Everyone is wondering how to fix the problems in NCAA recruiting violations, agents, and early entry into the NBA. Well they can look no further than the MLB…..they have it right. The NBA needs to adopt MLB’s drafting policy in that everyone in the country is available for the draft. Anyone who doesn’t like their draft position upon being drafted may elect to accept a college scholarship offer and enroll at a university. However upon enrolling they must stay at the school for a minimum of 3 years. This puts all the work on the NBA to find the players who are actually coming out and will sign with their team after being drafted, it lets the kids who go to school,actually go to school long enough to earn or be close to earning a degree, and eliminates the problems stemming from agents.
The way the system is now there are problems across the board. The NBA says that all players are eligible for the draft 1 year after their high school graduation. Any college player who enters the draft and hires an agent or stays in the draft is no longer eligible for the NCAA. This hurts the kids the most in that the elite high school players have to go to college, a prep school, or not play for a full year. We are telling an 18 year old kid he doesn’t have the right to earn a living playing ball for a year but can go to war. These kids could get injured and lose all that they could have had. The one year at college is a joke anyhow, these guys only have to go to class the first semester because by the time they are ineligible they are drafted and don’t care about going to school or the NCAA. If I am OJ Mayo what does it matter to me to take the money. I get free room and board for a year, I’m not going to be punished, only USC but USC just used me to get into the tournament, increase ticket sales, and make more money.
Secondly so a kid wants to test the waters and is lied to by numerous scouts, agents, and friends about how good they are and where they will be drafted. Then they go in the second round or are undrafted and now what…can’t go back to school. I understand the point of losing amateur status but if they aren’t drafted, don’t have an agent, and never play pro ball then they are still amateurs! Why are these kids being punished? Allow them to come back to school and work on their game while finishing their education. Both of these examples show that the current system is not in the best interest of the kids which is what both the NBA and NCAA like to say.
Lastly even though some schools make money for one season on these kids, there are also negatives. Coaches will have to decide if it is worth it to recruit these “one and done” players and closely monitor them while they are there to make sure there are no violations of these kids being paid. USC is looking at being penalized for OJ Mayo and for what, a first round loss in the NCAA Tournament. Coaches also are continually having to remake their teams and never know whom they are going to have one year to the next because a kid might opt to enter the NBA draft and be drafted or go undrafted but not be able to return to school.
By adopting the draft policy of MLB and making every player eligible to be drafted it will eliminate the “one and done” college player. The NBA would still get their “elite” players and sooner rather than later. This also would allow kids who are taken in the second round(non-guaranteed contracts) or undrafted to return to school as long as they did not sign with an agent. Speaking of agents this would also help eliminate the “feeding frenzy” by agents on these kids. They would only go after the elite players because thats where the money would be and would not be trying to break NCAA violations by tampering with college underclassmen. They would know if these kids weren’t good enough to be drafted, then they will be in school till they are 21. Finally NCAA institutions would not have to worry so much about recruiting violations stemming from a player’s amateur status and teams would know they are getting a commitment from a player for at least 3 years. The way I see if by making this simple change it’s a win, win, win for all involved. So what is the NBA and NCAA waiting for…oh probably too busy counting their money!
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