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This is Katie Ledecky's world right now, and the rest of us are just living in it. Want proof? Ledecky transformed MLB MVP Bryce Harper into a butler on Wednesday night, making him stand to the side and hold her hoard of medals from Rio while she threw out the first pitch before a Washington Nationals game.

Ledecky is just 19 years old, but the swimmer is now an Olympics hero after winning four gold medals and setting two world records in Rio. The contrast between Ledecky's tender age and her outsized athletic accomplishments creates a dilemma: Go to college or go pro?

SEE ALSO:Olympics star Gabby Douglas is not defined by Rio's social media drama

Ledecky plans to attend and swim for Stanford, passing up millions of professional dollars in doing so. She made that decision long ago, and announced more than a year ago that she would defer her enrollment at Stanford until after the 2016 Olympics. But her record-breaking success in Rio has cast new light on the tough decision.

Ledecky said in an interview with ESPN on Thursday that "it wasn't" a tough decision to honor her commitment to Stanford.

"I've always wanted to swim collegiately and have that experience," Ledecky said. "I think it is going to be a lot of fun to be on a team with some really great friends and great swimmers and also just go to class with them."

Meanwhile, analysts have said before, during and after the Olympics that Ledecky stands to make several million dollars, mostly through endorsements and appearances, should she go pro. But her mind seems set.

So, is Ledecky making a good call or a bad call? Arguments can be made for both, but it's a choice she shouldn't have to make at all.

Shut out by the NCAA

Ledecky hands her medals to MLB MVP Bryce Harper at Wednesday's Nationals game.Credit: Greg Fiume/Getty Images

This, of course, all comes down the National Collegiate Athletics Association's archaic rules about amateurism. If you want to compete in college sports, you can't earn money -- even if it's outside sponsors, not your university, cutting the check.

"From my perspective it's a shame it's an either-or situation," Luke Bonner, sports and entertainment marketing manager for the agency GYK Antler, told CNBC during the Olympics. "From an athlete's perspective really, the only people who can benefit financially from the college athlete's marketability is the NCAA and the NCAA sponsors."

So here's Ledecky, left with her armful of Olympics medals and that either-or choice.

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Four years ago, another teenage girl starred at the London Olympics. Her name was Missy Franklin. She turned down pro money after the games to attend college at UC Berkeley (which, coincidentally, is Stanford's arch-rival).

Franklin's story contains some cautionary lessons for Ledecky.

The unique cruelty of Olympic stardom

Ledecky, left, and Franklin at 2016 U.S. Olympic Team Swimming Trials in June.Credit: Al Bello/Getty Images

The Olympics are a cruel spectacle in that they boost young athletes to fame at impossibly young ages in a flash of hype and attention that comes just once every four years. By the next cycle, oftentimes, those newly minted stars are cast aside for someone younger and fresher.

Witness Gabby Douglas and Simone Biles for one illustration of this. Witness Franklin and Ledecky for another.

Ledecky dives into the pool in Rio before setting a world record in the 800-meter freestyle.Credit: ODD ANDERSEN/AFP/Getty Images

Four years ago, Douglas and Franklin were the USA's Olympic darlings. Now it's Biles and Ledecky.

Franklin turned down the pro swimming jackpot to attend and swim for Berkeley after starring in London. Then her mojo kind of ... disappeared. She hasn't been herself, swimming-wise, in two years and she failed to win an individual medal in Rio after snagging four golds in London. She was 17 years old then, and is still just 21.

Franklin turned pro last year and has surely made some good money since. Likewise, Ledecky isn't declining pro money forever -- just for as long as she wants to swim for Stanford.

But for Ledecky, the lesson is obvious: To maximize your earning potential, leverage your value when it's highest.

Then there's the curious case of Michael Phelps, who navigated these tricky waters perhaps better than anyone.

Take the money and run?

Ledecky with Phelps in July.Credit: Tom Pennington/Getty Images

Phelps, as Stephen Douglas wrote for The Big Leadon Friday, "should be the blueprint." He won six gold medals and two bronze medals at the 2004 Olympics. Then he worked the system.

Phelps enrolled at the University of Michigan but didn't join the swim team -- as an athlete, at least. He took classes, trained with the team and served as a volunteer assistant coach from 2005 to 2008. He was able to live whatever approximation of the typical college life Olympic heroes can manage, but he didn't sacrifice his earning potential by becoming an NCAA athlete.

Whatever Ledecky wants to do now is fine -- it's her choice, of course, and her mind appears made up. She is by all accounts an extremely mature and focused young woman who will do well in life either way.

But it's a bovine-manure decision she's faced to make between endorsement money and college swimming. You certainly couldn't blame her if she simply wanted to take the money and run -- or swim, as the case may be.

TopicsOlympics

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