>Would you Like Fries with that?

Last week, Jeremy Tyler, a 17-year old high school junior in San Diego decided that he was just going to go ahead and drop out of high school. Not for any reason that a person with moderate intelligence would find reasonable, but rather to go and play professional basketball overseas.

This is far from a reasonable decision for many reasons, both on and off a basketball court.

The fact is that these days, players who enter the NBA Draft after foreign careers (though usually foreign in birth) are considered project players (one who will take a lot of work) even when a NBA team does take a risk on them. Meaning that come 2011, chances are that not only will Tyler be expected to adjust to the American professional game from the finesse he will then be accustomed to from Europe, but he will also have to do so without the basic fundamentals that basketball players learn on a college level. And that’s a big factor, even as the only one on the court.

Here is an important thought that Tyler, his apparently crackpot father and “strategic advisor” should take into consideration: what is the answer going to be from a future potential employer if Tyler blows out his knee next season in Europe? If all Tyler can boast credential wise is that “I dropped out of high school, thought it would be a good idea to go play professional sports overseas, blew out me knee, came back and got my GED.” Oh, I know the answer– ‘would you like fries with that?’

In years previous to the implementation of the NBA’s age limit, players were taking a calculated gamble on passing on a college education that they could fall back on if the NBA did not work for any multitude of reasons. But the fact remained that at the very least; they would have a high school diploma in hand and the ability to attend a university even if they could no longer participate in athletics on that level. Tyler won’t even have that,.He won’t have anything.

All of these things considered, this does not seem like a very well calculated gamble to me.

But the Tylers didn’t take time to calculate here because it is all about the money and you can’t convince me otherwise. I thought this long before I even heard about Sonny Vaccaro, that aforementioned strategic advisor. What in the world is that all about? Tyler’s family is not well off, but really at this point, who is? This is about the all mighty dollar and the fact that more and more human beings are getting into the sports business, which itself is all about money. Where do we as a society or even those parents draw the line?

Kids are getting recruited to college and professional sports younger and younger. College coaches are in middle school gyms, pro coaches are at summertime AAU functions for kids age 14 and up. It is ridiculous and it needs to stop. The problem is that it won’t stop with Jeremy Tyler. All he is doing is fanning the fire and making society and sport that much worse off.