The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is not backing down on its fight to safeguard college athletes from harassment. Despite low turnover from states to join the ban against college prop bets, the association has gone further to utilize social media surveillance to help curb the issue at hand.
With this initiative, the partnered data company is left to identify threats targeted towards athletes and then further ban them from whichever platform that occurrence happened.
“If they see anything they think is inappropriate, they notify the platform and ask them to shut those people down for the rest of the tournament. And if they see stuff that they’re really worried about, they notify the authorities. And that’s happened in a few instances,” NCAA president Charlie Baker said at Monday’s men’s basketball championship game.
Baker also expounds on the effect of these threats, as they put unhealthy pressure on college athletes and also take a toll on their mental health. He acknowledges that it’s early in the game and will be a challenge for everyone going forward.
Some athletes have even attested to being bullied and harassed, and some of them include college athlete Armando Bacot. He’s received numerous angry messages on social media for not hitting player props. Chances are he hasn’t been the only athlete having to deal with these issues.
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NCAA Makes Slow Progress on Ban on College Prop Bet
Last week, Montana issued a letter to the NCAA, informing them that they would not be implementing the ban in their state because they do not face the harassment issue against college athletes despite it being a national predicament.
Currently, the states that have come around to implement the ban include Ohio, Louisiana, Vermont, and Maryland. It’s very likely that other states will follow suit as college administrators and athletes come forward with more stories about online harassment involving sports betting.
Still on college athletes’ related news, the NCAA Final Four is scheduled in 2028 in Las Vegas, likely to be the hub of sports betting. Brows have been raised about what Baker thinks about the venue of the event, and in response, he said that he is not focused on the region where events take place; rather, he’s concentrated on athletes being safe everywhere and anywhere.
“For me, it’s less about where your events take place and a lot more about what you can do with technology and partners to policies — hopefully, laws in some cases — to provide protection and support student-athletes,” Baker said. “They’re the ones who get sort of mashed by a lot of this.”
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