The National Collegiate Athletic Association has decided to grant a universal extra year of eligibility to all spring sports athletics, Nicole Auerback of The Athletic reports on Twitter. Designed to deal with the cancellation of baseball and other spring seasons, the decision has major implications for the MLB amateur draft this year and beyond.
You may recall that the recent MLB-MLBPA agreement to deal with the coronavirus included provisions involving the draft. Commissioner Rob Manfred now has authority to limit the 2020 draft to as few as five rounds, with $20K bonus caps on undrafted players. That’s far less in cash and opportunity than is typically handed out in a given year for amateur intake.
The NCAA decision provides an important counterweight to the huge loss of player leverage that comes with MLB’s crisis-driven modification of the typical draft. Having the ability to return to school and reenter the ensuing year’s draft may not be the preferred option for all players, but at least there’s now a realistic choice. Were it not for the grant of additional eligibility, college juniors would’ve faced an unenviable, binary choice: take what a MLB team offers now or enter the 2021 draft as a senior without any leverage to speak of. The best senior players now have newfound leverage they never would’ve had otherwise.
This decision was anticipated in advance of the MLB-MLBPA agreement; no doubt those negotiations took it into account. At the time the spring sports eligibility expansion was first floated, though, it wasn’t clear whether it would apply automatically to all players.
With far less money being spent in the 2020 draft, and the cash that is promised deferred, we’re likely to see quite a different outcome than would’ve taken place otherwise. Many collegians that would’ve ended up in the professional ranks will now stick with their universities — potentially taking spots on the depth charts from incoming freshmen. Perhaps some graduating high schoolers will be more apt to turn pro, though they’ll also be presented with the same limited earning opportunities.
Basically they’re declaring 2020 a redshirt season for everyone.
This is going to be fascinating to watch
Excellent call by the NCAA…can’t say that often
Unless you are high schooler looking to play college baseball next year. There was time when college was about an education.
or any other player on the fringes of a team.
Playing is one thing, most of the players in college won’t play organized pro ball, it’s those who wouldn’t go to college without the baseball scholarship I’m talking about.
You do realize that a giant majority of HS seniors heading to play D1 baseball have already committed? Those commitments and their athletic aid will still be honored.
The Junior class will be affected by redshirts, all this trickles down on somebody.
Not at all. Few seniors will return. Schools can easily cut them loose by not offering them aid. Going to be a much smaller problem than anyone thinks.
The name Dexter Manley and his 4y college degree, then after graduation still couldn’t read, nor write is still what is wrong sports scholarships in general.
They are wrong.. Wrong.. Wrong.
Institutions of higher learning were not created for games, but supposedly to put out the best and brightest people to make THIS country better, not mental morons, which some colleges it seems still target because of a sport.
Or a JUCO player looking to make the jump to NCAA.
Good call
Does this go back to 2012?
My arm still has some more innings left but I have definitely lost some velo.
Can you call the Mariners? Please.
I could be a right handed Wadw LeBlanc; the 2018 version hopefully.
less drafted players, more players vying for spots…rough go for these kids.
Doubtful. Way more seniors than you think will elect to move on. At the D1 level, for seniors only, schools have the option to give athletic aid up to what they received in 2020. That includes giving zero athletic aid if the return. In an equivalency sport already (which means no full athletic scholarships), there is an expense associated with returning to school. Even without that dynamic, a whole lot of seniors are just plain done anyway as 4-5 years in a program is a long time. I’d bet well fewer than 50% of seniors return…maybe closer to 20-25% max.
Then it is an extremely good call for 25% of kids trying live out their dream. For most of them it would disappear without this chance.
The NCAA’s decision will also extend the eligibility of all student-athletes — not just seniors whose careers would have ended after the cancellation of their seasons — and will allow schools to expand their rosters beyond current scholarship limits to account for incoming recruits and seniors who were expected to leave.
This reads they can expand rosters if needed.
Good move by NCAA.
Now the high schools should play their season starting middle June ( hopefully) so seniors can play and be evaluated. Here in California the season was cancelled after a few games. Summer High School ball !
That’s highly doubtful in all honesty in terms of evaluation. College coaches have their summer schedules set and or summer league commitments sown up. For a vast majority of the college profession, non power 5, the summer is crucial in ability to survive. High school has given way in terms of recruitment, and high school games are less important in the recruitment process. Then you have the weird position that graduating srs, and jrs have in terms of commitments that decide its more beneficial to participate in the big time showcases, camps, area code games, or preparing for college. You also run into the multi sport issues. High school summer baseball is a weird thought, I know it kind of works in Iowa, but I’m not sure it’s realistic in a lot of states. If you do have a high school season it’d probably be more youth centric. All in all, most with professional aspirations/college aspirations will probably choose against forgoing their summer season, for good or bad. Obviously it’ll be situational, but being from CA knowing how the process works seems a bit unrealistic, and a bit waste of resources.
Are they renewing all scholarships for an extra year as well? If not, the eligibility doesn’t mean much to most of those players.
First, I am highly biased as the dad of a high school senior. It may be true that a good many college seniors elect to move on, but it seems to me that there was no regard for the real impact on 2020 Hs seniors in making the changes. I know for a fact some division 2 colleges are already retracting the partial schollies offered to high schoolers. I honestly think it’s a crock to allow seniors, especially redshirt seniors another year. My goodness, if they’ve been doing their schoolwork properly they should be well on their way to getting a masters degree, depriving a lot of high schoolers a chance to maybe even go to college at all. If college seniors aren’t good enough for the mlb draft by now, they should get a job with the degree they’ve earned.
Yes, you are. Very biased. Only looking out for your kid. I would imagine that if your son was a college senior playing his last year this year, you would be front and center at NCAA office demanding that he get another year–and not a care in the world about what is happening to the incoming. There is someone that is gonna be negatively affected no matter what. I actually feel the worst for the high school seniors (I know your son is one now, but seems like a good player by your post)–no doubt there are many that this was their year to get playing time, and there won’t be any more. In college, I would bet your son won’t be that much affected. May even help him. If he’s a stud, then he will play. If not, he will actually have one more year to catch up to the sophomore competing for his spot–and your son will improve a lot more in the next year than that sophomore. When the occupying senior leaves, your son will be at more even ground with the guy ahead of him (in years). If he can’t beat him out then, then he wasn’t going to anyway.
These teams are taking advantage of this crisis at the expense of amateur players. 5-10 rounds and capping bonuses at $20K after that? It’s a joke. I would like to see kids negotiate for less than 7 season for the initial minor league contract in exchange for that low ball max. I’d say 3-4 years is fair for $20K as it will allow kids an opportunity to become a minor league FA earlier than what they can now and give them a little more control over their future. It’s a shame that nobody advocates for these amateurs.
It seems to me that those hurt the most by this decision are the HS seniors (with or without scholarships), as the college rosters will have less spots in spring 2021. Shortening the draft to only 5 rounds just means that the good (but not great) juniors that don’t get picked within five, will instead take their senior year in college and then try again in the 2021 draft. But how many current seniors are going to take another year in college ball hoping to get drafted next year? What if they’re slated to graduate from an academic standpoint? How do they take more classes just to play one more year of baseball? Even tho this seems like a fair decision by the NCAA for the seniors, how many will actually stick around for another academic year in hoped of being drafted next year? Honest questions, insights and opinions welcomed. Stay healthy everyone !
This will lead to a lot of grad transfers/grad school. Seniors aren’t guaranteed aid, and aid can be obtained easily in other ways as a grad student. To say a lot of seniors will stick around may be significantly premature. Ivy League, NEAC, SWAC, MEAC etc, the many other conf as a majority of colleges are not even close to fully funded to the tune of 11.75, players of schools that receive zero aid to little aid will move on or move to their next phase of life. I.E. Ivy League where guys aren’t allowed to stick around after graduation.
This is before mentioning those with lucrative jobs/ major internships lined up already who choose to move on. Schools generally re up their senior scholarships when resigning scholarship forms before SR year, knowing guys are going to graduate to boost the budget/protect for certain instances.
If guys stick around they’ll probably be tasked with internships more so than actual classes, finish up their credits to graduate, or like I said go to grad school. Internships they couldn’t really get to before. This doesn’t seem like a significant problem. Age is crucial in getting drafted and signed. I feel like a lot more seniors will sign if that’s their said goal, because there’s a real chance they’ll make make more than a typrical senior sign, and there’s a significant possibility that staying a year may prevent them from getting drafted. Senior signs make significantly less than the 20K ceiling. Same with some JRs who know their draft profile, and the fact they know they’ll be looked at the same as a sr sign would be next draft. I can’t really see a mass return as some seem to predict. Some seniors will return for a final hurrah, some will move on, some will go to grad school, not many will return to improve their “draft status” unless there’s confidence they can vault into 1st round/comp rounds. Some will take the 10-15K hoping to start their careers, some others will take the 5 K hoping they can impress to where they’re more than just a filler in short season. That said the idea of Srs returning to improve their draft stock is somewhat of an “unrealistic misnomer.” There will be relatively very few, much the same as JRs.