College football is entering dangerous territory as more and more of its stars are opting out of post season bowl games to begin training for the NFL combines if they feel they are prospects.
Latest to bail out are Notre Dame junior first team All American safety Kyle Hamilton and Kyren Williams, the team’s leading rusher, who both chose to declare for the NFL draft and will not to play in the Jan. 1 Fiesta Bowl against Oklahoma State. We get it where the 6-4, 220-pound Hamilton is concerned. He is a potenial top 10 pick in the NFL draft who is coming back after missing the last five games of the regular season with a knee injury. Williams, who was the Irish’s most productive offensive player in 2021 with 1,002 yards rushing and 14 touchdowns with 42 catches for 359 yards and three touchdowns, is also thinking about his future.
The list is growing in a sport that has evolved into a business decision for the best players.
Oregon All American defensive end Kayvon Thibodeaux, considered the potential No. 1 pick overall, announced on Instagram he will forgo the Ducks’ Dec. 29 Alamo Bowl game against Oklahoma. Arkansas outstanding wide receiver Treylon Burks will not play against Penn State in the Outback Bowl after putting together a stellar season with 1,104 receiving yards on 66 catches, including 11 touchdowns. He also rushed 14 times for 112 yards and scored another TD. SMU outstanding wide outs Danny Gray (803 receiving yards and nine touchdowns on 49 catches) and Reggie Roberson (625 yards and six touchdowns on 51 catches) also bailed out.
Most of them are reacting to the story of former Notre Dame linebacker Jaylon Smith who was considered one of the top overall prospects in the 2016 draft and likely would have been a top-10 until he tore his ACL and LCL in his left knee and suffered nerve damage during the Fiesta Bowl, which was not a CFP playoff game that season. Smith dropped into the second round and dropped into the second round of the draft, losing millions in the process.
It has now reached a point where elite players with pro ambitions do not want not to risk serious injury to play in what they consider a meaningless exhibiiton game if they are not playing in the four-team College Football Playoff.semi-finals. In the mind of some, they are finally standing up for their rights when their coaches make millions in salary while they make nothing over and above their athletic scholarship and full cost of tuition.
Some coaches like Mike Leach of Mississippi State have railed against the idea of players steppping on tradition.
“You/ve got an obligation to the place that helped build and develop you and finish it out in the bowl,” Leach said. “That’s part of it. You owe it to your team, owe it to your fans, owe it to your coaches and it’s the most bizarre thing in the world to me.
“Somebody says, ‘Well, I can’t play one more game.’ They think they’re going to have a storied 10-year NFL career, and then they can’t play one more college game. Well, that’s ridiculous. I mean, guys will go to the NFL, they’ll make the Pro Bowl and then they’ll play in the Pro Bowl. It’s one of the biggest absurdities that I’ve see, and it’s selfish, too.”
But Leach’s comments ring hypocritical when he makes millions in salary compensation while most in the state lives below the poverty level and many others in his profession. like Brian Kelly who left Notre Dame for LSU, think nothing about walking away as soon as a bigger job becomes available.
