Scholarship Limit Rule: Unreasonable

by Juco All-American on Jun 1, 2009 4:30 PM EDT Comment 9 comments

In case you haven't heard, the SEC decided to cap the number of football signees that one member institution can sign at 28. I think that's totally unreasonable, and it will lead to some bigger issues than many fans realize.

Find out about it after the jump.

Limiting scholarships to 28 means fewer players signing. That means that the coaches will take fewer academic risks. Sure, some would argue that schools shouldn't be taking those academic risks anyway, but tell that to Michael Oher and Peria Jerry.

Granted, this won't hurt scholls like Florida very much, since those schools don't have to deal with prospects who don't qualify (due to selectivity of recruiting), but it hurts all the schools that do have to go after academic question marks (see: every other school in the SEC).

Also, 28? Why not 30? Capping the signees at 28 means that if four don't qualify, you don't have a fifth to swoop in for that free scholarship. This could impact whether teams look to sign baseball players as well, though I assume that impact will be small.

More than anything, this means that more players who are academic question marks will be signing with schools like FIU, Southern Miss, etc. While most of those guys won't qualify, some will. I think we're about to see a rise out of some of the smaller southern schools in terms of recruiting classes, and that should yield to an improvement of those schools across the board. but more than that, it translates to a possible weakening of the SEC. For years, the league has thrived off of incredible players who barely qualify. Sure, those guys will still sign with SEC schools, but not as many of them. We're going to have to deal with more sure things and fewer incredible athletes who just didn't care about their grades.

Needless to say, even if I weren't an Ole Miss fan, I would be upset by this ruling. However, to say that Houston Nutt signed an unreasonable amount of players is, at least somewhat, uninformed. How was he supposed to know that 20 of the remaining 21 or so players on the board would sign with Ole Miss? He can't be blamed for that. What was he going to do? Tell the other guys to go sign somewhere else?

Poll

The decision by the SEC to limit signing classes to 28 players was:

Reasonable

60 votes

Unreasonable

139 votes

199 votes | Poll has closed

0 recs | Comment 9 comments |

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Comments

retarded. i don’t see what the incentive is for the sec to do this without other conference unless it is due to the sec getting too cocky.

by Charles2006 on Jun 1, 2009 5:39 PM EDT reply actions

Wasn't the vote unanimous?

Then again, who says the presidents have good judgement regarding athletics.

Juco, you raise some good points, and I’m still not sure how I feel about this yet, but I would have to ask, what if everyone started signing 37 (or 40, or hell, 100)? It would kind of be like buying penny stocks, hoping one might break out and make you a billionaire. Maybe that’s the idea behind recruiting in the first place. Like I said, I haven’t completely thought this one through yet, and can see some of both sides.

Please don’t mistake this for Nutt-bashing, but I noticed he’s mentioned a few times the effect of helping Mississippi junior colleges. I don’t remember him ever attempting to help the junior colleges in Arkansas. Then again, if he would have ever had such treasonous thoughts, the paronoid monopoly that is Razorback Nation would have run him out of the state faster than you can say Bev Campbell. And I’m talkin’ way more than just the Springdale mafia.

by artiger on Jun 1, 2009 5:43 PM EDT reply actions

I'm pretty sure all such votes are unanimous.

Take a picture, trick.

by The Ghost of Jay Cutler on Jun 1, 2009 6:30 PM EDT up reply actions

Another point that really hasn't been stressed enough:

How was he supposed to know that 20 of the remaining 21 or so players on the board would sign with Ole Miss? He can’t be blamed for that. What was he going to do? Tell the other guys to go sign somewhere else?

Bingo. Just look at our linebacker signings. My guess is, a few guys (Joel Kight, for example) got offers as contingency plans for the more highly rated guys (Mike Marry, for example) but, somehow, they all signed. I bet we were just as shocked as our coaches with that come signing day. I bet the same could be said for wideouts, defensive backs, and halfbacks. I mean, we literally got every guy we were looking for (outside of Marlon Brown) come signing day.

Take a picture, trick.

by The Ghost of Jay Cutler on Jun 1, 2009 6:34 PM EDT reply actions

I dunno, GOJC

Nutt ought to have a better grasp on who will be signing with the team than he did.

I can see you making the argument had we oversigned by 4 or 5, but we oversigned by 12. There was obviously some bad intel on who was going to be a Rebel and who wasn’t.

The 28 rule doesn’t mean you cannot go after academic risks. It’s just that now, it’s actually a risk to do so.

If I predict it, there's an 50 percent chance it happens.

by One Man To Beat on Jun 1, 2009 7:50 PM EDT reply actions

I don't mean to suggest oversigning altogether was an accident.

But by that much, yes. There was serious attrition under O and this season was Nutt’s big push to fight that.

It also bugs me that Saban signs 32 a year ago and there is relatively not much ado over it. I guess the magical cutoff point for ridicule and rulemaking is 35 or something.

Take a picture, trick.

by The Ghost of Jay Cutler on Jun 1, 2009 8:42 PM EDT up reply actions