Posted by Gwmayhem  5/07/2026 4:51 pm | #1 |
The Athletic reported this week about a new player coming to play for Rick Pitno. He is 23 years old and has been playing the past several years on a professional international team. He's making his way to Queens because he'll be making over $4 million per season, a big raise from his current salary. Under current conditions, this player can remain in college until his late 20's. Not exactly what one thinks of when they're thinking about college basketball.
A proposed "5 in 5" rule would bring far more predictability and hopefully, stabilization to the sport. College eligibility will either begin upon high school graduation or a player's 19th birthday, whichever happens first. They will have five years of college eligibility rather than 4; however, the window to remain as a college player will only last 5 years (there would be exceptions for military service, religious missions and pregnancies). Say goodbye to most redshirts and medical waivers.
The stabilization would be greatly magnified if a separate rule limiting the number of times a player can transfer without siting out a season to just once. Without this, we could still see some players playing for 5 schools in 5 years. While player advocates will cry that limiting player movement translates to limiting player opportunities financially, I would argue this several ways. First, schools can start building financial incentives for players to stay at their current school rather than move around. Obviously, this doesn't fully solve the issue. If UNC would like one of GW's players, they will outbid us plain and simple. But, maybe GW keeps a player with that bonus rather than see him go to say DePaul. Second, this will make it much easier on incoming freshmen who aside from the stars in the sport have been losing playing time to more experienced transfers early on in their college careers. And third, to those few out there who care about things like academics, socialization, and a more normalized college experience, diminishing the thought of having to switch schools every year or two can only be considered a good thing.
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Posted by GW Alum Abroad 5/07/2026 5:13 pm | #2 |
I do not disagree, but these are the types of "restrictions" that led to the lawsuits that have submerged us into the current state of disarray we are now in. Age and transfer limits (in the face of all the oodles of money being splashed around) resulted directly in the present day free-for-all. So maybe, instead we limit coaches´ pay to the mean salary of professors with similar seniority at that school, create revenue sharing models for all athletes in an athletic deparment (pooled from all the sports revenue) and force schools to deposit all AD profits in to their schools´ general funds. Then, good ideas like limiting transfers and imposing age requirements could become feasible.
But as long as the coach is the highest paid of all the state employees, the football gate receipts for a single game are greater than the entire physics department annual budget and TV is paying the GDP of a mid-sized European country to transmit it all, then the "talent units" (i.e. the players) deserve to get in on the action with as few obstacles as the mucky-mucks face, too.
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Posted by DC Native 5/07/2026 5:55 pm | #3 |
GW Alum Abroad wrote:
I do not disagree, but these are the types of "restrictions" that led to the lawsuits that have submerged us into the current state of disarray we are now in. Age and transfer limits (in the face of all the oodles of money being splashed around) resulted directly in the present day free-for-all. So maybe, instead we limit coaches´ pay to the mean salary of professors with similar seniority at that school, create revenue sharing models for all athletes in an athletic deparment (pooled from all the sports revenue) and force schools to deposit all AD profits in to their schools´ general funds. Then, good ideas like limiting transfers and imposing age requirements could become feasible.
But as long as the coach is the highest paid of all the state employees, the football gate receipts for a single game are greater than the entire physics department annual budget and TV is paying the GDP of a mid-sized European country to transmit it all, then the "talent units" (i.e. the players) deserve to get in on the action with as few obstacles as the mucky-mucks face, too.
Exactly. Every time the NCAA has tried to put in place some common sense rules, a court of law has overturned them. At this point, I think they have just decided to give up. In my opinion, the only way the NCAA puts these kinds of rules in place is if Congress or a court of law makes them.
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Posted by Gwmayhem 6/23/2026 4:42 pm | #4 |
The rule has passed, and over 50 players are lining up to sue. But of course.
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Posted by Gwmayhem 8/03/2026 11:23 am | #5 |
We are weeks before the start of football season and a few months ahead of the start of the college basketball season with certain rosters very much in limbo. That's because the 5 in 5 rule has passed meaning that an athlete now has five seasons of eligibility to complete in 5 years (with a few restrictions) BUT the NCAA opted to not let this apply to Class of 2026. Put another way, the freshmen of 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022 each received an additional year of eligibility due to Covid. The freshmen class of 2024 will be the first class to take part in the 5 in 5 rule. The NCAA could have easily applied 5 in 5 to freshman class of 2023 but ultimately opted not to. These are the athletes who are suing.
There is no figuring the NCAA. Such a simple move could have brought clarity to the entire eligibility issue and would have avoided these lawsuits. If there is a chance to get things wrong, they almost always do.
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Posted by GW0509 8/03/2026 5:25 pm | #6 |
I'm actually ok with the NCAA not applying the 5-in-5 to the Class of 2026. First off, they are almost all graduates so the NCAA should be concerned with those athletes who are actually enrolled in school for the 26-27 season. Second, life isn't fair and sometimes people get lucky and get benefits that others don't get. I mean, should the class of 2019 be upset that the class of 2020 go a Covid Year?
I believe the Covid Year wasn't actually that good in hindsight and caused way too much confusion when it came to waivers etc. If I were the NCAA, I would've just made the 5-in-5 apply to some future class like the class of 2032 so none of the current athletes could cry foul.
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Posted by AT Hiker 8/03/2026 9:33 pm | #7 |
While the "5 in 5" rule is predictably being challenged in court, there is a real chance the Senate this week will approve legislation that includes "5 in 5" and importantly limits athletes without having to wait a year to just one transfer. The SEC and the Big 10 announced last Friday night they support this legislation; all the other major conferences were already in agreement with the bill.
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Posted by Gwmayhem 8/04/2026 9:17 am | #8 |
GW0509, I fully agree with your last sentence. That solution would not have seemingly randomly excluded any active class from partaking in 5 in 5. As for whether the 2019 class should be upset that the 2020 class received a Covid year? Well, they shouldn't. After all, it was the Class of 2020 that actually experienced Covid and had its postseason cancelled.
