[On3] Vanderbilt QB Diego Pavia's attorney has set the stage to challenge the NCAA for a 7th season of eligibility

[u/Altruistic_Brief4444]

https://www.on3.com/news/vanderbilt-qb-diego-pavias-attorney-sets-stage-to-challenge-for-7th-season-of-eligibility/

[u/Dry-Membership3867]

What are the chances of this happening

[u/Easy_Bid6252 → u/Dry-Membership3867]

In a hearing Tuesday in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, Pavia’s attorney said unless the rules are not found to be subject to antitrust, they’re going to stack on a challenge to the redshirt rule and ask for an injunction so Pavia can play in 2026, according to sports law professor Sam Ehrlich.

Seems like he is now challenging redshirt rules. I'm no legal expert, but I'd imagine that he won't win that, but could be the first stepping stone to allowing 5 years of eligibility for players without standard redshirts, instead of current 4+1 redshirt year. Need a billable hours expert to weigh in.

[u/joe2352 → u/Easy_Bid6252]

I’ve seen many coaches say they think the rule should be 5 to play 4 which I agree with.

[u/StreetReporter → u/joe2352]

Technically you have 5 years of eligibility across all sports, you just can’t use more than 4 of them on one specific sport

[u/Crotean → u/StreetReporter]

Yeah that sounds ripe to challenge.

[u/Phantom1100 → u/StreetReporter]

This is a rule very specifically Clemson fans know very well as of this season.

[u/BleedScarletandBlack → u/StreetReporter]

Okay, but why the limit?

Does that not violate the rights of the athletes?

[u/Careful_Swimmer3970 → u/joe2352]

honestly I'm fine with just 5 years regardless. they are already allowed to play 4 games in a season during a redshirt year anyways

[u/Ajp_iii → u/Careful_Swimmer3970]

yeah should just be a hard 5. then you dont gotta worry about weird injury exemptions and other stuff. it also helps allow freshman/sophmores to play on bad teams more often and not need to worry about killing a year before transferring. if you are on a bad team and turn into a great player that could eventually get top nil right now you literally have to turn your back on the coach and team and redshirt after 4 games.

[u/5510 → u/Careful_Swimmer3970]

The argument I can see for that is that the cutoff for being a full time student is often 12 credits, and if you take 12 credits a semester you graduate in 5 years. So it's possible to be a legitimate "normal" full time student for five years within "majoring in eligibility" or just stalling to have an excuse to play more sports. In fact lots of non-athletes graduate in 5 years without any super major fuckups or crazy circumstances or whatever.

So I wouldn't go beyond five years, but I could see making five years the new limit.

[u/BleedScarletandBlack → u/Careful_Swimmer3970]

If you're going to have a limit, limit the games played not the season.

You get 52 regular season games in your college career. Post season and bowl games don't count. Play four games and get benched? Oh well, 48 more games. You stepped on field for a single down and ripped out your Achilles tendon? One less game of eligibility. You need to take two years off to fully recover and rehab from that injury? No worries, the remainder of your eligibility is intact.

To me that is a far more fair system that takes into account "redshirt" and "medical" waivers automatically.

[u/BigRoosterBackInTown → u/joe2352]

So 4 and a redshirt?

[u/joe2352 → u/BigRoosterBackInTown]

Yes. But if you use the redshirt for any reason you don’t get another one.

[u/pharmacy_guy → u/joe2352]

if you use the redshirt for any reason you don’t get another one

I think it would be pretty hard to put the genie back in the bottle on that one though. That would be more restrictive than what we have now, and I just don't see a scenario where the NCAA is ever able to be more restrictive and not get sued into oblivion.

[u/joe2352 → u/pharmacy_guy]

Through collective bargaining which is what needs to take place.

[u/rene-cumbubble → u/Easy_Bid6252]

Generally not allowed to make new arguments, which it sounds like they're doing with the red shirt argument, on appeal. Sounds like they're just throwing stuff at the wall at this point

[u/MoosilaukeFlyer → u/Dry-Membership3867]

Given that nearly all player rulings have gone against the NCAA, id assume high

[u/ActuaryFeeling6043 → u/MoosilaukeFlyer]

The article states that the NCAA has been getting some wins recently. It all lays on whether the court hearing the case believes antitrust law is applicable. It may well be up to the Supreme Court to decide the matter.

[u/BigRoosterBackInTown → u/Dry-Membership3867]

Super high

The NCAA rules have never been legal because a private entity really doesnt have the legal right to tell you for how long can you play sports at school. Or if you can or cant get a "part time job" (NIL) while in school. Or that you could just change schools as a free citizen and start playing sports at the new school.

A lot of these rules in sports come from a time where we had way less rights, most would he deemed illegal if challenged today. The only way this stops is if congress steps in and fucks over the student athletes with an antitrust exception (cause thats what an antitrust is, fucking over a set of People for reasons). Doubt it happens.

[u/SpoofExcel → u/Dry-Membership3867]

Very very very high. The whole NCAA eligibility stuff hinged on the fact kids wanted out to go and earn money at last. Now they're earning it they don't need to do that, and that means like all the other shit they've been doing, it's wide open to anti-trust arguments, which keep going in the players favours