It's not a lawsuit about the coaching decisions. It's a lawsuit about the arbitrary NCAA rule 4 games for a redshirt to still apply.
Once the NCAA gave 1 free year to transfer, them limiting the 2nd transfer was arbitrary and is being challenged and a restraint on players choice.
Here Tau would make that same argue that once the NCAA made it a blanket rule that it would grant redshirts while playing, it was arbitrarily set at 4 games. Why? Tau played lest than 2 snaps in 2 of the games. Some players could start and play 4 full games and still get a redshirt while Tau playing very meaningless football loses a full year.
Add in stupid **** like McCormick playing 8 plus years in many more games in those seasons that Tau did that 5 game year is a joke. All these medical redshirts over 6 years is just more evidence of the NCAA's arbitrary ways.
It's all about the NCAA limiting people playing based on an arbitrary rule that limits eligibility without a valid reason. It's all about violations of antitrust laws like the Sherman Act.
The NCAA is on a major losing streak, this argument is enough to get past the initial phase of the lawsuit and into an injunction against the rule that would severely impact Tau's right to play that would cover his 1 year here
If you go back and read the discussion history, it was typed, "It was a coach at a school who should have known better." That's a coaching decision. That's what I was responding to.
Now you'd like to argue that 4 games is arbitrary for a RS... different argument/premise, but ok, let's discuss it.
Putting aside the comparison to the transfer rule (which is a poor comparison because the RS does not limit a player's ability to transfer, but merely limits their overall eligibility), let's take your position to it's logical extreme... why have any limit to eligibility other than enrollment and "so-called" "amateurism"? At the end of Year 4, let's pay Bain $10 MM/year over 3 years to stick around and get a couple master's degrees. Maybe by then we have a few more rich benefactors and can pay Bain $20 MM/year over 4 years to get his PhD. And play football for UM, of course.
Outlandish? Ok. What's an NFL punter make? Let's get Lou back here at $500K/year and not have to recruit a punter for a decade (had he not already gone pro). What about all of the position players with minimal NFL prospects that could be kept around indefinitely to fill in a roster and provide (grown man) depth?
It would be the end of college football.
On the other hand, if you acknowledge that there is some number of games that would not be arbitrary and destroy the RS, then you eventually run up against a coach's decision to play/not play a player when challenging the application of the rule for a waiver. If that's the argument being made by the NCAA, then to protect eligibility I'd say, "fine. **** it. Playing in even 1 game in a season makes your ineligible to take a RS that season." Or maybe just "no more RS year, everyone gets 4 years to play 4." I suspect such an eligibility rule would do more harm than good to the majority of college football players, but be much easier for the NCAA to defend.
Be careful what you wish for.
