why not just switch from D1 to D3 athletics? Would seem a more appropriate level of sports to the mission of the service academies - if you asked me which nobody did.
That said President Trump is Commander in Chief and really how many guys would this ever really apply to? In the end one way or the other isn't really going to matter all that much
1-2 years of grad school is far different than the length of a football career. We also extract an additional commitment for the grad school.I guess I don’t get the heartburn with letting someone play pro sports if they’re going to come back to serve afterwards (not just buying out of their obligation). We allow ENS/2LTs to go straight to grad school at Stanford or wherever else before serving.
And again we extract an additional commitment.We train aviators to be the best in the world and then send them to do a staff tour or run an admin department on a boat somewhere.
I would have called it helping the war effort on the home front.I’ve been watching The Pacific tv series and back in WWII they pulled heroic Marines off the battlefield to travel around the States selling war bonds instead of fighting like they were trained for.
Personally I think there is enough publicity. There is no lack of excellent qualified candidates applying to the service academies. And there is enough publicity from the Army-Navy game. Just my 2 cents.Billy Hurley had a lot of good publicity on the PGA tour a couple years ago, which was after serving, but the storylines would be quite a bit different if he was actually in the reserves awaiting service and didn’t take a few years off his golf training. Lots of examples of people being trained for one thing but being asked to do something else because there is value in it for the military at large. Great storylines, great publicity.
Imagine the publicity (read as more $) the USN and USNA would get if they had more "Staubachs" to brag about. I'm sure the USNA tour guides would like to stop by other athletes on the Hall of Fame wall as well. Not saying I support it or not, just thinking of the different motivations.
I guess I don’t get the heartburn with letting someone play pro sports if they’re going to come back to serve afterwards (not just buying out of their obligation). We allow ENS/2LTs to go straight to grad school at Stanford or wherever else before serving. We train aviators to be the best in the world and then send them to do a staff tour or run an admin department on a boat somewhere. I’ve been watching The Pacific tv series and back in WWII they pulled heroic Marines off the battlefield to travel around the States selling war bonds instead of fighting like they were trained for. Billy Hurley had a lot of good publicity on the PGA tour a couple years ago, which was after serving, but the storylines would be quite a bit different if he was actually in the reserves awaiting service and didn’t take a few years off his golf training. Lots of examples of people being trained for one thing but being asked to do something else because there is value in it for the military at large. Great storylines, great publicity.
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--- Either you're going to be a military school to train a professional officer corps or you're not.---