Background
Byers, Walter was born on March 13, 1922 in Kansas City, Missouri, United States. Son of Ward and Lucille (Hebard) Byers.
athletic association executive
Byers, Walter was born on March 13, 1922 in Kansas City, Missouri, United States. Son of Ward and Lucille (Hebard) Byers.
Student, Rice U., 1939-1940; student, University Iowa, 1940-1943.
He served from 1951 to 1988. He also helped start the United States Basketball Writers Association in 1956. The National Collegiate Athletic Association Walter Byers Scholarship is named in his honor.
Byers expanded the National Collegiate Athletic Association men"s basketball tournament in 1951 from 8 to 16 teams, the first step in expanding the tournament to the spectacle it is today.
The number of teams fluctuated over the next few decades, but never went below 16 again and eventually expanded further under Byers" leadership. WFAN New York"s Mike Francesa referred to him as an "Oz-like" figure who ran the National Collegiate Athletic Association with ultimate control.
Byers went on to negotiate lucrative television contracts that preempted individual colleges" rights on the way to building a billion-dollar business, leading to a 1984 United States. Supreme Court ruling that freed the colleges to negotiate on their own. In his book Unsportsmanlike Conduct: Exploiting College Athletes Byers turned against the National Collegiate Athletic Association in its current form, saying it established "a nationwide money-laundering scheme." (P 73).
Byers also revealed that the National Collegiate Athletic Association developed the term "student-athlete" in order to insulate the colleges from having to provide long term disability payments to players injured while playing their sport (and making money for their university and the National Collegiate Athletic Association).
(P 69). Byers concludes the book demanding that Congress, "Free the Athletes," and enact a "comprehensive College Athletes" Bill of Rights." (P 374). (P 375). Finally, he says, "Collegiate amateurism is not a moral issue.
lieutenant is an economic camouflage for monopoly practice., "operat an air-tight racket of supplying cheap athletic labor."" (Pp 376, 388). On May 26, 2015, Byers died at the age of 93.
With Medical Corps Army of the United States, 1944.
Children: Ward, Ellen, Frederick.