OT- Would you be in favor of undrafted underclassmen having the option to return to school for their final year?
Just read an article about how 27 underclassmen who delcared early went undrafted and will now have to fight for a roster spot as a UDFA. Would you be in favor of undrafted underclassmen having the option to return to school for their final year? " Arkansas coach Bret Bielema thinks underclassmen who go unpicked should have the option to return to school. "
That is a great idea.
No, that puts a pretty big burden on colleges building their rosters with scholarship limits it think. Plus it's kind of fair to the early entrant who got drafted second to last in the 7th round. What's the big difference between that guy and a fringe 7th rounder who ended up being an UDFA? In this case, it's better to not get drafted so you have a decision to then go back and try and move up, or move on as a UDFA.
The best model I've seen is the NHL model. Make everyone draft eligable at some point whether that's after they're 17, 18, or year out of high school, whatever. But then everyone, the players, college program, and NFL team has expectations laid out and people aren't caught by surprise. If you play out your eligability, then you re-open draftability. But that will never happen because it means less expendable resources for the NFL and they have to think harder and take more risks in drafting. I think the only way to get the NFL on board is way expand the rounds to like 10 rounds or something.
Seth mentioned the hockey rule earlier in the comments and I like that one. I also like the baseball one. Each would help address a lot of the problems borderline kids face - though it usually applies more to basketball (like Wilson & Wagner) than football. The issue with those rules is that they work better with the NHL and MLB because of the robust minor league systems in those sports. When kids are ready to go pro, there is probably a home for them within the organization even if they aren't on the bench. In the NFL you might make a practice squad and the NBA sort of has the NBDL growing.
I think the only way this could work is that the undrafted kids in football can return to their school, but wouldn't be on scholarship anymore. Meaning that they could return with eligibility but the school doesn't have to promise them a scholarship and thus they pay their own way? Or the NCAA creates a loophole for extra scholarships? Or they become an NCAA free agent grad transfer?
I don't know - very complicated. They probably aren't even in good academic standing either.....if you want to believe that matters.
you're welcome to come back to school and finish your degree on scholarship but you aren't eligible to participate in football.
It goes against every fiber of my being to agree with a policy proposal espoused by Bret Bielema. Thumbs down.
I appreciate the thought behind it, but not the details. The hockey model might work, but even that gets dicey. There are multiple problems with recruiting and scholarship limits. If you have 85 scholarships, plus those that can be backdated, what happens if you have a bang up recruiting year and have 89 or 90 scholarship already committed? What do you do? Rescind a signed NLI to an incoming recruit or to someone who has 4 years promised? As already mentioned, what about those who drop out of school to prepare for the combine, and maybe they slacked academically the term before as well?
Regarding the hockey model, I'm curious about something. I am only a casual observer of hockey, but it seems to me that players are much more interchangable, with the exception of goalie. You basically have forwards/centers, defensemen, and goalies. Differential in weight, height, size, speed, is less than in football. In football, I see 16 different specialties: QB, RB, FB, OT, OG, C, TE, WR, DT, DE, ILB, OLB, S, CB, P, K. Obviously, there is some give and take among positions. But only some. In terms of depth charts, having guys declare and then come back could wreak havoc.
Even if they were in some way allowed to come back to college, there has to be some cost for those who miscalcuate and enter the draft early. As said above, in the real world, there are consequences to choices. They had best think through those consequences.
Even if they were in some way allowed to come back to college, there has to be some cost for those who miscalcuate and enter the draft early.
They are trying out for a job. They put their resume on monster.com. What's the big deal? The biggest issue in my mind is dealing with those who quit school to train for the combine, and then want to come back as they are no longer on track to graduate in 4 years.
I love the hockey model and for the life of me can't figure out why the NBA doesn't utilize it. That said, I'm not sure it's right for football.
When would you draft players? For better or worse, the NFL Draft is a huge business and it is largely because they're drafting a) familiar names that people have been able to watch on TV and b) players that coud potentially help a team immediately. If they start drafting guys that have never played a down of college football there's going to be a lot more guesswork and misses and a lot less familiarity for the average fan.
You could do it and say you need essentially two years of college (so say draft age is 20) to be drafted by a team. Then your young up-and-comers can get picked up, but you're not drafting guys based on high school tape and recruiting ranking alone.
That would be amazingly chaotic!
I keep seeing "do it like hockey." No. Hockey works because there are minor leagues. And to do it like hockey, the NFL would have to make that change. They're not going to, because they like (and basically, need) those three or four years of tape. And they need the combine. You're not going to send these players to the combine every damn year of their college eligibility, it would become this impossible unwieldy event. This has to be an NCAA solution, which means you're not allowed to change the NFL system.
The NCAA could very easily solve this problem by having a hard cap on the number of high school signees and no cap at all on total scholarship numbers. You can sign 25 per year, the end, no more, and then you can bring back all the undrafted juniors you want. You could even allow drafted players to return if they don't like their landing place. You probably wouldn't see a lot of that, no flood of third-rounders returning to school, because like baseball, juniors would lose their leverage by returning to school. On the other hand, NFL teams might be more likely to pick seniors in the later rounds.
I don't see how having minor leagues makes a difference
Because if the guy goes pro and then shows up to camp and doesn't make the team, he doesn't get cut from the organization entirely, he gets sent down and has a landing spot. Practice squad is far from the same thing.
I guess I don't see that as being terribly different from how it is now. If a guy declares and gets drafted late or is a UDFA, goes to spring camp, and gets cut, well then tough luck kid. You're a free agent now. I hear Edmonton is nice in January.
It would just shift all the draft focus to primarily wherever the age is when someone can be drafted, and would let those guys stay in college until their pro team wants them or their eligibility expires
Minor league tootball (and basketball for that matter) would make a huge difference and for the better as it would provide a venue for those kids who want to play for money, place no value on a college degree, have no interest in being on a college campus and have no business being on one.
The difference would be, the guy just never signs a contract. I don't like my draft position, or lack thereof, I go back to school. In hockey, the player signs a contract and leaves school at some point after being drafted. Then, he goes to camp in the fall, and generally doesn't make the team. In fact, he signs knowing he likely won't, but has decided the next step in his development is the minors - AHL hockey is quite a step up from college, after all. In football, the guy signs the contract, but has nowhere to go if he gets cut. That's why it can't be like hockey. An NFL team can't say "we want you in the organization" for the same reasons an NHL team can. If the NFL team says "we think you're ready" and he shows up to camp totally not ready, there's no stashing him somewhere.
If it were to happen, I'd want to make sure the kids were still enrolled in school and meeting the necessary academic requirements during the winter/spring academic terms. If you can prep for the draft and keep up with your schoolwork, then all the power to you. But if you want to prepare full-time for the draft, go to all the interviews with teams, etc, then school isn't for you any more.
Well I was initially in favor of this, but if Bielema thinks it's a good idea, I may have to reconsider.
What would prevent EVERY underclassmean from declaring? Given the increased awareness of injuries and the potential for how they can affect future earnings, I would think that if players were just allowed to return to college that it would create more problems. Many of the logistical issues have been mentioned already.
I think the real issue lies in providing better services to the players that allow more transparency with NFL management. You may be the best WR in the country as a junior, but if every NFL team is looking to address defensive needs in the first two rounds that is something a player should know to help make a decision.
I say no.
When a man makes a decision like that, he needs to learn to live with the consequences, for good or bad. You made your bed by leaving, now you need to sleep in it. You're not a little kid anymore. Be a man and either try your luck being an UDFA, or finish school and move on with your life.
Also, I can't imagine how bad it would affect recruiting. Let's say you have 4-5 guys who get undrafted and want to come back. That's putting you 4-5 guys over the limit. So what do you do? Tell 4-5 recruits that they have to choose another school (1-2 months before they get to campus, mind you)? Grayshirt them? How do you decide who gets to stay and who has to leave? Or, do you tell 4-5 5th year seniors that maybe its time for them to get a firm handshake and move on?
There's no way something like this doesn't end poorly with a lot of bad blood and some really hurt relationships. These athletes have every right to submit themselves to the NFL Advisory Board, do their homework and see where they might get drafted. But once they leave, they leave. It's not fair to the other players and incoming recruits that they get to do "take-backs."
There is a reason that we are all supposed to give adequate notice before making a choice that affects others. That being said, we are talking about 30 student-athletes per year (total). If I can count correctly, 85 student athletes gave up their remaining elgibility this season.
Allowing early enrollees seems to hurt the kids more than it hurts the NCAA teams. (I mean, the last time this happened to a Michigan player was 2010 -- Donovan Warren [iirc].)
In the end, these are 20 year olds. Shouldn't an agency who's goal is to protect student althletes actually, you know, PROTECT STUDENT-ATHLETES? Football teams are generally large entities run by competent people. They will make it work with whatever rules we give them. Suppose this was the rule:
You can take back an undrafted player this year (and have 86 scholarships) as long as you give back the scholarship the next year (and have 84 scholarships).
That might be the simplest fix.
An even simpler fix is to get rid of the scholarship cap entirely and place the limit instead on how many high schoolers you bring in. Solves a lot of other problems too.
To each their own, but I still believe that when a player leaves, they need to face the consequences of leaving. Whether those are good consequences or bad.
That being said, I'd be okay with them being given the option to come back as a walk-on. They would have the opportunity to earn the scholarship back the following year (assuming they won't already be coming back as a fifth year senior). They would just need to understand that no matter what happens in the draft, they are forfeitting the right to come back the following year as a scholarship player.
I could never look an incoming recruit and his parents in the eye and tell them I now have no more room for their son because another player made a mistake and wants to come back. That's one way to destroy a relationship with someone, not to mention the school he comes from. There are some HS coaches out there who would tell a college program to never come back if they ever did that to one of their players.
1. If it works like it does in basketball
2. But they would need to change the date for February's National Signing Day (apart from the already enacted December early signing day), since it would likely occur *before* players pulled out of the draft, and potentially mess with scholarship limits.
As has been mentioned above, the timing issues are a hurdle. One possible solution would be to make 2 drafts.
- Senior Draft: Works just like the current draft, except only seniors (student-athletes with no more elgibility) may participate.
- Futures Draft: Works more like the hockey draft, where teams talk to players about when they should "move up".
The thing about the futures draft is that many players (like Jabrill Peppers) were always going to get drafted. It was always just a question of when. The logistical way of handling this is to make sure that if the Futures draft happens before NSD, then the teams need to convey their intentions (we want him in the NFL) before NSD. If it is after NSD, the teams need to let them sit on the NCAA roster for one more season.
One rule that I'd add in either futures draft scenario: the NFL team may take out a loss-of-value policy on the player making the player a partial beneficiary (50:50). I could definitely see NFL teams wanting top players to sit out bowl games if they aren't protected in this way.
or they could return on their own dime and it not "take a spot of the 86"
... though that would become the SEC's playground right there.
I like the idea of the hockey model, but what happens if you get drafted in the 7th round early and then greatly outperform your position with a couple years in college? Can you get redrafted? Can you leverage a higher salary?
Hell I'd be fine with teams drafting anyone thats out of high school 3 years and if they would still have college eligibilty left having the option to keep them at their respective university for their senior or redshirt senior year as a way to develop them.
... so yeah Im cool with undrafted being able to return.
Neither will ever happen though.
I am not in favor of this.
A MICHIGAN MAN WILL PLAY AT MICHIGAN.
I sacrificed my academic career at Michigan so I could deliver pizzas and tweet full-time. I know what it's like to go after and achieve one's destiny.
most players who make the NFL are there for a short time.
Players who are "set for life"are not more than 10 to 20 per year - many of them squander the money regardless
Either in college or out- can always go back to college on their own money
why they couldn't participate in a combine workout and get a draft score like in basketball? But there is enough information available to kids that they should be able to make an informed decision whether or not to leave school. Consider Kaaya, he had a year of eligiblity left and chose to leave for a 6th round pick who may not make the roster. That decision is on him and whoever is advising him. Just because he didn't like where he was picked (or if he hadn't been picked at all) doesn't mean he should be able to come back and take a roster spot of an incoming freshman. If he wanted to keep his spot on Miami, he should have been smarter and not left early.
if they have eligibility let them come back, finish their degree and play another year and hopefully the following year they get drafted. Everyone makes mistakes should give them a chance to correct it. Just don't let them sign with an agent before the draft.
reading it intially I saw no problem, but your presented one I have no answer to. Perhaps my favorite feature on this site. Someone will always come up with something the person, in this case, Beilema, would probably not have an answer for.
Should undrafted players be allowed to return to their team? I think the simple answer is yes. Would that type of change require other rules to be amended and other practices, such as recruiting, be forced to adapt? The simple answer again is yes.
It wouldn't be as easy as just changing one thing, and since the NCAA is involved, any change would likely have to be reworked before they got it right anyway. But anything that takes steps to allow unpaid (or underpaid, depending on how far you lean on that debate) employeesto protect themselves while exploring their options is something I am for.