It was appropriate that James Heckman's work was referenced in the Supreme Court argument last month involving the NCAA and its principle of amateurism.  Several of the Justices mentioned what is the key issue in this research: does the NCAA's amateurism model exploit student-athletes, or does it, on balance, benefit them with a free education having lifetime benefits? That is an important question which is susceptible to a quantitative answer, not merely a polemical argument. Unfortunately, time did not allow for a complete answer during the argument. My colleagues and I were able to examine the issue using two large Department of Education data sets tracking high school students over time to compare educational and life outcomes for athletes to the same outcomes for similarly situated non-athletes.