NCAA on COVID-19: "Eligibility relief is appropriate for spring sports"

[Aaron Carrara]

Also places a temporary ban on in-person recruiting

 

[joeywa]

While the idea itself is probably the right thing to do, the possible long-term implications will be something to watch. Logistically speaking, going from baseball roster sizes of ~35 to possibly 50 creates concern. Funding of additional scholarships is an issue. If HS baseball season is cancelled, there’s a strong likelihood that some of the seniors that would be strong candidates to leave for the draft out of HS will instead come to campus. Scholarship limits will have to be waived and adjusted. What will be the limit on numbers?  Will this affect the current 11.7 scholarships moving forward?  What about how the locker rooms are set up?  Currently there are prob ~40 lockers available at UT. What do you do for the extra 10 players?  How do coaches manage their rosters with a possible increase of 25%?  What about equipment and uniforms?  Increased costs. For schools like Texas, where baseball makes money, that might be less of an issue, but what about smaller schools without the resources of a UT?  

If the NCAA doesn’t handle this correctly, and I have very little faith that they will based on history, this could be an astronomical failure for college baseball. And I’m only talking about baseball. There are all the other Spring sports to think about as well.