The record number of underclassmen that declared early eligibility for the NFL draft this year (98) has been a hot topic since the draft closed with 36 of them undrafted. How to lower that number in future drafts is no easy question, but Senior Bowl executive director Phil Savage believes he has an answer.
Savage is in favor of pushing the deadline to declare early entry, currently Jan. 15, to a later date. He would also like to see a combine for underclassmen prior to the later deadline, one that might allow some of them to develop a more realistic expectation of where they might be drafted.
"Some of these kids are going to come out regardless. They weren't going to be going back to school or they have families to support or something else. But a lot of them think they run a 4.5 (40-yard dash), and then get to the combine and they run a 4.75 and they're surprised and disappointed with what happens," Savage said, according to ESPN. "That kind of information, maybe that helps reduce the numbers. Maybe we can give them a window where they're really assessed, then understand it and then they say, 'I really need to go back to school.'"
There is no shortage of opinions on the issue, but there isn't much agreement on the right solution, either. NFL Media analysts debated the topic last week. College Football 24/7's Mike Huguenin also suggested a later declaration date could be a good idea, but thinks college coaches would be none too pleased to have to close out their signing classes in early February without knowing which underclassmen would be departing.
That's one issue with Savage's idea. Another issue is the strain it would create for players in the area of time management. With the current mid-January deadline, departing underclassmen don't enroll for the spring semester because they already know they'll be turning pro early. As such, they can devote themselves full time to training for the NFL Scouting Combine. A later deadline would compel underclassmen to enroll for spring classes. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it would certainly slow down the off-campus, full-time training schedules many of them go through in draft preparation.
But if a later declaration deadline would prevent enough bad decisions, a pitfall such as that one shouldn't matter.
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