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When football recruits put pen to paper next week, it could be the last time the first Wednesday in February carries so much meaning for the nationâs college football programs. If the NCAAâs Division I council approves a sweeping package of recruiting reforms at its meeting April 13â14, most of the class of 2018 will sign in mid-December. So get your fill of hat switcheroos and fax machine-related humor. It probably wonât be the same next time.
The new signing period, a three-day window that matches when junior college players are allowed to sign now, wouldnât replace the period that begins with National Signing Day in February. But given how early most recruits make their college choices, the bulk of the signing action likely would move to December, just as most of the National Letters of Intent for basketball are collected in November instead of the also-available April period.
The changes would do more than change when players sign, though. They could fundamentally alter the way the Recruiting Industrial Complex does business in ways that could help the high-schoolers and some of the coaches chasing them. They also might change the way athletic directors decide when to fire and hire coaches. âItâs the most wholesale change to recruiting in the 11 years since I started working in college football,â said Matt Dudek, who serves as Arizonaâs director of on-campus recruiting and player personnel.
Besides the new signing date, the package also contains the following changes:
⢠Schools would be allowed to bring in recruits on official visits (paid for by the school) between April and June of the recruitâs junior year of high school. Currently, schools canât bring in a player on an official visit until Sept. 1 of the playerâs senior year of high school. This could offer a boost to schools that arenât close to recruit-rich areas.
⢠The package also would create a window for camps in June that would allow coaches to work camps in conjunction with other four-year universities but ban them from camps that donât take place on a college campus. This is the most sensible way to settle last yearâs argument over âsatellite camps.â It keeps the best part of coaches leaving campus for campsâall the staffs in the MAC can work Ohio Stateâs camp, for exampleâand eliminates the opportunity for schools to pay exorbitant sums to high schools (which almost always happen to regularly produce great players) to serve as satellite camp hosts.
The earlier signing date remains a half measure that doesnât address as many issues as the elimination of signing day entirely would, but that idea remains a bit too drastic for mainstream acceptance. The oversight committeeâs decision to ditch a proposed June signing period was a good one because that would have only sped up the offer/commitment process more. Allowing for signing less than two months earlier probably wonât accelerate the process much but will allow longtime commitments to end their recruitments as well as force coaches to declare whether their âoffersâ are actually backed up by real scholarships. That could help mitigate some uncomfortable situations.
For example, new/old Connecticut coach Randy Edsall wouldnât have made news last week for dropping a long-committed player less than a month before signing day. Had the December signing period been in effect for this recruiting cycle, New Jersey linebacker Ryan Dickensâcommitted since June 2016âwould have signed a National Letter of Intent before Connecticut AD David Benedict fired Bob Diaco, the coach who recruited Dickens. (Diaco was fired effective Jan. 2, which, conveniently, was a day after his buyout dropped by $1.6 million.) Edsall wouldnât have had the option to stiff a high-schooler under the new rules, though itâs possible Benedict may have made his decision sooner.
Most firings now come in November or early December. Most new coaches get hired in the first two weeks of December. Hiring a new coach days before signing day could create high drama. But when SI asked several Power 5 athletic directors last week if the new signing period would change when the firing/hiring decisions got made, most respondents said it would not. They reasoned that the decision to change coaches is too big to allow the possibility of a few players being signed to change the timetable.
One AD wasnât so sure, though. âIf a school has some high profile commits but a poor record, the early signing day may save a coach his job more so than with the current calendar,â the AD said. âOr schools may try to poach a coach mid-season, which I'm sure would be well received by all.â (That last line dripped with sarcasm.)
The earlier date also could force coaching staffs to declare whether a scholarship offer means what they say it does. Every year, a few players learn shortly before National Signing Day that the âofferâ they thought they had either evaporated or was replaced by an offer to âgrayshirt,â to delay enrollment a semester and go on scholarship in January of the following year. âEverybodyâs going to have to show their cards two months earlier,â Dudek says. And the players left without an offer would have two months to find another scholarship instead of a few weeks. Meanwhile, recruits stringing along more than one staff also would have to declare their intentions earlier.
The change in official visit dates also could help level the playing field for schools such as Nebraska, Oregon State and Syracuse that arenât located in recruiting hotbeds. With more players choosing a school during the summer between their junior and senior years of high school, those schools faced a distinct disadvantage. Itâs much easier for Auburn to convince a recruit to drive two hours from Atlanta for an unofficial visit than it is for Nebraska to convince that same player to drive 15 hours or shell out hundreds of dollars for a plane ticket. Now, the Cornhuskers may have the option to bring in players before the frenzy of summer commitments hits. If those players like Lincoln, they may be willing to pay their own way for an unofficial visit during camp or during football season.
Dudek, whose Wildcats are also reliant on recruits from far away, said staffs will have to be careful with the early official visits. They may wow recruits, but they also may get forgotten after a summer attending camps and official visits to other schools on game weekends in the fall. âItâs good that you can get the kids who canât afford to get to Tucson in there early so you can get them excited,â he said. âBut the Catch-22 of it is if a kid visits April 1 and doesnât sign until Dec. 15, thatâs eight months that he hasnât been on your campus. He hasnât been engulfed in it. He hasnât been to a game.â
The earlier official visits and earlier signing day may also lead to slightly earlier offers, but that might not be as terrible as initially projected. This may force programs to make more offer decisions based on junior film and the spring practice between a prospectâs junior and senior years rather than based on performance in camps and at seven-on-seven tournaments. âThe less of the underwear warrior offers there are, the better youâre going to be,â Dudek said.
Will the changes actually improve the recruiting process for players? They should. The official-visit flexibility should allow prospects to see more places without spending so much money. The choice of signing date should allow them to sign sooner with a school theyâve fallen in love with or narrow their choices after the first wave has signed.
It feels unusual to use this phrase with regard to the NCAAâs legislative process, but an awful lot of common sense was used to create these proposals. Hereâs hoping itâs the start of a trend.
It's the end of signing day as we know itâand thatâs good
The new signing period, a three-day window that matches when junior college players are allowed to sign now, wouldnât replace the period that begins with National Signing Day in February. But given how early most recruits make their college choices, the bulk of the signing action likely would move to December, just as most of the National Letters of Intent for basketball are collected in November instead of the also-available April period.
The changes would do more than change when players sign, though. They could fundamentally alter the way the Recruiting Industrial Complex does business in ways that could help the high-schoolers and some of the coaches chasing them. They also might change the way athletic directors decide when to fire and hire coaches. âItâs the most wholesale change to recruiting in the 11 years since I started working in college football,â said Matt Dudek, who serves as Arizonaâs director of on-campus recruiting and player personnel.
Besides the new signing date, the package also contains the following changes:
⢠Schools would be allowed to bring in recruits on official visits (paid for by the school) between April and June of the recruitâs junior year of high school. Currently, schools canât bring in a player on an official visit until Sept. 1 of the playerâs senior year of high school. This could offer a boost to schools that arenât close to recruit-rich areas.
⢠The package also would create a window for camps in June that would allow coaches to work camps in conjunction with other four-year universities but ban them from camps that donât take place on a college campus. This is the most sensible way to settle last yearâs argument over âsatellite camps.â It keeps the best part of coaches leaving campus for campsâall the staffs in the MAC can work Ohio Stateâs camp, for exampleâand eliminates the opportunity for schools to pay exorbitant sums to high schools (which almost always happen to regularly produce great players) to serve as satellite camp hosts.
The earlier signing date remains a half measure that doesnât address as many issues as the elimination of signing day entirely would, but that idea remains a bit too drastic for mainstream acceptance. The oversight committeeâs decision to ditch a proposed June signing period was a good one because that would have only sped up the offer/commitment process more. Allowing for signing less than two months earlier probably wonât accelerate the process much but will allow longtime commitments to end their recruitments as well as force coaches to declare whether their âoffersâ are actually backed up by real scholarships. That could help mitigate some uncomfortable situations.
For example, new/old Connecticut coach Randy Edsall wouldnât have made news last week for dropping a long-committed player less than a month before signing day. Had the December signing period been in effect for this recruiting cycle, New Jersey linebacker Ryan Dickensâcommitted since June 2016âwould have signed a National Letter of Intent before Connecticut AD David Benedict fired Bob Diaco, the coach who recruited Dickens. (Diaco was fired effective Jan. 2, which, conveniently, was a day after his buyout dropped by $1.6 million.) Edsall wouldnât have had the option to stiff a high-schooler under the new rules, though itâs possible Benedict may have made his decision sooner.
Most firings now come in November or early December. Most new coaches get hired in the first two weeks of December. Hiring a new coach days before signing day could create high drama. But when SI asked several Power 5 athletic directors last week if the new signing period would change when the firing/hiring decisions got made, most respondents said it would not. They reasoned that the decision to change coaches is too big to allow the possibility of a few players being signed to change the timetable.
One AD wasnât so sure, though. âIf a school has some high profile commits but a poor record, the early signing day may save a coach his job more so than with the current calendar,â the AD said. âOr schools may try to poach a coach mid-season, which I'm sure would be well received by all.â (That last line dripped with sarcasm.)
The earlier date also could force coaching staffs to declare whether a scholarship offer means what they say it does. Every year, a few players learn shortly before National Signing Day that the âofferâ they thought they had either evaporated or was replaced by an offer to âgrayshirt,â to delay enrollment a semester and go on scholarship in January of the following year. âEverybodyâs going to have to show their cards two months earlier,â Dudek says. And the players left without an offer would have two months to find another scholarship instead of a few weeks. Meanwhile, recruits stringing along more than one staff also would have to declare their intentions earlier.
The change in official visit dates also could help level the playing field for schools such as Nebraska, Oregon State and Syracuse that arenât located in recruiting hotbeds. With more players choosing a school during the summer between their junior and senior years of high school, those schools faced a distinct disadvantage. Itâs much easier for Auburn to convince a recruit to drive two hours from Atlanta for an unofficial visit than it is for Nebraska to convince that same player to drive 15 hours or shell out hundreds of dollars for a plane ticket. Now, the Cornhuskers may have the option to bring in players before the frenzy of summer commitments hits. If those players like Lincoln, they may be willing to pay their own way for an unofficial visit during camp or during football season.
Dudek, whose Wildcats are also reliant on recruits from far away, said staffs will have to be careful with the early official visits. They may wow recruits, but they also may get forgotten after a summer attending camps and official visits to other schools on game weekends in the fall. âItâs good that you can get the kids who canât afford to get to Tucson in there early so you can get them excited,â he said. âBut the Catch-22 of it is if a kid visits April 1 and doesnât sign until Dec. 15, thatâs eight months that he hasnât been on your campus. He hasnât been engulfed in it. He hasnât been to a game.â
The earlier official visits and earlier signing day may also lead to slightly earlier offers, but that might not be as terrible as initially projected. This may force programs to make more offer decisions based on junior film and the spring practice between a prospectâs junior and senior years rather than based on performance in camps and at seven-on-seven tournaments. âThe less of the underwear warrior offers there are, the better youâre going to be,â Dudek said.
Will the changes actually improve the recruiting process for players? They should. The official-visit flexibility should allow prospects to see more places without spending so much money. The choice of signing date should allow them to sign sooner with a school theyâve fallen in love with or narrow their choices after the first wave has signed.
It feels unusual to use this phrase with regard to the NCAAâs legislative process, but an awful lot of common sense was used to create these proposals. Hereâs hoping itâs the start of a trend.
It's the end of signing day as we know itâand thatâs good
