No merit in NFL's stance
The Shadow
By David Steele
Until the end of today, college football's newly liberated underclassmen
still have a chance to declare themselves eligible for the NFL Draft. To the
best of anyone's knowledge, USC's Mike Williams still has no regrets about
leaving early. Maurice Clarett still has love handles.
And the NFL still has no case.
Never mind what Commissioner Paul Tagliabue says. Never mind what the
league's latest appeal says, although what it does say will crack you up.
And never mind what another learned lawyer/commissioner, the NBA's David
Stern, says. Those entities all will tell you that the decision that opened
the door for the cuddly Clarett, as well as Williams, was legally flawed and
that it will be picked apart in the higher courts.
They also will tell you that letting players such as Clarett and Williams
into the pros only two years after their high-school graduation would ruin
them, their sports, the educational system, the natural order of the
universe and our democratic way of life.
In an unguarded moment, they also might allow that it does their league's
bottom line a bit of damage, but that might come off as a little less
altruistic.
Better to say, as the NFL did in its latest appeal filed Friday, that
letting "adolescents'' be eligible for the draft would put those youngsters'
health and educational futures at risk and bring "potentially tragic
consequences for both themselves and society.''
Or, as Stern said two weeks ago in Los Angeles during All-Star Weekend, that
"the influence that that's going to have prospectively on youngsters on what
they do with their lives and what they aim for is going to be profound
because ... a youngster who thinks he's coming to the NBA is, as Arthur Ashe
pointed out, much more likely to be a rocket scientist or a brain surgeon
than an NBA player.''
Oooh, cheap shot, invoking Arthur Ashe. In other words, if you disagree with
letting teenagers into the NBA or NFL, you're opposing one of the great spor
tsmen and humanitarians of our time.
Then again, having Ashe as your standard-bearer plays better in the public
eye than having Clarett. Pioneering clearly is harder than it looks. Good
job taking the first big step, good job selling it to the courts -- but bad
job making a first impression. Someone in Clarett's inner circle should have
pointed out: The NFL doesn't want you there and it will jump on any flaw
with a vengeance to bolster its case.
You're breaking a mold the game doesn't want you breaking, he should have
been told. Don't arrive at the scouting combine looking as if you just came
out of a jello mold. Jackie Robinson didn't show up drunk on the first day
of spring training in 1947, did he?
In the grand scheme of things, though, Clarett's unnecessary jiggle
shouldn't matter. Speaking of the grand scheme, Stern (or Ashe) isn't wrong.
At least, not as wrong, or obnoxious or two-faced, as his NFL counterpart.
In fact, Stern has more of a legal and moral ground on which to stand: His
sport spent time, effort and money on a developmental league, embryonic as
it is.
The age limit Stern continues to push might be, as union head Billy Hunter
has said, like "putting the genie back in the bottle.'' Still, it's a lot
easier to swallow with an option available to bridge the gap from college to
the big leagues. The NFL remains content to use the colleges as its minor
league and to tout the educational benefits of spending at least three years
entertaining strippers, hiding firearms and enrolling in nonexistent
classes - - er, maturing into young adults.
Meanwhile, as the NFL's deadline to expand this year's draft pool approaches
today, neither college rosters nor high-school classrooms are emptying in a
mad rush to the NFL. The departure of Williams -- from the national champs
into the top five of the draft, no less -- doesn't even qualify as a
trickle, much less a deluge.
It hasn't happened in the NBA, either; it only seems that way, because each
high-schooler who bolts gets attention far beyond any collegian -- and, as
was the case last year with LeBron James, deservedly so. More than a few of
them have washed out, of course. Yet no proof has been produced by anyone
that they have washed out, in the game or in life, more frequently than
those who spent even four years in college.
What is true is that the NCAA still doesn't allow players who try to go pro
out of high school to come back to college ball if they are not signed.
Really advances the cause of education, doesn't it? "Ludicrous,'' Hunter
calls that rule.
Judges without a rooting interest in how their team does in the fall or
winter likely will take note of all this; at least two already have. The
sooner the NFL accepts its fate and adjusts accordingly, the sooner it can
get to more important matters.
Such as seeing whether Clarett's gut crosses the finish line in the 40
before the rest of him does.