Athletes Can Talk to Pros : NCAA: Delegates vote to allow negotiations without loss of eligibility and to require prior approval of coaches’ outside income.

Delegates at the NCAA convention in Anaheim took small steps in two significant directions Thursday, providing college athletes with a greater opportunity to test their professional value and increasing the amount of control college presidents have over coaches’ outside income.

In a move that may lead to more telling change, the nearly 700 voting schools and conferences adopted legislation that will permit a college athlete to negotiate with a pro sports organization without losing his eligibility.

The legislation, which goes into effect immediately, does not allow the athlete to enter a pro draft or retain an agent.

Under the NCAA’s current rules, a college athlete loses his eligibility by either negotiating with a pro team or declaring himself available for a pro draft.

The measure was directed at college baseball and hockey players, who are included involuntarily as underclassmen in major league baseball and NHL drafts but technically cannot test their worth by negotiating contracts without violating NCAA rules.

In introducing the legislation, Texas Christian Athletic Director Frank Windegger said such athletes are using “clandestine advisers” to negotiate with the teams that draft them.

In theory, underclassmen in football and basketball also will be allowed to negotiate with pro teams without losing their eligibility.

But they should be unaffected because NFL and NBA teams, as a matter of policy, do not conduct full-blown contract negotiations with players who are college underclassmen unless the players have declared themselves eligible to be drafted.

Still, proponents of the legislation indicated that it could lead to a more significant step in the near future: allowing athletes to go through pro drafts and evaluate financial offers without losing their college eligibility. NCAA Executive Director Dick Schultz lent his support to such an idea in his annual state-of-the-association address at the 1990 NCAA convention in Dallas.

“I think an important thing has happened,” said Temple Athletic Director Charles Theokas, chairman of the NCAA Professional Sports Liaison Committee, which proposed the legislation. “A message is being sent. Because of changing times, we need to review the issue of amateurism.

“Although it doesn’t look like this (legislation) has a lot of teeth, it will start conversations (that could lead to further changes).”

USC Athletic Director Mike McGee, however, said the measure could lead to trouble: the increased presence of agents around college athletes.

“What (proponents of the measure) don’t understand are the unintended consequences,” he said. “There are going to be . . . kids testing the water. When we do that, we disrupt the whole (educational) process.

“Right now, a youngster has the opportunity to test the water in the narrowest way. (The old standard) is seen as a limiting of options when, in fact, it is not. You are now going to see a young person have two or three good games as a freshman or sophomore. The press is going to speculate, ‘Maybe he’s going to come out and test the water.’ Then (the player) is going to get advice from a ‘counselor’ who is an agent.”

McGee raised the possibility of a football or basketball player entering the draft, deciding he doesn’t like the spot in which he was picked and taking legal action to regain his college eligibility based on the legislation.

“When you approve something that is so loosely worded, you allow the floodgates to open,” he said.

Another key move Thursday will require coaches to receive approval in writing from their schools’ chief executive officers before receiving income related to their jobs from outside sources.

The legislation, sponsored by the NCAA Presidents Commission as part of its reform effort, was designed to give CEOs greater control over coaches’ income in an era of six-figure shoe deals and television-radio packages.

As a consequence of such control, a CEO might decide that a coach should not receive income from a source because the money represents a conflict of interest.

“Our general concern is that a CEO needs to know who is paying his employee,” said Presidents Commission Chairman Gerald Turner, University of Mississippi chancellor. “If a coach is making $100,000 from the university and $300,000 from another source, the president should be aware of it.”

Said Schultz: “It’s a matter of getting approval (for a deal) in advance rather than after the fact. . . . A president can say the money should go to the institution rather than the (coach).”

Turner acknowledged that the measure could lead to discussion of legislation that would require coaches to turn over all outside income to their schools--an idea that some feel is the next step for the presidents.

Said Louisiana State athletic director Joe Dean, a former representative for an athletic shoe company: “I’ve always felt the money (generated by a coach’s shoe deal) belongs to the institution. Coaches say it’s their money. But even when I was in the (shoe) business, I felt the dollars belonged to the institution. It’s not the coach’s team. It’s LSU’s team.”

As it is, LSU basketball Coach Dale Brown makes $250,000 a year from his contract with LA Gear and gives about $62,000 back to the school to finance scholarships and other projects, Dean said.

* FISCAL DILEMMA

Legislation to establish a Division I-AAA, nonscholarship category for football is voted down, leaving the future of some Division I-A programs in doubt. C7