12-02-2022, 06:50 PM
Quote:* As Shaw surveyed the changing landscape both at Stanford and nationally (as well as with rules changes related to redshirts, transfers, the COVID year, etc.), he confronted a confounding "roster management" situation, as he frequently reminded us. It's so hard to know how many scholarship spots you have in this environment. To make this more manageable, he leaned into the shifting norms above and encouraged players to go to the NFL when they could, to get masters degrees elsewhere when they could. Win-win, his high-minded, deontological, football loser mentality thought.
This doesn't make sense. Roster management is a lot easier when you can pick amongst a plethora of seniors who have eligibility left and you can decide after signing day who to offer a fifth year based on the number of remaining scholarships and positional need. The current system increases roster uncertainty, because you don't know who will be available for a fifth year until after the early signing period, so there is the possibility both of having to turn away potential contributors or (more likely) having a player you may have counted on enter the portal or decide to move on.
BC