What are the odds that a broke, frozen burrito eating student-athlete will take the money in exchange for some shaved points?

Who knows for sure, and that is were the problem lies.

Hey, those Tina?s Burritos are good, but they are no match for a filet mignon. NCAA athletics are a multi-million dollar business, and the product (student-athletes) doesn?t get a dime of the action. Sure, Division I athletes get a full-ride scholarship that includes an invaluable education for free and allowance to pay for food and board.

But this money is like a single grain of sand in a sandbox, not to mention the fact that in agreement with the scholarship, they can?t have a job for some extra cash.

Most of the time, these athletes can?t even afford to go to a movie. Then imagine all of a sudden getting offered a few grand in exchange for a favor.

The temptation undoubtedly exists; therefore, gambling on college athletics should be banned completely. Sorry, Pete Rose.

In today?s gambling world, anything from total points in a game to how many points the favorite will win by is gambled upon. Points are the payoff, not just win/loss results.

So it is not a case of some greasy bookie approaching a college athlete and asking him/her if they will throw the game in exchange for a large amount of money. Now, the technique is much smoother.

Student-athletes are now being approached by their peers and asked to just “shave” some points. Don?t throw the game, just let the opposing team score a few “worthless” points late when the contest has already been decided.

No harm done.

This is exactly how it went down at Arizona State University back in the mid-1990s. Kevin Pendergrass, a former Northwestern University football player, approached a few members of the Sun Devils men?s basketball team and convinced them to set up point shaving incidents in exchange for $1,000 payoffs.

The athletes aren?t criminals as much as victims used by the free labor profiteer, the NCAA.

College athletics are the purest form of competitive sports today, and the threat of corruption takes away the purity.

Gambling threatens the integrity of college athletics, and once that is lost, the public trust is lost along with it. Professional sports lost their purity a long time ago, and college athletics are all America has left.

Besides, how could college athletics possibly benefit from gambling? It can?t.

So bet on a horse or a dog, don?t bet on a college athlete who probably has a test in the morning.

This is not intended to be a full, formal assault on the gambling industry. I myself occasionally gamble and have no problems with it. Just keep it exclusive to the professional athlete and the green felt.

There are plenty of other things to bet on in the sports world. Leave the MTV watching, five-dollar-in-the-pocket having student out of your wagering.

My favorite argument against the banishment of college athletic wagering is the one that claims that if college athletics were banned from casinos, there would be unregulated underground black market gambling rings.

Well, in this case unregulated is a euphemism for untaxed, and local state governments couldn?t have that.

And as far as underground rings, that sounds much better than above-ground rings that have the power to manipulate poor student-athletes.

In the age of Internet gambling, overseas gambling and a new casino being built every month in Las Vegas, the gambling industry is definitely booming.

The removal of college athletics will not hurt the billion-dollar industry.

But it will help end the corruption that threatens our beloved college athletics.