One problem many college coaches and football players have seen with the draft process is that many underclassmen don’t get the opportunity to gauge where they could end up in the draft before making a final decision on whether to leave or return to college. It looks like Alabama head coach Nick Saban wants to change that.
He said at SEC Media Days on Wednesday that he is meeting with the NFL to discuss the possibility of an underclassmen draft combine, which could give them better reason to head to the league or return to college for another season. As it stands now, underclassmen either declare or remain in school, but have no in-between.
“I think the NFL is very much interested in this,” Saban said. “We have a meeting scheduled in the near future to discuss some ways to implement this.”
He talked about how only a fraction of the underclassmen that declare get drafted and most of them don’t end up getting a job in the NFL. This leaves them at an awkward position and hurts their chances of having a career.
“There is a cross-section of people out there who maybe aren’t giving young men responsible information about making this decision, which is indicative of 107 guys going out for the draft last year. Probably at least half of those guys probably shouldn’t have made that decision relative to whether they didn’t get picked, or where they got picked,” Saban said. “They’d have been better off enhancing their draft status by staying in school and developing as a player. There is a group of people out there not being responsible on how they help these guys, and create unrealistic expectations of what their future might be as a football player based on where they are in their development.”
Currently, the NBA allows underclassmen to declare for their draft and participate in a combine before making a final decision. Of course, far less players are selected in that draft compared to the NFL’s, but it has been proven that it can work and ends up being for the best for the student-athletes.
What do you think, football fans? Does Nick Saban have a good point that there needs to be an underclassmen combine?
