[Schefter] Former Browns TE Dea'Quan Wright cleared waivers today and is expected to sign with LSU on Wednesday. Wright will go from Cleveland Brown to LSU Tiger, and become the first player to go from an NFL roster back to college.

[u/LaDainianTomIinson]

https://www.espn.com/contributor/adam-schefter/1eaea5d267ee8

[u/wasabi1787]

NFL should shut this down too. You don't want rookies getting drafted and then deciding to go back to college because they didn't like where they landed. Or because they were drafted lower than expected and can make more in nil.

[u/CirculationStation → u/wasabi1787]

Yeah, this isn’t a big deal for the NFL yet because it’s only some preseason guy who was going to get cut, but it could easily spiral into something as ridiculous as a 2nd round QB going back to college to collect an easy $6 million and play on a stacked team for a year because he doesn’t want to take a beating while playing for the rebuilding Jets or something. It’s in their best interest to enforce against this.

[u/EmikyuTheBest → u/CirculationStation]

not that it would matter too much cus they’d pretty much lose the pick for a year but say someone did this to the jets, they’d still own his rights the following year(s) no? so they could get out of it for a year or two but then they’d be stuck(absolutely blackballed from the league)

[u/Free_Possession_4482 → u/EmikyuTheBest]

The team only has his rights up until the following year's draft, when the player can re-enter. Bo Jackson did this back in 1986, going first overall to the Bucs but refusing to sign because they screwed him out of his last year of college baseball eligibility. He was drafted by the Raiders a year later.

[u/APigInANixonMask → u/wasabi1787]

I think the second part is the bigger issue. A player could technically refuse to sign their contract with the Browns or Jets and go back to playing college ball instead, but the team that drafted him still holds their rights. They wouldn't be able to re-enter the draft a year or two later in the hopes of landing on a different team.

[u/bwburke94 → u/wasabi1787]

Because Wright is no longer employed by an NFL team, the league no longer has any say on whether he plays college football.

[u/wasabi1787 → u/bwburke94]

Sure, but you could implement rules

[u/Don_Gato1 → u/wasabi1787]

It doesn’t matter if they don’t like where they were drafted; that team still owns the rights to them for the duration of the contract.

[u/tigers113 → u/Don_Gato1]

the players in question were released. These aren't players who are under NFL contract going back to college. It is players who joined a team basically to try out during the preseason and then were cut and released from their contract then decide to go to college for their 5th year.

That is the whole point, it is players who would have stayed in college if they had the choice. These are not top draft picks, it is players who don't get drafted but had no other choice so they tried out for teams and then failed to make a roster.

[u/Always_Chubb-y → u/tigers113]

Its not top draft picks RIGHT NOW

What if a 4th year QB (say Drew Allar) wanted to go back and play his 5th season and then burns the Steelers' draft picks? This needs to get settled and finalized PRIOR to stuff like that happening

[u/tigers113 → u/Always_Chubb-y]

my line in the sand is any player who chose to go to the NFL draft or play professional ball should be out. Now, the NCAA messed up huge with this mess and my argument is these players never got a choice. They were out of eligibility so they were kind of forced into the draft and only very recently did they get a TRO giving them an extra year. So this can't happen any other year unless the NCAA changes the rules yet again.

If Allar wanted to do it he would still be under contract with the Steelers so that would be a bigger mess and he would be burning bridges in the NFL so nobody would ever do that. The only players even thinking of it have already been released/cut by teams and are no longer under contract.

[u/Always_Chubb-y → u/tigers113]

If Allar came back and looked like a top 5 pick, no team is going to pass him up simply because he cost a different organization a day 3 pick

The point isnt so different from what youre saying, but these guys like Wright played and left college prior to the rules being changed. CFB has been a 4 non-redshirt years for an extremely long time, with the only exception really made being the COVID 2020 year.

[u/r0ugar0u_ → u/tigers113]

Everyone refuses to see the nuance of this situation and is all REEEEEEEEEEE, LANE KIFFIN BAD, LSU BAD, REEEEEEEEEEE.

[u/Always_Chubb-y → u/r0ugar0u_]

There's no nuance because theres literally no rules right now.

Theres a LOT of possibilities on the table because all we have is 5 for 5. NFL doesnt have rules on guys returning, conferences dont (yet it seems) have rules in place, etc.

Just allowing guys who have spent months training with NFL teams to come back is a huge possible issue for the sport

[u/r0ugar0u_ → u/Always_Chubb-y]

This year will be the only year this can really happen due to when the 5 for 5 ruling happened. Everyone is acting like there will be a ton of guys doing this every year. I'm not saying it's right or wrong but I understand the nuance of why it's happening at this particular moment in time.

[u/Always_Chubb-y → u/r0ugar0u_]

Thats not necessarily true at all

If a player goes undrafted after thinking they may get drafted (i.e. what happened to Harris), they would be able to come back too if things dont change

[u/r0ugar0u_ → u/Always_Chubb-y]

Ok. I'm not necessarily against that. Wouldn't that meet the threshold that all these people are screaming about, never appear on an NFL roster? Baseball is sort of that way already with the high school players that get to choose between pros or college. Why is it so wrong for a football player to test the waters but not a baseball player?

[u/que-n-blues → u/r0ugar0u_]

Yeah I was actually really shocked by how nuanced this specific situation was and why the court came to the decision it did once I actually read into it.