Last year, I made the bold claim that the NCAA’s eligibility issue was coming to an end. Since that article was published on Feb. 20, 2026, NFL and NBA players have found numerous ways to return to college athletics.
Many people can agree it’s an issue. Almost everyone agrees that professional athletes should never come back to college. The Big Ten, SEC, ACC and Big 12 all have bans on former pros returning to the amateur level. Even leagues as small as the Patriot League have enacted the same bans.
But let’s give credit where credit is due to the class of 2022. When it’s all said and done, they will be the last recruiting class to follow the standard four-year eligibility rules set by the NCAA. Everyone in the class of 2023 and beyond will be subject to the new five-for-five rule, which allows up to five years of eligibility but imposes much stricter criteria for granting an extra year. Everyone in the class of 2021 and back got an extra year of eligibility due to COVID-19.
This leaves the class of 2022 SOL (for lack of a better phrase).
Before you start firing back and saying, “these are professional players” and “where do you draw the line?” take a second and breathe. These players are people first and foremost, and should have some sort of say when it comes to their future as professional athletes.
The decision to go pro isn’t as simple as ‘let’s go declare for the draft and become the next feel-good late-round pick/undrafted free agent story’. In 2026 alone, around 3,000 players were eligible for the NFL draft (seniors do not need to officially declare; only underclassmen submit paperwork to declare early). Of that rough estimate, 257 were drafted. By cut day on Aug. 30, over 1,000 players are cut — and that includes draft picks from that year’s draft.
One of the unforeseen consequences of handing out the extra years of eligibility has been how big and deep draft classes have been. Before 2022, no Mr. Irrelevant (last pick of the draft) had found any success outside of kicker Ryan Succop, who played for 14 years and won a Super Bowl with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2020.
In 2022, the San Francisco 49ers took quarterback Brock Purdy with the last pick of the draft. Before the start of the year, there was a very real possibility that he wouldn’t make the initial 53-man roster, as the 49ers put a heavy investment into North Dakota State quarterback Trey Lance in the first round. By the end of the year, Lance was hurt by Week 2 and Purdy led his team to the NFC Championship Game.
Make no mistake, there is correlation. Purdy was in the top ten in accuracy in all of college football. While he may not be the most physically gifted quarterback, he was a proven winner at the collegiate level and accurate with his arm. In most other draft classes, Purdy is likely a late fifth or early sixth-round pick. To put it in perspective, Tanner Lee, one of Nebraska’s most intriguing quarterbacks in school history, was drafted in the sixth round by the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2018.
Even current NFL players agree. Los Angeles Rams safety Quinten Lake explained to Trey Wingo on Inside Football how he prepped himself mentally to not even make the initial 53-man roster after being drafted in the sixth round.
“I think I got flagged because of some injuries,” Lake told Wingo. “But I also say this too: in 2022, that was probably the biggest draft class ever. You had guys that took another year because of COVID, and kind of COVID messed up everything, too. So guys that were graded five, six, seven (round picks) were really, you know, three, four, five.”
Lake doesn’t even bring up how COVID impacted his college career, because he was the one impacting the class of 2022. With his extra year of eligibility, he took a year from the class of 2022 to develop; now down to three years to play.
Outside of the cream-of-the-crop talent who starts on day one for their team, any given player likely won’t start or see valuable playing time until their sophomore year. But it’s very difficult to get any playing time over someone who’s been in a coach’s system for over three years.
Take a look at tight end Dae’Quan Wright. Wright spent four years in college. His first two years at Virginia Tech and his final two at Ole Miss. The 23-year-old logged 113 receptions, 1,603 yards and nine touchdowns, exclusively with the Rebels. After exhausting all of his eligibility, Wright went undrafted and signed with the Philadelphia Eagles before being picked up by the Cleveland Browns.
Wright was the first player to announce his intentions to return to college if he failed to make a team, and he planned to follow his old Ole Miss head coach, Lane Kiffin, to LSU. With a court ruling from Louisiana on Thursday, Wright, along with defensive lineman Zxavian Harris, is free to sign with the Tigers before the start of the season.
However, Kiffin opted to keep the two off of LSU’s roster, but with the ever-changing landscape of college football and judicial power, don’t be surprised if these two, along with others, find their way on a college roster before the end of the season.
Both of these players played at least three years of real ball, not just checking in for the final moments of the game. On the flip side, linebacker Jack Pyburn essentially played two full years of college ball, spending three years with Florida and a year at LSU. Pyburn signed with the Bucs as an UDFA and racked up four tackles and two sacks in the preseason. He also planned to sign with Kiffin and the Tigers if he were cut and not on an NFL roster. Pyburn will not be with LSU this year, as the Kansas City Chiefs picked him up from the waiver wire.
The line in the sand needs to be drawn when players forgo their eligibility (looking at you, RJ Luis Jr.). In the NBA, declaring for the draft and staying in the pool past the deadline means you are fully committed to the NBA. That is final, and a decision made by the player. Not external factors forcing them to stay in professional leagues.
Deep down in my core, I hate it. Every part of me wants to join the train of banishing these guys away from the game. But why should we punish a player who did nothing wrong? In the lawlessness and chaos of the current transfer portal, the last thing to do is add professional players to the mix. But these aren’t pros. They may have practiced with pros, but check any well-known college player, and you’ll see they are doing the same thing.
Reese Davis put it best when asked about the topic before the LSU vs. Clemson game.
“I scoff at people who say there is a bright line that’s been drawn when a professional comes back to college,” Davis said. “I don’t really like the idea of guys coming back from NFL training camps and play. I don’t. I don’t like it. But when you step back, I go, ‘ Why do you not like it? That’s a little bit harder thing to put a pin on exactly.”
Logan Moseley is a volleyball beat writer for The Daily Nebraskan. Follow him on X at @loganj_moseley.