Sam Pittman weighs in on challenges created by new proposed roster limits

College football programs are waiting to see what happens with the House settlement, which could force a major alteration to the scholarship and roster limits teams must operate under.

For football, the roster limit will reportedly be set at 105. Not every coach is thrilled with that.

“Well I think the first thing is you’re going to have to eliminate 15 guys, which none of us — I don’t want to speak for the other coaches — a lot of us didn’t want to do,” Arkansas coach Sam Pittman said Wednesday on an SEC teleconference call. “We thought we needed that number. But that’s the first thing, which is hard to do, because some of these guys’ dreams are to play for the University of Arkansas. So that’s just a given. That’s going to have to happen.”

Pittman further broke down the kind of impacts the new roster limits will have on his program, noting the exact details of the House settlement aren’t finalized just yet.

“I understand we’ll stay at 85, so you can cut the scholarships up like some other sports have been doing for years,” Pittman said. “So it’s yet to be determined how that will really affect us, but I do know that it’s going to affect us as far as two-spotting some things that we do that helps us. I think it’s going to take some of that away from us because of wear and tear on the kids, and I think you’re going to be very concerned about the limited numbers that we have.”

One reason the proposals haven’t necessarily been big with college coaches is that the entire model is different from, say, the NFL.

College rosters are built around school semesters, and it’s hard to replace players within a given semester. Transfers usually happen before or after a semester.

“We’re different than the NFL now,” Pittman said. “We can’t just go out and get a player whenever we lose somebody. And I know their numbers are less than ours, but… I think it’s going to be something that we’re all going to have to decide on how to go about the 105. But part of it will be, the helper of that is the ability to cut up scholarships. Certainly as I said before I don’t believe 105 is enough.”

There’s another chief concern that Pittman has when it comes to roster limits and it has to do with the integrity of the postseason. Not the playoffs, necessarily, but the rest of the bowl system.

Player opt-outs are already a huge concern. With stricter roster limits, the numbers get even trickier.

“As you look in the bowl systems right now, I mean guys that aren’t in the playoffs, they’re having a hard time fielding a football team,” Pittman said. “And now you take it down an extra 15 guys, it could be a little dicey at that point.”