When I was in high school, I followed football recruiting by reading the Clarion-Ledger and by talking to my friends in the cafeteria or before school. We had no recruiting websites, ESPN barely covered it, and I think there was maybe a few magazines that covered recruiting written by this Max Emfinger guy. Well, things have changed a LOT. Now we have recruiting websites run by super fans and freelance reporters, we have ESPN making National Signing Day a holiday complete with “hat parties” where coveted recruits pick out the hat of the team that they are going to pledge to, national combines for these high school prospects, you have the Elite 11 QB camp for quarterbacks, not to mention National All-Star games such as the Army All-American Game and the Under Armour All-Star game- and I can see even more changes on the horizon with the emergence of Team USA football. What HASN’T changed much is the NCAA. And they really need to start to look at changing things for the better, because recruiting is getting crazier and crazier every year. The NCAA needs to start to protect the players.
An Early National Signing Day?
I think this would be good in that players that know where they are going to go and are committed can go ahead and lock themselves in and get it over with and go on with their high school season. This would be beneficial to a player such as Chris Jones who has been bombarded by rumors and interview requests the past month since the MSU commit rose rapidly from a three star recruit to a five star recruit. So, the next question is when should an early National Signing Day happen- and I would suggest sometime around August 15th-August 20th before the high school football season has started. That said, I think the traditional National Signing Day date should be moved up regardless to around Dec. 15th-Dec. 20th for everyone because by doing so, you cut out the “dead period” which has become a joke, and you cut out a month of craziness. Another reason for having it in December is to reduce peer pressure from around the school and community since most people will be going on Christmas break and they will be focusing more on that and it will allow the pressure to simmer down a lot by the time the holidays are over. Also, that date is after the high school football playoffs are over, so again it doesn’t interfere with the high school season. What it would interfere with are the high school all-star games. This may very well spell the end of the Mississippi/Alabama High School All-Star Game, as I would suspect that the national All-Star Games such as the Army All-Star Game would move their game up to have things such as hat ceremonies. Another issue with an early signing day is “well, what if the head coach leaves?” A player has to use his good judgement on that and I would suspect that most of the players that commit early are committing early because they are going to go to that school no matter what anyway. However, if it’s easy to get out a commitment, then what’s the point in having an early national signing day? The solution to me is that a player that is committed and signs letter of intent, should have to go through the same procedures as anyone else. In other words-that player likely won’t be released to another in conference institution or that player will have to go to junior college for two years and then they are free to go wherever from that point on. If the school that a player signs with goes on probation, the NCAA has long set a precedent of allowing those players to transfer if they wish. I don’t see why they would do differently for players that sign early. Actually, an early signing period would protect players from coaches like Tommy Tuberville who have been known to cut a lot of recruits once they are hired.
Increase The Limits
As it stands, the scholarship limit is 25 and then it gets confusing because teams can roll over spots from the last class, but I’m not going to get into that. Personally, I think 25 is too few spots. Football is changing, and as it has changed, we’ve seen new positions rise up- like slot wide receivers, H-backs who are a combination of a tight end and a fullback, hybrid defensive players who can play defensive end and outside linebacker, and others who are outside linebacker safety hybrid players. At the same time, you still see traditional tight ends, wide receivers, fullbacks, and etc. So, I would like to see them increase the scholarship limits from 25 to 30. I think that would help a school like MSU out a lot because then we can take a few more chances on players like Dylan Bradley, Jarius Moore, and etc. and still have room for the Mackenzie Alexander’s. It would also give us more room to add junior college players without making us thin at another spot in a couple of years.
The NCAA- All About Good Grades?
One of the most ridiculous rules that the NCAA has is that if you are a football walk-on, you can not be on any other kind of academic aid. Even if you have a 4.2 GPA, made a 36 on the ACT, and won a Nobel Peace Prize- you’ve got to pay your way son. Now, the reason why they have the rule is because people like Bear Bryant would abuse the rule- but come on- the NCAA is being lazy here. How can you say that football isn’t really a business and it’s supposed to be about academics and sportsmanship and then NOT allow at least some deserving walk-ons some academic aid? I think teams should be rewarded for recruiting good students, and those students should also be rewarded. So, my proposal is to add two academic roster spots for deserving players. And by deserving- I mean have something like at least a 30 on the ACT and a 3.6 GPA. That would bring the signing day limit up to 32. What’s cool about this is a recruit could actually help his team by making good grades- because then you get an extra roster spot for another good player. Hopefully coaches would point this out, and it would encourage players to do well in school.
Limit the Media
I think the biggest difference in recruiting now and twenty years ago is the media coverage associated with it. You have these fan site writers that recruit for their school- even if they say that they don’t. They do this by asking leading questions such as “so does Mississippi State changing a coach affect where you stand with them?” But the real problem is these websites constantly contact these kids throughout their recruitment often multiple times a week. The biggest thing that I think is wrong with that is these website owners are distracting the players from their schoolwork, their team, and they are also harassing family members in the process as well. These websites should be allowed only two interviews a year per recruit until they step foot onto campus. No recruits should be allowed to interview during the high school season unless it is with a local newspaper about the players previous game. Local newspapers should also be allowed two articles a year pertaining to recruiting. One article is allowed before a player’s season starts, and one is allowed after that player’s season has ended. There is one exception- if a player commits to a school, then the website and local newspaper is allowed to do an article on that.
So, NCAA- get off your bun and make this happen!