College curveball
NCAA throws baseball coaches for a loop with added eligibility
Widely hailed as the right thing to do for student-athlete welfare, the NCAA’s decision to extend spring sports athletes’ eligibility a year because of the coronavirus pandemic is causing consternation for baseball coaches.
Ohio State’s Greg Beals said Tuesday he isn’t worried about 2021, when the 35-man roster limit will be relaxed to accommodate seniors choosing to return for another season.
The problem comes in 2022, when the limit is back in force. Beals has 11 freshmen coming in this fall, and they will join nine players who will be reclassified as freshmen because the 2021 season ended abruptly March 12.
“So I have a freshman class of 20, and that class is going to stay with me for the next four years,” Beals said. “So there’s some challenge there. We’re going to be able to work through it. There’s going to be some tough conversations while the roster is thick and strong. The lineup card still only has nine slots on it.”
New Mexico coach Ray Birmingham agrees, saying another problem exists in funding for a sport that offers fewer scholarship equivalencies than most major team sports.
“We’ve already got 35 kids on the roster and most of them will never get off the bench, but now you’re asking us to add a class of incoming recruits without adding any scholarship money to pay for them,” he said. “A lot of players are already getting zero money out of us, and now you’re just adding to it.”
The NCAA allows a total of 11.7 scholarships per team in Division I baseball, and it’s required they be divided among 27 players. Eight walk-ons are permitted, taking the roster maximum to 35. Baseball is the only spring sport with a roster limit.
Seniors who choose to return in 2021 will be allowed to have the same scholarship amount they had this year, less or none at all. Returning seniors’ scholarships won’t count against the 11.7 limit.
Looming logjams because of the extended eligibility could force coaches to sign smaller recruiting classes and nudge underperforming players to transfer or quit.
“The greater effect might be two or three years from now,” LSU’s Paul Mainieri said. “Most schools in the SEC have their 2021 recruiting classes for high school players already done. So now you’re bunching a lot of kids together, and we’ll see how it plays out.
“As far as this year, the impact is minimal. What is of greater impact is what Major League Baseball does with their draft.”
The draft always plays a role in roster management, but there’s additional stress for coaches and players this year. Because of the pandemic, MLB might not hold the draft until late July, and there’s no clarity about number of rounds.
The renewal date for scholarships is July 1, and coaches might not know which players are staying or going by then. If there are five or 10 rounds instead of the usual 40, juniors and seniors who aren’t projected to go in the early rounds would be apt to return to school.
“Ultimately, kids come to college to get into the working world and get a job, so that’s something we’re going to have to do,” Birmingham said. “I’ve told some of these guys that if it’s a job they’re looking for, give me their résumé and I’ll help them find something because there’s not space for everyone on the roster.”
The more rounds the MLB draft has, the more likely there will be fewer junior and seniors returning. UNM has just three seniors on this season’s roster, meaning the impact on the next recruiting class will be small, but the fall semester could be drawing to a close before every team’s numbers are known.
“You’ve got freshmen that are coming in that were counting on those seniors and juniors leaving or going to the draft,” Mississippi athletic director Keith Carter said, “so what does that look like for the young players, and does that change the dynamic with them?”
Junior colleges stand to be the beneficiary of the uncertainty.
Iowa Western Community College coach Marc Rardin said he recently got four calls in one day from advisers for high school seniors looking for a fallback plan if they aren’t drafted and the Division I schools they signed with have clogged rosters.
“Some kids who are signed with four-year schools coming out of high school are a little apprehensive about it and want to make sure they get somewhere they can have a chance to develop and play,” Rardin said.
An NCAA spokeswoman said rules remain unchanged for players who decide to transfer from one Division I school to another. The extended eligibility travels with them, but the scholarship they receive would count against the 11.7 limit this year.
If a junior-college transfer’s 2020 season ended because of the pandemic, his Division I school could apply for a waiver to extend that student’s NCAA eligibility.
Graduate transfers can play immediately and could receive the same, less or more aid than they did at their previous school.
“As an athletic director, the challenge now becomes finding the resources to fund these unanticipated scholarships given the uncertainty surrounding our enterprise,” Oklahoma State athletic director Mike Holder said. “However, I prefer this challenge over the alternative of telling our athletes they lost a year of eligibility.”