Kirk Ferentz makes case for five years of eligibility, no redshirts

Kirk Ferentz is on the five years of eligibility train in the wake of a slew of football players utilizing their redshirts in the middle of the season.

Basically, players can redshirt and preserve a year of eligibility if they don’t play in more than four games, so long as they did not use a redshirt yet. Ferentz, along with fellow Big Ten coach Lincoln Riley, see changes as a positive.

With the way the rules are currently constructed, it can cause a lot of movement. But it could be different if you change it to five years of eligibility, rather than the traditional four.

“That’s a new wrinkle,” Ferentz said. “What’s happened there is a new wrinkle to some degree. So, I mean, nothing surprises me for a long time, but especially nowadays. But yeah, I still feel the same way. I think it would make sense just to give players the option to have five years. 

“The trend right now is to be at a place less than longer as it was, you know, maybe 10 years ago. So, yeah, I’d favor that. Certainly would favor that. And then, you know what you’re referencing, what happened last week at a couple places. It’s just a reflection of the times. It is what it is, unfortunately.”

Some of those redshirt situations happened at USC this past week. News broke last week about Bear Alexander’s plans to save a year of eligibility after appearing in four games, and he won’t suit up for Riley’s group the rest of the way. Linebacker Raesjon Davis made the same decision, and Riley said he understood why.

However, the coach shared a potential solution during his weekly press conference on Tuesday. Riley said the NCAA should allow players to have five years of eligibility instead of four so teams don’t have to worry about players sitting out the last two-thirds of the season, utilizing a redshirt.

“I think guys should have five years,” Riley said. “Do whatever you want, play as much as you want or as little as you want, and the only way you get an extra one is if you have two season-ending injuries and miss the whole season. I think it should be that plain and simple and be done, and then nobody’ll have to worry about this other crap about how many games you’ve played and all that. I understand why it’s there, but I still think it’s a little bit behind the times.”

In the bigger picture, the redshirt rule will have to be addressed at some point.

Let’s not forget the 2021 season, a free year for all athletes in college athletics, vastly affected athlete’s eligibility. In some sports, such as wrestling for example, athletes were able to have sixth and even years of eligibility.

With a modified redshirt rule, athletes would just have five years of eligibility and as Ferentz and Riley allude to, use them however you want. Injuries, season ending ones at least, would be the exception to the rule.

With nothing on the horizon, we could see more situations like the four games and redshirt as the season progresses.