Yet another rule change will alter college sports, but Oklahoma head football coach Brent Venables saw this one coming. And he actually even welcomes it.
The NCAA Division I Cabinet on Tuesday approved a historical vote to implement a new "5-in-5" rule that will give student-athletes five years of eligibility to actually play their sport, compared to the previous situation of athletes having four years to compete with the ability to redshirt for an extra fifth year with limited or no participation depending on the sport. Essentially, this change extincts redshirts in college sports.
Venables warned this change was "inevitable" back in October during the Sooners' season, right as he was navigating redshirts for last year's freshmen. Before the latest update, football players were allowed to appear in four games and the postseason while still maintaining a redshirt. Four games into the season, coaching staffs really had to start deciding whose redshirt was worth burning and whose season would be more valuable down the road.
In the end, the Sooners burned eight returning freshmen's redshirts in 2025, but that no longer matters. Now, they can all get a fifth year unless the NFL calls first.
NCAA eliminates redshirt dilemma that frustrated Brent Venables
"So that coaches aren't hamstrung with a roster that now all of a sudden they don't," Venables said during a weekly press conference. "You spend all this time getting them ready, investing in them, preparing them, you made hard decisions where they became a two-deep guy, and then all of a sudden, at some point in time in the season, if that rule isn't there, it can make things a little more challenging than it needs to be, mentally, and from your roster standpoint week-to-week getting guys ready to play.
"So I think (the new 5-in-5 rule will) happen soon. It needs to for lots of reasons. Let guys have five years. One of the reasons is for that the NCAA will likely pass that, and the other is so that they don't have to have all these cases of giving an additional year, and getting into the sixth and the seventh year and all that. You get five years. That's hopefully coming really soon."
Roster management has become the biggest headache for college coaches. It's so much of a daunting task that nearly every major football program has hired a general manager to deal with it, including OU bringing in Jim Nagy for that role.
Read more: Oklahoma already rewarding Jim Nagy with handsome payday after quickly proving his value
The decision to redshirt or not has always been there for today's coaching staffs, but now it's also piled on top of NIL negotiations and constant roster turnover through the transfer portal. That also made the redshirt decisions even more complex considering the reason for that year is development, but then there's a slim chance that progress actually benefits your program since that player likely transfers before ever stepping on the field.
This change also erases all those arguments and court decisions (see Owen Heinecke) over if a player deserves a sixth or seventh or whatever year of eligibility. It actually brings more order to the chaos.
It's a rarity from the NCAA, especially today, but college sports actually got better and simpler today because of a rule change.
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