Not true. People who did things the right way cared. Joe Paterno sure cared. It is the scumbag renegade programs (Switzer's Oklahoma, Johnson's Miami, and take your pick in the SEC...) that normalized what we see now. Kids bought and paid for disguising as college students to win games. Just because some bad people abused the system doesn't mean we should normalize it.
It is COLLEGE football. If you want to play, you need to be a COLLEGE STUDENT. If you have no interest in that, don't play. Should be that simple.
LOL! Except the kids I knew on the team back in the Paterno days explicitly told me, when I'd joke with them about bothering to show up for class, that all they had to do was show up for class (not pay attention, not do well on exams, etc.) and they were guaranteed to pass and be eligible ... so that's what they did. Listen, some programs were better than others, sure. But this is still a system set up to bring in meatheads for football purposes, and process them through the educational system to keep them eligible to play what they're there for - football.
Trust me ... I'm 100% about actually emphasizing the "student" part of the "student-athlete" - I don't think college football coaches should be able to "recruit" a kid until after that kid has applied to, and been accepted at (blind to his athletic prowess) that university. That would actually be focusing on the student portion of the equation. Instead, it's grown men being paid millions to coax children to play a sport for them ... oh, and it's at this school, too. Don't worry, while you hold down this full-time job you'll be able to get an education, too ... we have tutors and study halls (to ensure you stay eligible)! Meanwhile, the landscape has gotten more and more "professional" and more and more people are getting richer and richer off of it, and few have said a word. That is until the kids doing all the work suddenly wanted a piece of the pie they've made. Now the whole sport is ruined.