Question of the Day #2: NFL Eligibility

Q: What should the rules for draft eligibility be for an incoming collegiate player?

A: Anybody coming out of high school should be eligible.

Of course that sounds nutty. The NFL has these rules in place to protect the athletes, right? Well barring some unfair lawsuit against the NFL, that's not my idea of how things should be. I believe anybody who is ready to compete professionally coming out of high school should be eligible to enter the NFL draft.

This idea popped into my head due to a Pete Fiutak Cavalcade of Whimsy where he mentioned how the rules are exclusive to some extent. The blurb raises some good points about how anybody who is ready to join the NFL should have an opportunity to make money for themselves. Regardless of your opinion of the NCAA holding itself up as some noble institution and then manage to not pay their players (although they certainly get some type of compensation for attending college for free), the fact that the players aren't getting paid relative to the product they put on (like selling Gator jerseys with Tebow's number or something like that) should raise some alarms.

The bottom line is that even if the eligibility rules are in place to protect the athletes from physical harm, it's a completely arbitrary system. Some players will be ready to compete at that level sooner than others whereas others will spend the four years in college developing. Sure it may suck the fun out of college football for the enthusiasts like us who enjoy the more stable atmosphere compared to college basketball, but if a guy is ready, I don't see the reason for him to sit out three years after high school in order to work at a job where he can perform. It seems dangerous on the surface, but with advisors and trainers today, I'm sure these players know their bodies and their status as potential NFL players better than we do. If they want to take the risk of playing one season of college football and trying to get molded into some NFL prospect, then they probably deserve that opportunity to take the risk.

Of course, the NFL is a private institution and I'm not going to tell them how to do their business. If it's in the financial interest of the league to bar players for a certain amount of time, then be my guest. It's not worth it to the fans or the players to sustain from enjoying the product or declaring a boycott on the system, so obviously it's found some type of market equilibrium. I just think it would be more fair to allow people the same opportunity across the board and that the NFL is mistaken here. Changing the policy won't affect much, as it only will apply to the exceptions rather than the rules (like in the case of a Larry Fitzgerald after his freshman year, something like that).