LOOPHOLE ALLOWING OVER-SIGNING NEEDS TO BE CLOSED

NCAA rules allow college football teams to sign up to 25 players in a recruiting class.In recent years, early entry by some students that graduate high school early has let schools sign extra players, and count those early entrants towards the previous year’s limits. And while over-signing by a few prospects has been common at programs where there are bound to be academic casualties among prospective student-athletes, over-signing is getting out of control. And there is no better evidence of that then Houston Nutt‘s recruiting class at Ole Miss.All 38 recruits.As Bruce Feldman mentioned in his Friday mailbag, and Chip Towers wrote in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the fact that Ole Miss inked 13 extra kids, a maximum recruiting class AND a half, openly mocks the entire purpose of the rule.While Nutt conceeded that the number was high, his rationale for the over-signings is confusing. “I know it seems like a high number,” Nutt told the Jackson Clarion-Ledger of the Rebels’ 2009 class. “But it helps Mississippi. It helps out junior colleges… . I’ve got some guys who want to be a part of our program, but probably won’t make it academically. They’ve got a chance to go to a (junior college) and still be a part of our family.”While “placing” a recruit at a junior college is a common tactic among certain SEC schools, offering and executing a contract (an athletic scholarship) that can’t be honored completely mocks the system that’s in place and makes an already uneven recruiting playing field more skewed.And signing 13 extra players, whether it’s because it’s good for the state of Mississippi or the morale of guys who want to be a part of the family, but can’t makes the grades, doesn’t do anyone any good.