Home Forums Skybox Sports Bar First and Goal Clarett and the NFL

What are your thoughts, should players be allowed in before 3 years after high school, or should they have to wait?

I stand with the NFL here. I definitely believe there is a maturity level when it comes to professional sports. Everyone says "look at the NBA, MLB, NHL" Well, I see them all besides the NFL have very "watered down" talent because of all the young players.

I am going the opposite way here. I can't see why they discriminate because of stature. You can start to work at age 16, vote at 18, gamble at 21, but can't play football until you're likely 21.

You can be drafted into the service, but can't play in the NFL at 18 years of age.

I think the NFL is using college football as it's marketing arm, and doesn't want to take risks on kids, like the NBA does. Difference is, the kids going to the NBA, are pretty well known, because the media makes sure of it.

If a person has it, they have to use it while they do, not wait. I think if of the kids that have had to stay in college and got hurt, and then no chance to get into the NFL.

Like Clarett or not, but he has a valid argument, and one I hope he wins.

I believe the 3 year rule is written into the NFL players association collective bargaining agreement. The same agreement that will be protecting Clarret when he does make it to the NFL is also protecting him now from making a big mistake. From everything I've been hearing through the media, this kid isn't physically or emotionally ready for the NFL. If he comes out now he could end up with a very short career.

If you want to talk about what is right and wrong then maybe he does have the right to chose for himself(even though the arguement that he is old enough to join the military doesn't hold up in states where the drinking age is 21).

Here is an article that helps explain some of the legal aspects

http://www.msnbc.com/news/971561.asp

It sounds like the NFL has a pretty solid case and more money to fight it.

I like the rule. I don't want to see kids out of high school in the NFL. The NCAA is basically a minor league for the NFL anyway.

Maurice Clarett's preliminary hearing on allegations he lied on a theft report was postponed Monday so a judge could decide whether to bar information from a separate NCAA probe of the suspended Ohio State running back.
The misdemeanor falsification charge probably will be dropped if the judge doesn't allow the evidence from the NCAA investigation, prosecutors said.

"If the evidence is suppressed, it would be difficult for us to proceed," prosecutor Stephen McIntosh said. He added that there were other legal options but wouldn't elaborate.

Clarett is accused of filing a campus police report that exaggerated the value of items stolen from a car he borrowed in April. His attorneys argue the NCAA information should have been kept private as a federally protected "student educational record."

Judge Steven Hayes will decide by a hearing scheduled for Dec. 17 whether to grant the defense' request.

Clarett, dressed in a black suit, sat quietly in the back of the courtroom. Neither Clarett nor his attorney, Percy Squire, spoke in court Monday and they would not answer reporters' questions afterward.

According to the defense's request to suppress the NCAA information, Clarett was asked about the theft during a taped interview with the university and NCAA investigators.

McIntosh said that Clarett's statements to NCAA investigators amount to an admission to the falsification charge.

"It's rare that we get a statement that we believe is an admission," McIntosh said of the interview tapes. "We believe the statement is an admission."

University officials gave information from the interviews to campus police who passed it on to prosecutors.

"I don't believe they did anything improper in disclosing the information and ultimately using it to file criminal charges," McIntosh said.

Ohio State lawyers have said the information was not a "student disciplinary record" so Clarett's privacy rights were not violated, according to court documents.

Clarett has pleaded innocent to the charge that carries a maximum penalty of six months in jail and $1,000 fine.

Clarett was suspended for his sophomore season for NCAA violations of accepting money from a family friend and lying about it to investigators. He is separately suing the NFL, asking a federal judge in New York to throw out a rule that prevents him from entering the draft until he has been out of high school for three years.