How Do We Fix the Dirty Culture of College Recruiting?

[ShotgunDawg]

A boring Tuesday seems like a good time to have this discussion.

With what we have seen at Ole Miss, Louisville basketball, these assistant college basketball coaches today, & then realizing that somehow Alabama manages to land most of the top high school football players in the country every year, I believe it's become apparent that the current recruiting model in college athletics doesn't fit in 2017 where there is more money in the sport & desire to win than at any point in history.

At this point it feels as if, not only has the playing field become extremely uneven for the schools themselves, it's even made coaching or working in college athletics an undesirable career field due to coaches & administrators basically being forced to either cheat or get fired.

So my question for discussion is: How can this be fixed?

- A draft in which players that enter into the draft are eligible to paid? If there is a draft, how many rounds?

- Does limiting scholarships help?

- An official ranking service in which teams could only sign a total number of stars?


There are no dumb answers in this thread. I'm looking for creativity & ideas.

[msstate7]

I think beating auburn Saturday night is the only solution**

Unless the NFL and CFB popularity fails, there's no fixing it. Pay players and someone will pay more

[Spiderman]

A boring Tuesday seems like a good time to have this discussion.

With what we have seen at Ole Miss, Louisville basketball, these assistant college basketball coaches today, & then realizing that somehow Alabama manages to land most of the top high school football players in the country every year, I believe it's become apparent that the current recruiting model in college athletics doesn't fit in 2017 where there is more money in the sport & desire to win than at any point in history.

At this point it feels as if, not only has the playing field become extremely uneven for the schools themselves, it's even made coaching or working in college athletics an undesirable career field due to coaches & administrators basically being forced to either cheat or get fired.

So my question for discussion is: How can this be fixed?

- A draft in which players that enter into the draft are eligible to paid? If there is a draft, how many rounds?

- Does limiting scholarships help?

- An official ranking service in which teams could only sign a total number of stars?


There are no dumb answers in this thread. I'm looking for creativity & ideas.

There has been cheating from day one. Only deterrent is go scorched earth every time someone is caught. Even for small stuff. Have to make the risk too great to take.

[BrunswickDawg]

I don't know that there is a fix, other than making penalties so severe that it keeps schools in check. Like serious death penalty type penalties. You cheat, your program gets shut down and comes back as a DIII non-scholarship program for 5 years. Ultimately, there is so much money wrapped up in college athletics that I don't think you can stop it.

[ShotgunDawg]

There has been cheating from day one. Only deterrent is go scorched earth every time someone is caught. Even for small stuff. Have to make the risk too great to take.

I actually like that the FBI is dipping their toe in this.

Even the FBI just investigates 1 case every 3-5 years in college recruiting, it will create an enormous deterrent. It's one thing to get a show cause, it's another to commit a felony & go to the clinker.

Coaches won't go along with it if there is a chance of criminal charges

[lefty96]

Sit back and watch the FBI work. . .

Those wire fraud and conspiracy charges will be hard to beat. . . you can be every coach in the country is nervous.

[Ifyouonlyknew]

There is no way to fix it. This has been going on since the beginning of collegiate athletics. The best way is allow the players to be paid but that won't happen because the NCAA wants to keep up this charade of college sports being amateur athletics. You're argument makes it seem like only a few schools are only paying kids when that's just not true. Everybody does it just varying degrees. You can't be upset when you're doing something shady & others decide to take it farther than you. That's just the game being the game. Either adapt or stop playing or quit whining. If you get caught well you knew the consequences going in.

[GoToHellOleMiss]

There has been cheating from day one. Only deterrent is go scorched earth every time someone is caught. Even for small stuff. Have to make the risk too great to take.

This

[confucius say]

Deterrence is the primary way. Combine mandatory audits conducted by NCAA and harsh penalties, this will go away.

You get busted, automatic 10 year show cause. Deterrence for coaches. You get busted for numerous (3 or more) level ones, automatic 10 years with no scholarships. Deterrence for university and promotes oversight.

[confucius say]

There is no way to fix it. This has been going on since the beginning of collegiate athletics. The best way is allow the players to be paid but that won't happen because the NCAA wants to keep up this charade of college sports being amateur athletics. You're argument makes it seem like only a few schools are only paying kids when that's just not true. Everybody does it just varying degrees. You can't be upset when you're doing something shady & others decide to take it farther than you. That's just the game being the game. Either adapt or stop playing or quit whining. If you get caught well you knew the consequences going in.

Mandatory audits. Harsh penalties for coaches and even harsher for universities. Problem solved.

[Ifyouonlyknew]

Mandatory audits. Harsh penalties for coaches and even harsher for universities. Problem solved.

The NCAA takes 3yrs to complete an investigation. They're short-staffed as it is. You think they're going to spend millions of dollars to create a staff just to perform audits on hundreds of universities? Not gonna happen.

[QuadrupleOption]

The NCAA takes 3yrs to complete an investigation. They're short-staffed as it is. You think they're going to spend millions of dollars to create a staff just to perform audits on hundreds of universities? Not gonna happen.

Millions would be peanuts to the NCAA. The NCAA generated $876 million in revenue in 2012 (from their website). Yes, that's not profit (they claim all but 4% goes back to member institutions). Still, if they spent $30 million a year on an auditing staff it wouldn't make much of a dent in what they pull in.

The money is there. The will to do it? Not so sure.

[Homedawg]

Mandatory audits. Harsh penalties for coaches and even harsher for universities. Problem solved.

how does an audit stop anything? hell ole miss got caught yes, but 90% of stuff they do never got caught and won't. Cash is hard to follow. They slipped up and made some mistakes but it didn't and won't stop what they have going on there. Sorry but cheating isn't going anywhere, audits or not.

[Ifyouonlyknew]

Millions would be peanuts to the NCAA. The NCAA generated $876 million in revenue in 2012 (from their website). Yes, that's not profit (they claim all but 4% goes back to member institutions). Still, if they spent $30 million a year on an auditing staff it wouldn't make much of a dent in what they pull in.

The money is there. The will to do it? Not so sure.

Oh no doubt they could but they won't. We already know the NCAA isn't big on spending money that doesn't make them more money.

[Mimi's Babies]

I actually like that the FBI is dipping their toe in this.

Even the FBI just investigates 1 case every 3-5 years in college recruiting, it will create an enormous deterrent. It's one thing to get a show cause, it's another to commit a felony & go to the clinker.

Coaches won't go along with it if there is a chance of criminal charges

I was told that OM cheating dated back to 1960 -- according a an OM booster.... (a life time booster)

[Pinto]

You get 85 scholarships that are valid for 4 years. If a kid transfers the scholarship is unusable until those 4 years are up. If you offer a scholarship it is binding on both.
All players are paid work study wages for the hours they put in during season and off season.
Any extra benefits to any students results in automatic loss of that scholarship for 4 years. If student has graduated, then school is docked 5 scholarships per student for 4 years.

[Doggie_Style]

In any endeavor involving humans there is going to be a tendency toward corrupt practices. Schools like OM should be severely punished as a deterrent. Paying players is the worst idea ever. It would end college football as most school would not be able to afford it. Scholarships provided are compensation for players efforts. Also, under title IX, an equal number of women athletes would have to be paid. Where would it end? Maybe one day college football will look a lot like baseball as the top talent plays for a developmental league instead.

[Really Clark?]

Millions would be peanuts to the NCAA. The NCAA generated $876 million in revenue in 2012 (from their website). Yes, that's not profit (they claim all but 4% goes back to member institutions). Still, if they spent $30 million a year on an auditing staff it wouldn't make much of a dent in what they pull in.

The money is there. The will to do it? Not so sure.

If those numbers are correct then 4% is $35 MIL. So $30 MIL a year would make more than make a dent. It's a complex issue because for the pay the players people you have budget issues that 85-90% of the schools would have trouble with and you also will have Title IX and non revenue sports headaches galore. Where do you make cuts to pay football players?

If you go scorch earth with detterants, you could see major football powers decide to leave the NCAA. Is there a balance to be found? Doubt it but the member institutions have to decide what model they are ultimately looking for and what makes sense. Is competitive balance something they even care about? The haves don't want that.

Complex problem but I agree it does need to be much better.

[Reason2succeed]

We are watching professional athletes. We just don't want to admit it.

Take away the facade (with special c) and allow market forces do their work. We believe in free market capitalism in everything else.

Making things illegal just punishes those who are too moral or too scared to break the law.

[TUSK]

I think it's working great.*

[dawgs]

We are watching professional athletes. We just don't want to admit it.

Take away the facade (with special c) and allow market forces do their work. We believe in free market capitalism in everything else.


Ironically in everything except professional sports. Profit sharing, salary caps, team control, drafts, etc. are all the opposite of free market capitalism.

[dawgs]

I actually like that the FBI is dipping their toe in this.

Even the FBI just investigates 1 case every 3-5 years in college recruiting, it will create an enormous deterrent. It's one thing to get a show cause, it's another to commit a felony & go to the clinker.

Coaches won't go along with it if there is a chance of criminal charges

Yeah, I think this is what you gotta hope for. Freeze can lie to the NCAA and worst case scenario is he retires early on the millions he’s made while cheating. Freeze lies under oath and his ass goes to jail. That’s why the burner phone stuff just came out in the ole miss saga.

[bostondawg]

I absolutely love the ideas here of scorched earth policies for small penalties. Give a kid a few grand? Death penalty for a year. I agree--make the cheating not worth it.

Some other points:
-baseball and soccer have no salary cap. As in, there isn't supposed to be an even playing field between teams. It's capitalism at its finest. So I think comparing college sports to the NFL/NBA isn't appropriate--plenty of sports don't have even playing fields.
- how do you guys think a relegation system would affect recruiting? I suppose very little? Throwing darts here.

[smootness]

Ironically in everything except professional sports. Profit sharing, salary caps, team control, drafts, etc. are all the opposite of free market capitalism.

Because teams within a pro sports league aren't really competing against each other. They're all in it together.

[ShotgunDawg]

I absolutely love the ideas here of scorched earth policies for small penalties. Give a kid a few grand? Death penalty for a year. I agree--make the cheating not worth it.

Some other points:
-baseball and soccer have no salary cap. As in, there isn't supposed to be an even playing field between teams. It's capitalism at its finest. So I think comparing college sports to the NFL/NBA isn't appropriate--plenty of sports don't have even playing fields.
- how do you guys think a relegation system would affect recruiting? I suppose very little? Throwing darts here.

I don't think a relegation system would work as it would create even more of an incentive to cheat while also making filling out future schedules a nightmare

Relegation systems are designed for professional sports in order to give owners, that are stingy with their money, a kick in the ass to spend more money & attempt to compete.

For example: a relegation system in baseball would offer the Marlins an incentive to spend money & build a healthy franchise.

College athletics don't have this problem & a relegation system literally addresses none of the current issues in college athletics

[ShotgunDawg]

Rick Ray with comments. There is a real problem here folks & I agree with Rick

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DKqoFubUQAAxS69.jpg:large

[dawgs]

I absolutely love the ideas here of scorched earth policies for small penalties. Give a kid a few grand? Death penalty for a year. I agree--make the cheating not worth it.

Some other points:
-baseball and soccer have no salary cap. As in, there isn't supposed to be an even playing field between teams. It's capitalism at its finest. So I think comparing college sports to the NFL/NBA isn't appropriate--plenty of sports don't have even playing fields.
- how do you guys think a relegation system would affect recruiting? I suppose very little? Throwing darts here.

Baseball doesn’t have a salary cap, but they also have 6-7 years of team control over players after the hit the big leagues, and savvy teams know that signing a ~30 year old first time free agent too a massive arod/pujols type deal in the post-steroids era is foolish. So few guys remain above average into their mid and late 30s, that by the time guys can make big money, it’s usually a poor decision to sign them to big money. Nevermind revenue sharing and limits on international signings. Yeah there’s no salary cap, but baseball has done everything else to ensure teams like Cleveland and Kansas City and Arizona can compete with Boston, the Yankees, and the dodgers.

As for soccer, outside of Leicester city’s fluke run, when was the last time someone with dropping huge $$$ won the epl? When was the last time someone besides Barcelona and Real Madrid won La Liga? Or someone besides Bayern or Dortmund won bundesliga? Outside of a once in a lifetime run by Leicester city, euro league soccer standings are pretty boring. At least half the teams in the champions league have a legit chance of winning it.

[dawgs]

I don't think a relegation system would work as it would create even more of an incentive to cheat while also making filling out future schedules a nightmare

Relegation systems are designed for professional sports in order to give owners, that are stingy with their money, a kick in the ass to spend more money & attempt to compete.

For example: a relegation system in baseball would offer the Marlins an incentive to spend money & build a healthy franchise.

College athletics don't have this problem & a relegation system literally addresses none of the current issues in college athletics

Problem is they are only motivated to spend enough money to put them solidly in the mid tier safe from relegation.

[dawgs]

Because teams within a pro sports league aren't really competing against each other. They're all in it together.

Need to get you on the political trail with that kinda message ;)

[Tbonewannabe]

Because teams within a pro sports league aren't really competing against each other. They're all in it together.

Exactly, the NFL is competing against other entertainment. The salary caps and such are there to make sure the NFL product doesn't become repetitive and boring. This is why when another team challenges for the title then it is a lot more interesting. If Bama and Ohio St play for the National title every year for the next 10 then you will see college ratings go in the crapper.

[dawgs]

Exactly, the NFL is competing against other entertainment. The salary caps and such are there to make sure the NFL product doesn't become repetitive and boring. This is why when another team challenges for the title then it is a lot more interesting. If Bama and Ohio St play for the National title every year for the next 10 then you will see college ratings go in the crapper.

But yet baseball ratings are the best when the Yankees or Red Sox or cubs are winning titles...

[JoseBrown]

I think beating auburn Saturday night is the only solution**

Unless the NFL and CFB popularity fails, there's no fixing it. Pay players and someone will pay more

Definitely, probably and for sure you're right.

[Westdawg]

I don't think you fix it by paying players openly.
The ONLY way to fix this is to allow for HS seniors to be drafted in all sports. And force NFL and other leagues to have a legit minor league\Dev league/farm system.
Yes, you would lose the top 300 or so football prospects per year, but let's not kid ourselves....a lot of those same kids view college as a means to HAVE to go through to go pro. They have no desire to be a college student.
The fact that college educational administrators continue to allow this charade to continue, the worse it becomes.

[JoseBrown]

There is no way to fix it. This has been going on since the beginning of collegiate athletics. The best way is allow the players to be paid but that won't happen because the NCAA wants to keep up this charade of college sports being amateur athletics. You're argument makes it seem like only a few schools are only paying kids when that's just not true. Everybody does it just varying degrees. You can't be upset when you're doing something shady & others decide to take it farther than you. That's just the game being the game. Either adapt or stop playing or quit whining. If you get caught well you knew the consequences going in.

It is also in the best interests of the Olympics for our college student-athletes to remain amateurs. If they are paid, then the track stars, volley ballers, soccer, swimming....won't be allowed to participate in the Olympics representing the USA. If only football players are paid I'm sure other countries would lobby for any college student athlete to be professional. And if you pay football players what's gonna stop every sport from being paid. I'm saying all this just to point out there are other interests in keeping college athletes considered amateurs.

[Tbonewannabe]

It is also in the best interests of the Olympics for our college student-athletes to remain amateurs. If they are paid, then the track stars, volley ballers, soccer, swimming....won't be allowed to participate in the Olympics representing the USA. If only football players are paid I'm sure other countries would lobby for any college student athlete to be professional. And if you pay football players what's gonna stop every sport from being paid. I'm saying all this just to point out there are other interests in keeping college athletes considered amateurs.

You do realize that most Olympic athletes are paid now? The ones who aren't paid are in a sport where they just don't get paid. The Dream Team in basketball isn't possible without paid athletes. This was a farce anyway since Russian and China have had basically professional athletes for a long time.

[Tbonewannabe]

But yet baseball ratings are the best when the Yankees or Red Sox or cubs are winning titles...

Yes, when there are high population areas that are big fans of those sports then they do get higher ratings. What I was saying is that you would see a drastic drop in ratings if the Yankees and Cubs played for the World Series every year. The ratings might be high for the first few years but by year 6 or 7, boredom would set in. It is the same way with TV shows. Eventually when plot of the show is repetitive then the ratings go down. Professional sports are kind of a different animal in that you have loyalty to your team. MSU fans are a lot more likely to watch a game involving MSU. Hell, we have people that think since Dan can't get over the hump of 7 - 8 wins then we need a new coach. That is kind of boredom of seeing the same wins against the same type of teams. People would risk going back to 4 - 6 wins just for a chance at beating Bama.

[Political Hack]

Quit paying teams $20 million to go to bowl games. Take football off TV.

[BrunswickDawg]

Rick Ray with comments. There is a real problem here folks & I agree with Rick

"You can't win if you don't cheat" - Rick Ray, 57-102 record as a HC

[confucius say]

how does an audit stop anything? hell ole miss got caught yes, but 90% of stuff they do never got caught and won't. Cash is hard to follow. They slipped up and made some mistakes but it didn't and won't stop what they have going on there. Sorry but cheating isn't going anywhere, audits or not.

A routine audit (phone records, text messages, bank records) would have revealed enough to give Mississippi the death penalty under my above referenced matrix. There were text messages about exchange of $ for crying out loud.

Also, FBS football generated billions of dollars yearly. A lack of $ is no issue. Simply make school pay for the audit. This would be easy.

[JoseBrown]

You do realize that most Olympic athletes are paid now? The ones who aren't paid are in a sport where they just don't get paid. The Dream Team in basketball isn't possible without paid athletes. This was a farce anyway since Russian and China have had basically professional athletes for a long time.

Why of course they are paid in ways that maintain their amateur status.... They are not paid until they turn pro. The Dream Team had to eventually happen, because every other countries basketball players were playing in professional leagues. We finally caught up to them. The extreme majority of Team USA athletes are not professional until they decide to give up their Olympic time.

[Dawgology]

"You can't win if you don't cheat" - Rick Ray, 57-102 record as a HC

He's the most honest guy I know!! HAHAHAHAHAHAA

[JoseBrown]

"You can't win if you don't cheat" - Rick Ray, 57-102 record as a HC

"It ain't cheating if you don't get caught." And "You ain't trying if you ain't cheating." Both quotes made by Jim Rome.

That's all I remember about him though, and somebody jumped across a table after him I think....

[Dawgology]

I like the idea of restricting number of players you can sign based on ratings. You would have to have a ranking system like the 247 composite rating then allow each school to sign no more than: 1 - 5 star, 5 - 4 star, 15 - 3 star per year. the rest filled in with 2 star and under if you had room. To a certain degree it would punish a college for losing a lot of players early (out of NFL early, dropped form team, etc) as it would make it impossible to fill all of those slots with top flight talent based on your cap...so colleges would have to be smarter and not waste scholarships just to bench guys or boost recruiting rankings. This would help improve parity throughout the collegiate football ranks.

[smootness]

I like the idea of restricting number of players you can sign based on ratings. You would have to have a ranking system like the 247 composite rating then allow each school to sign no more than: 1 - 5 star, 5 - 4 star, 15 - 3 star per year. the rest filled in with 2 star and under if you had room. To a certain degree it would punish a college for losing a lot of players early (out of NFL early, dropped form team, etc) as it would make it impossible to fill all of those slots with top flight talent based on your cap...so colleges would have to be smarter and not waste scholarships just to bench guys or boost recruiting rankings. This would help improve parity throughout the collegiate football ranks.

I absolutely hate that idea, personally.

[ShotgunDawg]

I absolutely hate that idea, personally.

Why?

[Dawgology]

I absolutely hate that idea, personally.

why?

[confucius say]

why?

Bc you are restricting where a kid can go to school. The kid should be allowed to go wherever he/she wants. A 5 star tackle wants to go to msu bc he wants to be a vet/engineer/or just grew up a fan and he can't Bc msu already has a 5 star committed. Don't take away choices from a kid.

And Bc you are penalizing coaches who are good recruiters.

The much easier way is to hold the adults accountable. You do it once, career over and school has no schollies for a decade. That will fix it.

[smootness]

Why?

It would be the most arbitrary, roundabout way to solve a problem I can think of. College recruiting has gotten out of hand, so the solution is to limit the number of kids a random internet site attaches a certain value to that can go to a school? That is truly bizarre, IMO.

Confucius explained the main issue with it above. You're basically saying that every school should field as close to the exact same product as possible, and we're going to legislate it that way and force everyone's hand, including the kids. And how would it even solve dirty recruiting? The truly special kids would get even more in this scenario because you get so few of them.

Imagine if you had 2 stud 5-stars in the state of MS who were both State legacies who had always dreamed of playing for State. You would suddenly despise that rule. Or imagine if you had a kid on the very edge between a 4- and 5-star. We already had one 5-star committed, and this kid was a 4-star committed to State as well, then just before signing day the kid's rating gets bumped up slightly by one site, so his composite rating bumps up to a 5-star. Now we can't sign that kid, our plans are ruined, and his plans are ruined.

You would give an unbelievable amount of power to the recruiting sites, who we already loathe. Imagine a world in which Yancy Porter can actually have influence on who can come to State and who can't, or on whose rating suddenly drops low enough to be able to go to OM.

There are a lot of really, really big problems with that plan.

[msstate7]

If you're going for parity, I like the idea of a scholarship being tied to 1 player for 4 years. When bama, Ohio state, etc lose 7-8 juniors to the draft, it would sting with no way to replace them for another year.

[smootness]

If you're going for parity, I like the idea of a scholarship being tied to 1 player for 4 years. When bama, Ohio state, etc lose 7-8 juniors to the draft, it would sting with no way to replace them for another year.

That, to me, is a potentially good idea and one that is actually realistic. It may also have pitfalls, but on the surface it seems like something that would definitely work.

My guess is that if they were to implement it, it would probably change to 2-3 years instead of 4. That way you penalize schools more for players who quit/transfer/flunk out than those who leave early to go pro.

[Ifyouonlyknew]

I absolutely hate that idea, personally.

I hate it too. Who is some committee to tell a kid where he can or can't go to school. You guys always talking about snowflakes & America becoming pussies. Well this is the most ***** thing I've heard. No kid you can't go to KY(bball) or Bama(football) they will have too many good players.

[Tbonewannabe]

Why of course they are paid in ways that maintain their amateur status.... They are not paid until they turn pro. The Dream Team had to eventually happen, because every other countries basketball players were playing in professional leagues. We finally caught up to them. The extreme majority of Team USA athletes are not professional until they decide to give up their Olympic time.

The Rio Olympics is the first Olympics that has no requirement for amateur status for any sport. So there were some sports that still wanted you to be an amateur but now everyone is welcome to compete.

[Lord McBuckethead]

If those numbers are correct then 4% is $35 MIL. So $30 MIL a year would make more than make a dent. It's a complex issue because for the pay the players people you have budget issues that 85-90% of the schools would have trouble with and you also will have Title IX and non revenue sports headaches galore. Where do you make cuts to pay football players?

If you go scorch earth with detterants, you could see major football powers decide to leave the NCAA. Is there a balance to be found? Doubt it but the member institutions have to decide what model they are ultimately looking for and what makes sense. Is competitive balance something they even care about? The haves don't want that.

Complex problem but I agree it does need to be much better.

30 mill off the top.

[msstate7]

I hate it too. Who is some committee to tell a kid where he can or can't go to school. You guys always talking about snowflakes & America becoming pussies. Well this is the most ***** thing I've heard. No kid you can't go to KY(bball) or Bama(football) they will have too many good players.

IYOK used to never get mad like this. Thanks ED

Lol

[Lord McBuckethead]

The much easier way is to hold the adults accountable. You do it once, career over and school has no schollies for a decade. That will fix it.

I agree with punishing the adults big time, but I also would set up some sort of sting operation against Saban until he messed up in the slightest of ways. Just a matter of time.
Also, with the redmond situation, it could be seen as mullen not having control of his guy, then Mullen wouldn't be able to coach anymore?

[dawgs]

The ratings might be high for the first few years but by year 6 or 7, boredom would set in. It is the same way with TV shows. Eventually when plot of the show is repetitive then the ratings go down. Professional sports are kind of a different animal in that you have loyalty to your team. MSU fans are a lot more likely to watch a game involving MSU. Hell, we have people that think since Dan can't get over the hump of 7 - 8 wins then we need a new coach. That is kind of boredom of seeing the same wins against the same type of teams. People would risk going back to 4 - 6 wins just for a chance at beating Bama.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/01/Breaking_Bad_Viewership_Chart.jpeg/800px-Breaking_Bad_Viewership_Chart.jpeg

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_Bad

Check the viewership section under reception.

[dawgs]

That, to me, is a potentially good idea and one that is actually realistic. It may also have pitfalls, but on the surface it seems like something that would definitely work.

My guess is that if they were to implement it, it would probably change to 2-3 years instead of 4. That way you penalize schools more for players who quit/transfer/flunk out than those who leave early to go pro.

Yeah I think you figure out a way to keep the bama’s and Ohio st’s from processing guys that don’t develop as expected. I don’t think penalizing teams for a guy being good enough to leave a year early is fair and would promote coaches to try to limit the impact of their underclassmen stars. I would like to see something where coaches can guarantee a scholarship for as many years as a player wants it. So maybe bama only offers a guy a guaranteed 1 or 2 years, but we could offer with a 4 year guarantee. Probably wouldn’t be a huge swing in the best players, but the guys in the bottom half of bama’s classes would still be damn good recruits for us, and we might be able to swing a few of those types each year offering them a full 4 years instead of the real chance of them being processed after a year or 2 at bama when bama picks up a bunch of 4-5* guys again next year.

[Dawgology]

I hate it too. Who is some committee to tell a kid where he can or can't go to school. You guys always talking about snowflakes & America becoming pussies. Well this is the most ***** thing I've heard. No kid you can't go to KY(bball) or Bama(football) they will have too many good players.

It was just a spitball idea. Jesus, chill the **** out Dan. It's not like you are pulling in a dozen 5-stars every year anyway!**

[Dawgology]

It would be the most arbitrary, roundabout way to solve a problem I can think of. College recruiting has gotten out of hand, so the solution is to limit the number of kids a random internet site attaches a certain value to that can go to a school? That is truly bizarre, IMO.

Confucius explained the main issue with it above. You're basically saying that every school should field as close to the exact same product as possible, and we're going to legislate it that way and force everyone's hand, including the kids. And how would it even solve dirty recruiting? The truly special kids would get even more in this scenario because you get so few of them.

Imagine if you had 2 stud 5-stars in the state of MS who were both State legacies who had always dreamed of playing for State. You would suddenly despise that rule. Or imagine if you had a kid on the very edge between a 4- and 5-star. We already had one 5-star committed, and this kid was a 4-star committed to State as well, then just before signing day the kid's rating gets bumped up slightly by one site, so his composite rating bumps up to a 5-star. Now we can't sign that kid, our plans are ruined, and his plans are ruined.

You would give an unbelievable amount of power to the recruiting sites, who we already loathe. Imagine a world in which Yancy Porter can actually have influence on who can come to State and who can't, or on whose rating suddenly drops low enough to be able to go to OM.

There are a lot of really, really big problems with that plan.

We were just throwing ideas out I thought for discussions sake. No reason to really get all upset over it. I have no power to make this happen. You can't deny it though. It would force parity. Also, it would have to be an official site and not random fan site. Like I said. It was just an idea for discussion. Everyone cool out. Shit.

[Turfdawg67]

If you're going for parity, I like the idea of a scholarship being tied to 1 player for 4 years. When bama, Ohio state, etc lose 7-8 juniors to the draft, it would sting with no way to replace them for another year.

So big boosters would set up trust funds to be collected after graduation...

[WeWonItAll(Most)]

Nm