Big Ten and SEC ban NFL players from returning to play, threaten severe sanctions
On Tuesday, the Big Ten became the first conference impose significant sanctions when its athletic directors and faculty athletic representatives unanimously approved a ban on former NFL players pursuing a fifth year of eligibility within their league.
Sources told CBS Sports the punishment is based on the NCAA’s ghost transfer rule. That rule prohibits coaches from participating in 50% of games and carries a financial penalty for the school equal to 20% of its football budget.
The SEC announced its new policy later Tuesday after a meeting at the conference headquarters in Birmingham, Alabama. LSU was considering adding two former NFL players to its roster, but sources told CBS Sports’ John Talty that the vote, like that of the Big Ten, was unanimous. SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey will have broad powers to determine punishments for violating the new policy.
The SEC’s ban includes players from the NFL, NBA or WNBA. The Big Ten policy only mentioned NFL players.
The Big 12 is considering a similar ban and the ACC will meet Wednesday to discuss the issue, sources told CBS Sports.
The Big Ten’s decision and the other conferences’ discussions come amid growing legal uncertainty and a recent push by players who signed NFL contracts trying to return to school and even looking to enter the transfer portal, using recent court rulings that allow players interested in a fifth year of eligibility to return to college football.
The Big Ten made it clear that its ban includes players who signed a professional contract, were on a professional roster or declared for the NFL draft without withdrawing.
Previously, under the Big Ten Sportsmanship Policy, standard disciplinary actions gave the Big Ten commissioner the freedom to impose immediate five-figure fines or impose suspensions under his own authority, while major escalations, including extended band bans or institutional sanctions, only required the rubber stamp of the executive committee.
Those violations will be addressed quickly and decisively. That will surely be the case for other conferences if they implement the same rule, as many in the college athletics space expect. Lawsuits could arise from players (and potentially schools) seeking to circumvent these rules, although it seems unlikely to have much impact, at least within the Big Ten, at this time, given the unanimous approval among all 18 schools.
“The lawsuits are bypassing the NCAA, but now when the league says you can’t do it, you’re dealing with issues with your conference,” one conference head coach told CBS Sports.
Several head coaches told CBS Sports they would like to see additional punishments, including forfeiture of games, if teams play a former professional athlete.
The SEC issued a statement Tuesday night urging Congress to pass the College Sports Protection Act in September to better guard against such developments, but the league, along with other power conferences, is moving toward individual conference-wide rules and enforcement.
It also potentially signals the first step toward long-standing proposals within the Big Ten and SEC to take on compliance policies under a new rules and enforcement model separate from the NCAA. The conferences have been preparing self-governance models in case the legislation in Washington, D.C. does not become law later this year.
LSU has been at the center of recent controversy after Lane Kiffin landed commitments from two former NFL players: defensive tackle ZXavian Harris and former Cleveland Browns tight end Dae’Quan Harris.
LSU athletic director Verge Ausberry has supported Kiffin’s plan, although it remains to be seen if he votes with his SEC colleagues this week to ban those players from the SEC.
“There are a lot of parts of this that I don’t like,” Kiffin said Tuesday on The Pat McAfee Show. “I don’t think professionals should go back to college sports and college football. But in this case, these are not players who have played seasons professionally or who have filed a random court order. This is part of a specific class that was declared erroneous by the NCAA and was supposed to be [five years to play five seasons]”.
The NCAA approved a measure that allows players to play up to five seasons in a five-year span, but only for the class of 2023 and beyond. That decision led former players from the class of 2022 who had exhausted their four years of eligibility to file lawsuits seeking temporary injunctions for a fifth season.
Some were successful, leading many players to rejoin squads across the country, although LSU is the only school so far pursuing players who landed on NFL squads.
However, now there is once again growing doubt among the athletic department, coaches and front office sources about whether those players will actually be able to play this season.
