News SEC limits football signees to 28 per year

Nutt claiming that he oversigned to help out the Miss JC's is BS. He 's just hoping something sticks to the wall. It's kind of like Kiffen saying he's keeping the Tennesee "brand" in the news on purpose when he screws up royally.

What else can they say? ... that the SEC has it in for Miss. junior colleges?

This new rule is more significant than the Saban "bump" rule because it may potentially put SEC schools at a slight disadvantage when recruiting against other conferences. But it had to be done because oversigning by as much as Saban and Nutt did is an unfair advantage. They just want to keep these athletes from signing with someone else.

It's like when NASCAR made rules about gas tank capacities in the 60's and cars suddenly had two miles of fuel line snaking around everywhere.

 

Thanks. I see. The NCAA limit (25) is how many can show up in the fall under schollie, but you can sign more (up to 28 in the SEC) as insurance against losing a few to injury or illness, academic non-qualification, legal problems, etc.

I appreciate the response. :tigereye:

 

You're welcome, and thanks to you and uscvball for being great guests and USC representatives on our board for a few years! I enjoy your posts.

I think most SEC schools oversigned by 2 or 3 per year to cover this situation. Last year, Saban took 32 commits and raised a few eyebrows, this year Houston Nutt at Ole Miss signed 37, and that's outrageous. What was he trying to do? Could he be denying other SEC teams an opportunity to sign a kid that's better than the #26 kid you have on your list? I think the SEC stepped in and did the right thing.

 

The 37 by Nutt just shows you how desparate he is to win. He signs a bunch of guys and prays that somehow they qualify. There is plenty of talent available that are qualifiers. He just wants the best talent, regardless of whether they are cut out to be a student-athlete. Its win at all cost for Nutty.

 

Thanks. I enjoy sometimes seeing things from a Tiger perpsective. There are many knowledgable and insightful posters here, so I do a lot more reading than writing on your site. :wink:

Under the circumstances of Nutt and LS grabbing so many, I can see the need for the league to step in. Good move.

 

I think it will level the playing field against other conferences rather than creating a disadvantage. If you look at the recruiting classes of Big Ten and PAC Ten schools (there may be exceptions here and there) you'll find that they sign much smaller classes than nearly every SEC school. They also have much less academic fallout in initially getting recruits into school.

I've always had a problem with over signing and "funneling" recruits to JC and prep schools. I understand that if the recruit goes this route he doesn't have to honor his initial commitment but I don't think anyone that thinks logically can't connect the dots and see what the expectations are.

Of course, this is JMHO.

 

I haven't done any research to verify this, but it seems to me that more often than not, these kids do end up somewhere other than where they initially signed, a la DeAngelo Benton for us this year.

 

You were quoting me, VAbuckeye, and I wasn't sure what the other conferences do. I was thinking that the other conferences might be "signing away" while the SEC wouln't be able to...That's why I thought it might be a potential disadvantage.

Either way, I think Saban and Nutt were getting greedy by oversigning by so much. They were probably hoping that some of what they were flinging at the wall would stick...and if it didn't then they would have the advantage of at least preventing those academically risky players from signing with someone else.

I'm from New Orleans, and we have a lot of domestic violence here that ends tragically. The prevailing attitude is that "If I can't have you then no one else will either". This makes me a natural sceptic when Houston Nutt makes claims of altruism by helping these poor,academically disadvantaged students be able to stay in Miss. by being placed at regional JC's.

The welfare of the athletes is thus secondary to winning at all costs.

These coaches (Saban and Nutt in particular) can not possibly care about the recruits because if they do qualify, then heads have to roll to make the mandated limits.

But this is not surprising to me because the whole NCAA system is a culture designed to take advantage of the players by denying them any form of recompense for their extreme efforts either monetarily or in kind despite the enormous revenue produced as a fruit of their efforts.

 

these coaches dont do it really any more than any other coach and for most teams it is not as bad as it seems. once you include early enrollees, greyshirts, and guys that do something else like MLB you are generally only looking at at a couple of academic causalities. carroll did it when he had to. so did tressell, tubs, davis, and others. if les came into an unstable situation he would have done it too.

you can sign twenty-two and still worry about the 85 (lsu). it is smart for mid-level teams to take chances on guys that might qualify. florida, usc, and texas would do it if they didnt have top talent already. there is really no need, however, to sign 37. and from an academic standpoint...well, my standpoint, half of these kids should not be going to college immediately anyways.

 

When you refer to Carroll and Tressel if you are saying that they oversigned you are incorrect. Both Ohio State and USC are very stringent in sticking to a realistic number of open scholarships for the upcoming year. I believe the number that Ohio State has available for next season currently is around 16 which may change if there are defections to the NFL after the season.