Before you read this post, you need to watch the video above.
This clip appeared on the Dan Rather Reports show earlier this week and came to my attention after a reading an article on Roanoke.com
I don't think there is anyone that can deny that Daniel Rodriguez does not deserve a chance at playing college football. I posted on Facebook last night, hoping that Coach Beamer gives this incredible young man a chance of playing football in Blacksburg. If there was ever a place that he should be, I think it is here.
Hours later, and after much thought, I find that I am walking a fine line between admiration for Daniel Rodriguez and the hypocrisy of my own views and some of the rules that surround college sport.
Like it or not, Daniel is twenty-three years old. He could be playing college football when he is twenty-six. While current NCAA regulations are in place, he is perfectly within his right . And you don't have to tell me that he deserves this chance!
But you have to ask, is it right? He will be playing against other athletes who are eighteen and nineteen years old. You only have to look at the video to see that Daniel is a physical specimen.
In football, I think there is less of a problem than our sport, where I have seen some huge physical mismatches that border on being a major safety issue. The occasions I've seen this, it has occurred because it involved an ex-serviceman at college in his mid-twenties on the GI Bill, coming up against an eighteen or nineteen year old.
Personally, I think that the physicality of players coming into college football programs from high school out weighs any safety issues playing against ex-servicemen in their mid-twenties. I will even go so far to say that I think that football should be exempt from any age limit and the NCAA should look at this issue on a sport by sport basis.
But than again, I also think that football should be exempt on many things, including Title IX on a head-count basis, but thats for another day!
Authors note - After writing this I have since learned that the NCAA does in fact look at eligibility issues on a sport by sport basis.
This clip appeared on the Dan Rather Reports show earlier this week and came to my attention after a reading an article on Roanoke.com
I don't think there is anyone that can deny that Daniel Rodriguez does not deserve a chance at playing college football. I posted on Facebook last night, hoping that Coach Beamer gives this incredible young man a chance of playing football in Blacksburg. If there was ever a place that he should be, I think it is here.
Hours later, and after much thought, I find that I am walking a fine line between admiration for Daniel Rodriguez and the hypocrisy of my own views and some of the rules that surround college sport.
Like it or not, Daniel is twenty-three years old. He could be playing college football when he is twenty-six. While current NCAA regulations are in place, he is perfectly within his right . And you don't have to tell me that he deserves this chance!
But you have to ask, is it right? He will be playing against other athletes who are eighteen and nineteen years old. You only have to look at the video to see that Daniel is a physical specimen.
In football, I think there is less of a problem than our sport, where I have seen some huge physical mismatches that border on being a major safety issue. The occasions I've seen this, it has occurred because it involved an ex-serviceman at college in his mid-twenties on the GI Bill, coming up against an eighteen or nineteen year old.
Personally, I think that the physicality of players coming into college football programs from high school out weighs any safety issues playing against ex-servicemen in their mid-twenties. I will even go so far to say that I think that football should be exempt from any age limit and the NCAA should look at this issue on a sport by sport basis.
But than again, I also think that football should be exempt on many things, including Title IX on a head-count basis, but thats for another day!
Authors note - After writing this I have since learned that the NCAA does in fact look at eligibility issues on a sport by sport basis.
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