The NCAA Division I Council’s decision to grant all spring-sport student-athletes an additional year of eligibility at the end of March presents a challenge for college baseball programs across the country.
College baseball coaches face challenges each year when it comes to roster management and recruiting future classes. The bulk of this is trying to determine who exactly the program may lose to Major League Baseball a year or two in advance.
West Virginia, for example, is actively recruiting 2022 and 2023 classes. The 2021 class was filled prior to the 2020 season’s cancellation due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
But while the council's decision gives student-athletes, specifically seniors, an opportunity to return after having their final seasons cut short, the fact all freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors get an extra year of eligibility makes the roster management and recruiting part even harder for sports like baseball that have scholarship and roster limits.
Programs are held to 35-man rosters with 11.7 scholarships available for 27 players and each of those 27 on scholarship must receive at least 25% of a scholarship.
Even with the council allowing programs to go over the 35-man roster limit for next season as long as that overage consists of only seniors who decide to return, it's unknown if college baseball will go back to the 35-man limit the following year.
If so, that will lead to some tough decisions being made by programs regarding incoming players and players already on the roster.
That additional year of eligibility is guaranteed for players, however, some of their spots on a roster may not.
“I think the biggest issue would be years two through three because it’s not a singular year issue because by granting everybody an additional year of eligibility, this has now become a four-year issue where you’re consistently putting five classes into four years or five classes into a roster size that was built for four classes and a scholarship allotment limit that was built for four classes,” West Virginia assistant baseball coach and recruiting coordinator Steve Sabins told WVSports.com.
Fortunately for West Virginia, the Mountaineers will be in good shape for the immediate future with three seniors and four juniors currently on the roster.
But at the same time though, the 2021 class, for example, was recruited to replace the juniors, but if those juniors don’t get drafted and sign or sign as free agents, they could return to school with two years of eligibility left.
“We had signed a recruiting class based on (Braden Zarbnisky) being gone and (Kevin) Brophy being gone and (Dillon) Meadows being gone, the seniors being gone and we’ve got a bunch of juniors -- Jackson Wolf, Tyler Doanes, Paul McIntosh,” West Virginia head coach Randy Mazey said. “We have to project whether they’re going to be gone or not, so you can’t get caught holding the bag if you think they’re coming back and then they actually leave and you didn’t sign anybody to replace them.”
This trickle-down effect will definitely make its way to the 2022 and 2023 classes.
With 14 true freshmen currently on the roster and 13 coming in from the 2020 recruiting class, that makes the roster managing process even more difficult for the future.
“That’s fine when you don’t have a roster limit,” Mazey said. “But when they say the roster limit is only good for one year and next year we’re back to a 35-man roster limit, then we’ll have 25-30 sophomores in one class on the team on a 35-man roster limit, that can’t work.”
Again, this highlights the already tough job baseball coaches have of filling voids and projecting who they may lose in the future and when, whether they’re currently on the roster or in a future recruiting class.
“We’re the only team that has a professional draft that takes your kids,” Mazey said. “You know, in a normal year we lose 20% of our incoming class, 20% of our current team, you know we don’t know what our team is gonna look like from year to year.”
With this year's MLB Draft containing just five rounds instead of the usual 40, there obviously won’t be near as many players drafted which means they could sign as undrafted free agents for $20,000 or enroll in/return to school.
Last year, the Mountaineers had seven players drafted after the fifth round.
Yes, those players or incoming recruits who you thought you were losing to graduation or the draft will be great to have back on your roster to win and increase the competition across college baseball, but it only further complicates the roster management duty for coaches.
“I guess you can look at it both ways,” Sabins said. “Maybe competitively those guys would really help you, but then if there’s a lot of tough decisions, your younger guys aren’t developing as much and getting as much playing time, so there’s just a lot of different things to consider this time, but I think in general for recruiting, it’s time probably to slow down a little bit and truly evaluate where you’re at and your roster’s at.”
What happens with this issue moving forward is unknown, but Sabins brought up a potential solution that could better help programs navigate their roster management processes.
“The clarity would be very nice if maybe seniors were going to be exempt from a roster limit for four years until everybody that was affected by (the) COVID-19 ruling was out of the system,” he said. “I think that would make a ton of sense and that clarity hasn’t come yet.”
There are many unknowns as of now, but what we do know is that West Virginia will welcome back its three seniors in Brophy, Meadows and Zarbnisky if they decide to return. Those three have yet to come to a final decision.
The council also left it up to programs to decide much scholarship and aid they can provide its seniors if they decide to come back. Returning seniors can receive anywhere from nothing to the same scholarship amount they were getting for the 2020 season.
"We cherish guys that have been in the fire and wanted to be here and led our team," Sabins said. "Those guys will absolutely be taken care of. They absolutely have a spot on this roster. We want them back.”
“They all want to come back and they’re all excited to come back, but they’re all potentially guys that could sign free agent contracts if things fall into place or they could come back and be contributors to our team,” Mazey said. “Who knows what the future’s going to hold, but they’re in a waiting game just like everybody else and trying to stay in shape and do the best they can and just wait to see what happens, but I’d love to have all three of them back.”
In the meantime, Sabins and Mazey have been on the phone with prospects and recruits and evaluating.
No matter what lies ahead, Mazey said that baseball coaches will find a way to deal with all of this, but this ongoing matter may very well change college baseball as we know it.
“The most encouraging thing about the decision that was made was that they did say that since college baseball is a unique entity, we’re going to have to take a more in-depth look at college baseball,” Mazey said. “I’ve been waiting 35 years for that to happen…You know, we cut scholarships from 13 to 11.7, we cut games, we limited the number of kids you can get on scholarship, there are roster limits, we tried to get a third assistant coach that didn’t pass. Every answer that we’ve ever tried to get has been no in college baseball, so hopefully one day the people will get together and you know, logic will prevail.”
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