on the line. Any other route (Europe, junior college) is unproven.

So facing a system rigged against him, he instead rigged the system. He kicked down the door, clearing an academic hurdle that bears no relation to his character as a person or his ability as a performer.

In Hollywood they make movies about people who do that. In basketball, they vilify them and humiliate them, although not before they cash in on them. No one cared when Danica Patrick went pro as a race car driver at 16. No one tried to prevent Shawn Johnson from winning an Olympic gold at the same age or Miley Cyrus from making millions singing and acting with her dad even younger than that.

I truly believe deep down inside Stern’s heart he knows they should have the opportunity to turn pro out of high school the way Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Dwight Howard, Kevin Garnett and so many other stars did.

And no one ever required them to recognize analogies before doing so. So why do we make Derrick Rose?

Updated stories: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=4224139&campaign=rss&source=ESPNHeadlines