Yahoo Sports senior NBA analyst Kevin O’Connor is joined by Jonathan Givony to discuss the growing trend of players returning to campus after short professional stints. Check out the full conversation on “The Kevin O’Connor Show” and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you listen.
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Video Transcript
Yeah, so the NCAA is basically acknowledging the fact that everybody is professional now.
There’s, eh, almost every player in high major basketball makes, um, you know, six figures.
Some of them make seven figures.
We’re hearing, uh, you know, guys making 4 to $5 million per year.
So, you know, when this came out, everybody was like, “Oh my God, how is a professional basketball player gonna play college basketball now?”
And I’m just thinking to myself, like, “People haven’t really been paying attention the last few years.”
Because everybody’s a pro and a lot of guys have made a lot more money than James Naje.
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I just don’t really see the difference between a James Naje who played last year in Turkey, you know, was a bench player in the EuroLeague, 21 years old, when you’re talking about guys like Chad Baker-Mazzara at USC who’s 26 years old.
You’re talking about Ramel Betha at Green Bay who’s 29 years old.
So I just, I’m f- I don’t really understand the outrage, to be honest with you, why, you know, the fact that he was drafted three years ago.
Uh, you know, I mean, I just th- The NCAA is looking at that and they’re saying, “It doesn’t matter.”
You know?
Like, he wasn’t under our umbrella when he entered the draft, when he failed to withdraw from the draft.
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Now they have their own different rules for guys testing the waters.
If you enter the NBA draft and you do not withdraw your name, you know, within 10 days of the NBA combine, uh, completing, you are ineligible to play college basketball.
Now our …
If somebody gonna test that this year and maybe say, “I’m gonna take this till the very end.
I’m going to maybe see where I get drafted.
If I don’t like it, then ” college, you know, a judge might look at that favorably and say, “There’s not a big difference between what happen with James Naje and this.”
If you graduated high school in 2022 or later, then you are okay to go back and play college basketball.
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And I think we’re going to see, you know, guys who are in the G League right now, guys who are in two ways, guys that already went through the draft potentially even, trying to test that this spring and go back to college basketball because they’re within that five-year rule.
And, uh, you know, I think, to me, it’s just, it’s good for the game, it’s good for the product.
I mean, college basketball has never been in a better place than it is right now, in my view.
I think everybody wins in this.
I don’t really understand the outrage.
I mean, I get, you know, like the old school people thinking, like, “Oh my God, how much this game has changed,” but I think it’s great for the sport, personally.