Jay Paterno on Oversigning
Recruiting is now valued as a second season for football coaches. After a difficult season, one of the best defenses a coach can mount is a class ranking among the top five or top 10. It creates a public perception that your program is on the rise.
The pursuit of recruiting rankings has led to over-signing—the more you sign, the more points you get. Over-signing is signing more players than the NCAA allows in a given year.
At the major college football level, NCAA rules allow you to enroll no more than 25 new scholarship players a year. The NCAA also limits the total number of scholarship players on your team to 85.
Those are hard caps and are non-negotiable. The limit is the limit--or is it?
There are three accounting tricks used to get around the limit. For years, one of the tricks was to have a player graduate early and start in January. You could essentially back-date that player to the previous class (unless you signed the limit the previous year).
The second trick is pushing a few players back to the following January, essentially moving that scholarship to the following year.
The third trick is to sign players who will not make the NCAA’s initial academic eligibility standards, and stash them in a junior college so that no one else can sign them. It is a game of keep-away. It also explains how one school was able to sign 37 players in 2009 (the highest number of signees in the last 10 years).
Recently, there has been some media discussion about the ethics (or lack thereof) in continually over-signing. Over the past 10 years, an average of nine of the top-20 rated Rivals teams over-signed. One particular team has signed 143 players the past five years (an average of nearly 29 per year) and 275 over the past 10 years.
Now, I am no math major, but I do believe even Enron’s accounting firm would have a hard time making those numbers fit the NCAA’s rules.
But even with all the evidence, the tough questions remain unasked. During one network’s signing-day coverage, they interviewed four coaches who had over-signed in a two-hour window. Not once did anyone interviewing the coaches ask for the math equation that makes 27 or 29 or even 31 fit into 25.
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February 12th, 2011 - 17:37
“The third trick is to sign players who will not make the NCAA’s initial academic eligibility standards, and stash them in a junior college so that no one else can sign them”
I would expect a long-time assitant coach to know the rules better than that. If a signee does not qualify, then the NLI is voided and the recruit is free to sign with whomever he chooses once he does qualify.
February 12th, 2011 - 18:48
Yes, Vesper has more insight than Jay Paterno on the tricks of recruiting. No wonder PSU has had its share of problems — they don’t even know the rules, like Vesper does. Pretty funny.
February 12th, 2011 - 19:17
“Eligibility Requirements. This NLI shall be declared null and void if, by the opening day of classes in fall 2011, I have not met (1) the NCAA initial eligibility requirements; (2) the NCAA, conference or institution’s requirements for financial aid to student-athletes; or (3) the two-year college transfer requirements, provided I have submitted all necessary documents for eligibility determination.”
http://www.ncaa.org/wps/wcm/connect/nli/NLI/NLI+Provisions/Letter+Becomes+Null+and+Void
When an NLI is voided, it means the recruit is free to sign with whomever he wants. I say again that Jay Paterno was totally wrong when he stated “no one else can sign them”. Whether he doesn’t know the rules or was intentionally being misleading, I do not know.
February 13th, 2011 - 01:54
You are uniformed or naive if you don’t understand how coaches shuttle players to Juco programs to keep them away from other programs. You think you can go to a website, read a provision in the NLI and gain an understanding of how this process works?
I’ll give the answer…
1. Coaches have the recruit sign the NLI not knowing if he will qualify via the clearinghouse or with the school(or in some cases, KNOWING that will likely not qualify).
2. At this moment, no one can recruit the player.
3. Other schools sign their recruits, normally maximizing out the class.
4. In July, the player doesn’t qualify either via the clearinghouse or with the school admissions dept.
5. Coach has player sign with Juco team that he has a relationship with, telling them, we will have a scholarship for you in two years.
The player might have been able to qualify at other schools but by this time the schools have signed and admitted their classes… In any event, a school that does this to 5-6 recruits just played a game to keep the talent away from the other schools…
February 13th, 2011 - 02:36
I agree with 1-5 but fail to see the harm. The players are choosing to sign with a particular school because that’s the school they want to play for; in some cases their dream school. If the player fails to qualify, he goes to JUCO motivated to succeed because if he does he knows that he will have a scholarship waiting for him at the 4 year school he wants to play for. If, during those 2 years, he decides he doesn’t want to play for that 4 year school anymore, he simply has to re-open his recruitment since he is not bound by the initial NLI.
As a former player, tell me honestly, do you think that current high school, JUCO, and college football players oppose the practice of sign and place? If so, please explain.
February 13th, 2011 - 12:34
I am sure that players that never make it back from the JUCO ranks might have an issue with it if they could have gained admission to another 4 yr school initially.
Now, players have to take some responsibility here as well. Is it worth going to JUCO or trying to sign on with someone else is January.
But we are talking about the behavior of the institutions whom I hold to a higher standard. Adults shouldn’t be playing games with the lives of these kids.
February 13th, 2011 - 02:45
One more thing I forgot to mention. The only cases I’ve heard of where a student failed to meet the school’s admissions dept (as opposed to clearinghouse) were Big Ten signees and the Big Ten schools are not associated with the sign and place practice that you seem to oppose. I don’t have a link to support it, but I believe that the majority of sign and place players are cases where they failed to meet clearinghouse standards which means that they weren’t going to be able to play for other 4 year schools anyway.
February 13th, 2011 - 10:50
Vesper, are you stating that Jay Paterno does not understand the NCAA NLI regulations? Is this really your stance? Just admit you were wrong in your prior post. Or do you stick by your stance and believe that Jay does not understand how things “really work” in football recruiting? Please clarify.
On another issue: Clearly, if you sign the player, you gain an edge in “re-recruiting” him if he does go JUCO. In addition, hurdling the NCAA clearinghouse can occur in several ways — such as a “great” last semester that raises the HS GPA or maybe a school “unexpectedly” submits a change of grade and a “D” becomes an “A” or maybe the student takes an online course or two. These are all developments that can occur in the time period between Feb and July. Miracles sure do happen a lot for hs football players who are on shaky academic ground.
February 13th, 2011 - 11:00
I did clarify in my previous response to you. Either he is misinformed or he is being intentionally misleading.
Why would I admit that I am wrong? I have the regulations from the NLI website to back up my assertion. If Jay Paterno or anyone else provides evidence that a JUCO player is unable to sign with any school but the one he originally signed with, then I will gladly admit that I am wrong. Do you have such evidence, rich?
February 13th, 2011 - 10:37
Of course, although the coach does not necessarily have to wait until July to let the athlete know the “truth” about their academic record. As Ole Miss showed, first sign them and then a coach can figure out who is going to enroll where (this is part of the “effective roster maximization” process that the defenders of oversigning mention) and when.
February 13th, 2011 - 10:41
Vesper, are you stating that Jay Paterno does not understand the NCAA NLI regulations? Is this really your stance? Just admit you were wrong in your prior post. Or do you stick by your stance and believe that Jay does not understand how things “really work” in football recruiting? Please clarify.
February 13th, 2011 - 10:57
I did clarify in my previous response to you. Either he is misinformed or he is being intentionally misleading.
Why would I admit that I am wrong? I have the regulations from the NLI website to back up my assertion. If Jay Paterno or anyone else provides evidence that a JUCO player is unable to sign with any school but the one he originally signed with, then I will gladly admit that I am wrong. Do you have such evidence, rich?
February 14th, 2011 - 16:34
If Jay Paterno or anyone else provides evidence that a JUCO player is unable to sign with any school but the one he originally signed with, then I will gladly admit that I am wrong. Do you have such evidence, rich?
This is a “red herring” if I ever read one. This was not the focus of his comments at all? Are you intentionally misconstruing his comments?
February 13th, 2011 - 09:20
This article brings up an interesting point; that one reason for oversigning is simply to increase a program’s recruiting ranking, in which a lot of fans place some value. OTOH, I’m sure Texas and ND, for instance, would rather have a top team on the field, instead of high recruiting rankings over the last several years. In the end I think its more about the numbers game – even highly ranked recruits can be a bust, and bringing in more recruits is insurance against under-performance, injury, etc. You just have to find a way to get rid of the non-contributors to stay under the overall cap.
February 13th, 2011 - 12:10
Nutt, Saban, and Miles all seem to be very good at “roster management”
February 13th, 2011 - 12:26
This should read…
The Crimson Tide is absurdly loaded thanks to oversigning the roster by Nick Saban.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/605720-college-football-2011-10-programs-facing-off-season-quarterback-controversies/page/6
February 13th, 2011 - 12:52
I’m not sure how 2 four stars (McCarron, Sims) and 1 three star (Ely) at QB equates to “absurdly loaded”. Compare that to, say, Nebraska: 4 four stars (Green, Carnes, Starling, Turner) and 2 three stars (Martinez, Spano). Source: Rivals
February 13th, 2011 - 14:33
Spano will never see the field. He has had 3 knee surgeries in 2 years. He is what you would call a great candidate for Saban to put him on medical hardship. Starling probably wont come because he is projected as a first round pick in the MLB draft.
February 13th, 2011 - 14:36
also, I think the article was talking about “absurdly loaded” on the entire team with the ONLY real question being at QB
February 13th, 2011 - 15:08
Well, even if I remove those 2 players, Nebraska is still more loaded at QB than Alabama.
Ohio State: 1 five star, 2 four stars, 2 three stars.
Oklahoma: 2 four stars, 2 three stars.
Georgia: 2 fours stars, 1 three star.
Florida: 4 four stars, 1 three star.
Notre Dame: 1 five star, 1 four star, 3 three stars.
Point being that Alabama is not loaded at the QB position relative to other major programs.
February 13th, 2011 - 21:50
i dont really care about star rankings. Roy Helu was a 3 star and he ended up being Nebraska’s all time leading rusher. Martinez was not highly recruited 3 star but he was recruited at a different position other than QB EXCEPT for Nebraska. They gave him a chance and he may pan out. He needs to stay healthy and we will see. Green was a 4 star but he is not a good qb. IMO he needs to switch positions. You guys know as much as I know stars really dont matter.
Again, they are talking about the rest of the team loaded with the ONLY real question at quarterback.
February 15th, 2011 - 12:01
Again nothing accomplished with all this banter back and forth. The only thing I’ve seen from this site is the Big 10 wants to win on the field but has rules in place that put it at a disadvantage to SEC teams. The Big 10 wants to impose it’s will and rules on the SEC and the SEC wants to be left alone. The Big 10 people want everyone to believe that it has the only “ethical” rule (thereby making it the superior conference) and wants to point out the fallacies in the SEC and NCAA rules. The SEC people like things the way they are and are playing by the rules–no harm, no foul. This is what it always comes down to. The Big 10 wants only the best students to play college football (poor, dumb kids from the south shouldn’t be given any chances if they can’t qualify immediately). What a waste of time and effort. No wonder the NCAA hasn’t adopted the Big 10 rule.
February 16th, 2011 - 01:40
That is an old southern argument… Let’s not engage in intellectual debate…lets just play the southern victim (don’t tread on me…we handle our own just fine). Give me a break. Many people on this board don’t give a darn about the Big 10, SEC debate. I personally care about student-athletes and institutional credibility. So don’t try to simplify this argument to an old southern paradigm…
February 16th, 2011 - 05:01
My point exactly. This is where the debate started and it hasn’t progressed from there.
March 27th, 2011 - 09:29
While Josh fails to discuss the fact that Big Ten schools recently oversigned, other blogs have taken note:
http://www.linebacker-u.com/2011/03/did-penn-state-oversign-for-2011-kinda.html
http://leatherhelmetblog.com/2011-articles/march/penn-state-oversigns-too.html
I love the arguement that what Penn State did is ok because it’s allowed by Big Ten rules, but what Alabama does is still evil even though it’s allowed by NCAA rules.
March 27th, 2011 - 13:20
Ever consider that I might have known about this article written by Mike at LBU before it came out? I am going to do a quick follow up on it, but Mike has done most of the work already.
March 27th, 2011 - 13:36
No, I never considered it because you’ve never talked about the fact that PSU is oversigned on this blog.
March 27th, 2011 - 13:24
You should also know that I asked Chad Hawley about oversigning and according to him only 1 team is over, so it must be Penn State, which means that the other 3 in the cup standings are off. Don’t worry, I plan to do a write up about that as well. One explanation that everyone needs to consider is that the SPES numbers were the best we could get from the Internet and might be off. What is not off is the number of departures and the number of players signed, and by using those two numbers we can back into the SPES number to balance. For example, in Alabama’s case, in order to balance the budget their SPES number from last year would have to be 73. And given that we know that they were over last year and had to make cuts all the way up until the deadline there is no way they finished the year with 73 guys. I’ll have more on this — don’t worry.
March 27th, 2011 - 13:42
When you started the oversigning cup, the very first point that I made was that SPES was going to be largely guesswork since schools don’t typically release to the public which players are on scholarship and which ones aren’t. So now you’re going to retroactively adjust the SPES of Big Ten schools so they they won’t be oversigned? No bias there.
March 28th, 2011 - 11:04
That’s a mighty big assumption to make. If I remember correctly, you had links to verify the numbers of Ohio State, Michigan State, and Michigan. Hell, Hawley might be talking about Illinois. They signed 27 on NSD and they had 14 seniors (at least 1 of whom was squad team) and lost 3 juniors to the draft. I don’t know what their SPES was, but I’m surprised that you haven’t looked into it – oh, wait, Illinois isn’t in the SEC, are they?. Another interesting thing about Illinois, they actually had 29 commits, but 2 didn’t sign LOIs (Daniel Rhodes, Hunter Wells). Since Illinois didn’t have any early enrollees they would have been unable to sign both those players because of the 28 signing limit. Sounds like a similar situation to Mauldin and Montgomery at South Carolina.
http://www.illinihq.com/blogs/recruiting_wrap/2011/02/03/zook__class_addresses_needs_across_the
Here’s what Zook had to say about the numbers at his NSD press conference:
“There’s 27 guys, and we’ve signed more than that in years going past. But you know we’ll just have to wait and see how it all works out. Everybody knows exactly where they are and what they have to do. We’ll see how it all falls out.”
(taken form the 2:20 mark of this video: http://www.fightingillini.com/allaccess/?media=223330)
Then again, maybe it’s Indiana. They had 18 seniors (http://espn.go.com/college-football/team/roster/_/id/84/indiana-hoosiers) and lost 1 underclassman to the draft yet signed 21. And we know that they were at 85 scholarships at the beginning of the 2010 season:
http://blogs.heraldtimesonline.com/iusp/?p=9000
March 28th, 2011 - 11:24
Indiana head coach at NSD press conference:
“In the Big Ten you are allowed to oversign by a couple spaces. That means if no one leaves the program, or medically injured or academically ineligible, then technically they would come mid-year. But each year as you go through, guys jump into the league going pro, guys transferring, injuries that become a medical scholarship. Typically there are spaces that open up. So every Big Ten school can technically go over by a couple. We actually have a couple in our back pocket, but we’re not in any hurry to distribute those to anyone right now.”
http://iuhoosiers.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/020211aak.html
If Indiana has “a couple in [their] back pocket”, sounds like they may only be oversigned by 1 as opposed to the 3 allowed by Big Ten rules. At any rate, doesn’t sound like he’s opposed to the concept of oversigning to mitigate expected attrition.
March 28th, 2011 - 11:35
Not really, the associate commissioner is on record that there is only one team over…fwiw, I’m working on a formal request to the conference to get access to their data.
March 28th, 2011 - 12:07
Given that the B1G controls the number of LOI’s schools are allowed to give out and they never allow a school to give out more than 3 over what they have room for under the 85 limit, I find it hard to believe that Illinois would be over that far. Hawley said 1 school went over…we are working to get their data, if we get it we will share it here.
March 28th, 2011 - 19:23
According to this Illinois recruiting expert, there are 3 more recruits (in addition to the 27 signees and Rhodes and Wells) who didn’t sign LOIs but plan on greyshirting: http://www.illinihq.com/chats/2011/02/04/cody_westerlunds_recruiting_chat__pm/
For the record, I don’t have a problem with it as long as everyone knows the plan ahead of time. But a pretty easy way to circumvent the Big Ten signing rules would be to just have your greyshirts not sign LOIs.
May 19th, 2011 - 08:34
New article mentioning Penn State’s oversigning:
http://pittsburgh.sbnation.com/penn-st-nittany-lions/2011/5/18/2177192/penn-state-depth-chart-injuries-oversigning
Here’s an article on Penn State’s recent transfer Brandon Ware:
http://blog.pennlive.com/bobflounders/2011/05/report_penn_state_defensive_ta.html
Since PSU is oversigned, does the Ware transfer warrant any scrutiny from this site?
May 19th, 2011 - 18:15
Another article on the Ware transfer as it possibly relates to oversigning:
http://blog.pennlive.com/pasports/2011/05/penn_state_football_oversigning_ware.html
May 20th, 2011 - 19:53
Apparently, 2011 wasn’t Penn State’s first time oversigning. This blog entry is from just after NSD in 2009:
http://www.blackshoediaries.com/2009/2/9/753110/that-was-fun-let-s-do-it-a
May 19th, 2011 - 08:41
Add Wisconsin to the list of oversigned schools in the Big Ten:
http://www.buckys5thquarter.com/2011/5/17/2176359/zach-brown-to-leave-badgers-transfer-elsewhere
Cuts?
Wisconsin, Michigan State, Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, Illinois, Indiana all oversigned, yet Hawley stated only 1 Big Ten school oversigned, right? Makes you wonder how truthful these teams are in reporting their budget numbers to the Big Ten office.