Yesterday the NCAA Division I Council voted to allow any student-athlete in a spring sport who was affected by the virus ending their season short to gain another year of eligibility. The council’s decision would let individual schools make their own decisions at the campus level. People were worried that The NCAA DI council wouldn’t grant athletes the extra year of eligibility, but they ultimately would make the right decision after being influenced by a letter written to them by the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee. It would also look bad to go against every other division in the NCAA structure and even the NJCAA, all of which granted the extra year of eligibility.
This decision has wide-ranging ramifications across multiple sports, specifically college baseball. Seniors would be allowed to return and it will not count towards the programs 11.7 scholarships it is alloted, the 35 man roster or the 27 counters. The university will have the right to give a returning senior whatever scholarship amount they seem fit, as long as it doesn’t exceed what they would have been getting for the 2020 season. The school could end up not giving a senior any scholarship, ultimately making the decision for a senior to return to the university even harder. It’s all going to depend on what each individual university decides to do, thus making for some awkward conversations between players and coaches in the near future.
This would also extend the roster cap for teams all depending on how many seniors would be returning. For example, if a team has six seniors coming back their roster would be set at 41 players. There is no cap as long as the excess of players are all seniors. The total number of players for the other four classes cannot exceed the 35 man roster limit, so these are the players who were freshman, sophomores, juniors and all incoming high school players. It’s going to be interesting to see how this affects incoming players to these programs. In a lot cases, incoming freshman usually red shirt their first year, unless they come in and contribute right away. A player may not want to head to a school now that the position they were promised would be open during the 2021 season is now being taken over by a senior who gained an extra year of eligibility. On top of that they would have to compete with the freshman already in the program who had a whole year to develop and get adjusted to the college baseball world. Definitely going to be more competitive, which may not be such a bad thing.
This is definitely a huge win for college baseball that allows great college players to get their last year in and potentially go on towards the next level. It’s especially important for seniors who have a chance to get drafted as this years draft may even be shortened to only five rounds. There may only be a finite amount of spots available for players in a usual forty round draft process. It does make for a unique situation for each individual athlete as well. Some may have been on track to graduate through four years, but you have to be full time student to participate in college athletics. This may lead to a number of seniors applying for their universities graduate programs, which their usual scholarships may not cover. On top of that they would have to pass a test to even make it into graduate school if their grades aren’t good enough. Some seniors may have already had jobs lined up coming out of college and returning to school to finish out their career may end up with them losing that job opportunity. Again these are all decisions based on each athlete and their particular situation. This is still a difficult situation, but a huge win for any senior student-athlete that had their final year ended short and wants to return.
It’s important to note as well that student-athletes involved in winter sports will not have another year of eligibility granted. This would mainly affect all college basketball seniors who were in the midst of playing their conference championships and aiming at the opportunity to participate in the March Madness tournament. The NCAA DI Council’s logic would be that they already had a full season to showcase their skills if they were to go on to play the next level. The only argument to that would the exposure some of these seniors would have had during these nationally televised March Madness games. Mny players have seen their draft stock increase during these games, especially from smaller schools. A great example would be when Steph Curry had a fantastic tournament playing for Davidson. Not that he wouldn’t have gone on to the next level, but the tournament can really help bring to light some of these players who don’t get national exposure because they don’t play at big time college basketball programs.
The Washed Up Athlete 