Wait a minute: it’s opt-out week

We’ve all heard that UNLV QB Matthew Sluka opted out of UNLV, ostensibly over promised but unpaid money, and yet the timing is also significant as players can only play in four games before their redshirt is burned. Sluka had played in three, meaning he’ll leave Las Vegas with his fifth year of eligibility intact. Yesterday, Sluka’s UNLV teammate, RB Michael Allen, himself a transfer (from NC State), announced he was entering the portal. So did USC DT Bear Alexander; wherever he ends up, it will be his third school in four years, but since he’s only played in three games this year, he still has two years of eligibility remaining.

This isn’t necessarily new. The four-game rule has been around for years, but with NIL, the idea isn’t just that a season’s eligibility can be protected, but that players can use the rule as leverage to make more money, either by threatening to transfer unless the school pays more or by actually entering the portal in hopes of making more money. In 2018, Clemson QB Kelly Bryant, who had led the Tigers to a 12-2 season and the CFP in 2017, retired after four games when Dabo Swinney announced freshman Trevor Lawrence as the new starter.

Many teams are at that critical four-week juncture. That could mean more midseason exits, many of them starters like Sluka who have been playing well and see it as an opportunity to go somewhere to make more money or are unhappy and think a change of scenery will help. And the truth is, we could still see other players who haven’t played in four games decide to do it later in the regular season, like a reserve playing behind a starter who gets injured — does he want to burn his redshirt to hold down the fort until the starter returns? And of course, there will be those who choose not to participate in the postseason, whether it’s Marvin Harrison, Jr., who didn’t want to risk injury and potentially millions of dollars in a “meaningless” bowl game, or Kyle McCord, who felt pressured to leave rather than compete and wanted to find a new school.

Roster management used to be a checker game — pretty simple, straightforward, one-dimensional, and the schools were in control — but it’s become chess because there’s a lot more strategy, maneuvering, and player advantage than there used to be. Roster depth has always been important, but now it can work against a team because players drop out and there’s no one to replace them. Players take control of the board because, like Sluka, they can let their team down if they don’t get what they want or think they can get more by going somewhere else.

I’ve heard people refer to what’s happening now as the “unregulated era” of college football. From my perspective, these developments aren’t surprising and needed to happen, but I hope they’re eye-opening and the catalyst that forces schools and the NCAA to work together to implement new rules that work for everyone, but most importantly protect the future of college football.