2020 can just go do something anatomically unlikely

The NCAA Board of Governors, among a suite of (positive) COVID responses, recently voted through a resolution that grants an additional year of eligibility to all fall sports athletes, and an additional counter year. What that effectively means is everybody's eligibility is frozen in place.

They also ruled anyone on scholarship with senior eligibility in 2020 won't count against the 85-man limit in 2021. At the moment that does not extend to 2022, which will be a problem when schools are shedding players with eligibility remaining to get back under 85.

This is going to change some things. For one, the 2020 and 2021 classes are now effectively one big class. With most visits impossible this year, and no new information coming from the camp circuit most of the 2021 class has already committed to their schools. Michigan has 21 commits right now, and still need room for top targets like RB Donovan Edwards, OG Drew Kendall, DT Rayshaun Benny, DE/DT George Rooks, S Daymon David, and whatever elite prospects they're chasing.

The long-term effects of something like 50 true freshmen on campus at one time are staggering to think about in the macro. West Virginia athletic director Shane Lyons, chairman of the Football Oversight Committee that drafted this, was pretty blunt about it:

"As administrators, as coaches, we're going to have to deal with a potential backlog on the back end, but I'm very confident that we've done it in other situations in a yearly basis. It may be greater numbers, but we can work through that with the normal attrition you have on your rosters, as well as discussions with athletes in the coming years about their playing time and their interest in potentially transferring to other institutions."

That is some quiet parts out loud right there. So let's break it into pieces, and consider how this changes the short- and long-term outlooks for different groups. Just promise me you'll treat this as one guy's speculation, nothing more.

General Effects

Any decision this huge is going to have far-reaching ramifications and not always equal ones. It's impossible to foresee all of them but I think we can project how this will affect different types of roster situations.

The grad transfer markets of the future are going to be flush. Many players will have degrees in hand years before their eligibility expires. Some will leave college football, but many more who are trapped on bloated depth charts will seek easier climbs. It's not that hard with the educational resources available and summer trimesters to complete a degree in three years (nine semesters) and grad transfer with two years of eligibility remaining (e.g. Brandon Peters). On the other end you're going to have a lot of teams needing to shed graduated players to make room for the new recruits. Come the 2023 offseason you'll have Class of 2020 guys ready to transfer and play immediately with three counters left, a ton of Class of 2019 guys who got their degrees in four years and still have two to play, and Class of 2018 guys who still have a sixth year of eligibility remaining.

Pro factories will have more turnover. At Ohio State, and to slightly lesser degree at Michigan, Notre Dame, and Penn State, the average length of career might not change that much because so many of their starters project to the NFL, meaning you can expect they will leave for the league at the first point they perceive they've maximized their draft stock. Expect a lot of roster turnover as these schools cram players into their rosters, and those who lose their position battles are given their degrees and shuffled out the door.

Schools with a lot of seniors win. It's unclear how many of Michigan's eight scholarship seniors (Evans, MASON, Nico, Eubanks, Kemp, Kwity, Hawkins and Nordin) would stick around for 2021. It would be cool if they extend that to walk-ons because we have plenty of those. Wisconsin on the other hand can likely hold onto their quarterback, 3rd down back, fullback, top three receivers, second tight end, best DE, two linebackers, and half of a secondary for a 2021 they weren't going to be eligible for.

Frey-types and middle-tier Power 5 schools win. This changes the math for schools who recruited small guys in 2019 and 2020, expecting to see what they have after three years in a weight room. We lost a year of Dax Hill and Chris Hinton; in return George Johnson III and Mike Morris get a free extra year of development. Programs that never get a Hill or a Hinton but are good at slowly growing GJ3s and Morrises now get an extra season with their hits. Ferentz and Dantonio showed the efficacy of this strategy with their endless waves of excellent run defenders who didn't play until they had four years to ken complicated zone systems. MSU even had its own 6th year cottage industry for a time. Now every Purdue and Indiana gets to hold onto their very good college players who aren't of interest to the NFL for a little longer during their developed stage.

Small schools who can't afford it lose. Once you're at the MAC level programs could barely afford the 85 scholarships to call themselves FBS before. And it's not like their finances are in great shape after no football in 2020. Also they regularly hemorrhage their best players to the grad transfer market. So at the same time bigger schools can pack in more players a lot of small schools are going to have tightened budgets while spending the next five years of trying to hold onto seniors who already have their degrees.

NIL just got more interesting. More eligible players who can play at a Power 5 level + a more open transfer market + players who can now profit off themselves all happening at the same time could blow the doors open on player free agency. Regardless of how you feel about this (as a Michigan fan you should feel good because we're positioned to be the #1 beneficiary of it), it's going to be wild.

[After THE JUMP: A position-by-position breakdown of how it affects Michigan]