Swoosh U., home of the fighting interests

There was an odd headline in my newspaper last Friday: "Southern Cal suspends 3; Nike adds Florida State."

Excuse me?

I mean, excuse me!

Our institutions of higher learning have finally hit upon the ultimate: Do as I say, not as I do.

Southern Cal suspended three starters while the school -- whose football team is ranked fifth in the nation -- investigates alleagations they received money from an agent.

Remember, these are just allegations. Nobody has proved these kids have taken any money at all. But in Tallahassee, Florida State proudly announced -- as Michigan did a year ago -- that it has taken an armored car full of money from Nike. In exchange for $6 million and free uniforms for five years, the Seminoles will become running billboards for Nike's swoosh logo.

The school says the proceeds will, of course, be used mostly for humanitatian efforts. It says $750,000 will be used for minority and women's programs and a degree-completion program for former athletes. Another $100,000 will go to the university's capital campaign, whatever that is, and, oh, yes, $225,000 a year will be paid directly to good ol'Bobby Bowden to supplement his coaching salary. Does that mean he's still working for Florida State or does he take coaching tips now from Nike?

Probably some of those kids at Southern Cal -- if they are proven guilty of taking money -- will say it went for good causes, too. For their mama's medicine or for a trip to a relative's funeral. But you can bet neither USC nor the NCAA will have a sympathetic ear for such a claim.

It is another step away from the idea that athletic programs are a part of and controlled by their universities. While the presidents preach a lot of empty rhetoric about taking control of their athletic departments, they hold their hands out to people like Nike.

What if the R.J. Reynolds people offered $6 million if the universities would sew a picture of a cigarette package on their uniforms? Do you think they would do it?

No?

How about at the University of Kentucky? Or Louisville? Or other schools in tobacco-growing states? If Nike is OK then why not tobacco, especially in states where the economies depend on that crop?

The sad truth is, once we start off in one direction in this country, seldom do we make a U-turn and go back to where we began. So the commercial prostitution of collegiate athletics is not at its end, it is only at its beginning.

There might come a day when a player is identified not by the number on his uniform but by the product pictured there.

No longer will the introduction go like this: "Wearing No. 12, Joe Smith!" It will be: Wearing the Men's Warehouse Jersey, Joe Smith!"

I've never believed in paying players. I've always believed the opportunity to get a free education was their payment, their ticket to a better way of life.

Now, though, these universities are not I just selling themselves, they are selling their players. For years the most liberal and militant have claimed college athletes were chattel, no more than the property of money-machine athletic programs, and I always thought those people were overstating their case.

Now I am beginning to move to their side of the street.

I heard from a friend in Florida about a former Florida State football player who seldom spent any of his per diem money but saved it to buy Christmas gifts for his parents.

Meanwhile, Florida State gets $6 million from Nike and dresses its players in uniforms with Nike's swoosh on them and sends them out before filled stadiums and TV audiences to advertise the product.

The kids are unpaid models for Nike products, plain and simple.

And in Los Angeles, three kids might or might not have taken some money from an agent -- probably it wasn't $6 million -- and they are suspended until they can be proven guilty. Or innocent.

Charlie Vincent is a columnist for the Detroit Free Press.

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