On Christmas Eve, Baylor sent shockwaves around NCAA by signing 7-foot center James Nnaji, the No. 31 overall pick in the 2023 NBA Draft who never actually signed an NBA contract. His rights were originally owned by the Detroit Pistons before getting moved to Charlotte. But Nnaji spent time overseas in Spain and, most recently, played with Merkezefendi in Turkey.
However, that opened floodgates for an unprecedented situation: Players who have declared for the NBA Draft … returning back to play college
basketball?! Charles Bediako, a 2023 undraftee, soon followed, joining Alabama.
This epidemic even bled into the Mountain West, with former UCLA guard Amari Bailey — who has played 10 NBA games with the Hornets after being a second-round pick in 2023 — scheduled his first recruiting visit to Grand Canyon, even though he will need to receive a waiver granted by the NCAA.
In Bediako’s case, a Tuscaloosa judge recently denied his eligibility. So the NCAA has some guard rails as to who it’s letting in, and evidently shoving out.
But it’s still a big problem, where players are still toeing the line and attempting to revive their careers in an NIL-centric entity.
There are simple solutions to this issue:
For one, the NCAA will have to collectively bargain this eligibility crisis — as well as employ and enforce a modicum of NIL guardrails. When there’s no structure, all direction is lost. And when all direction is lost, all bets are off.
Therein lies the problem: There’s zero leadership. NCAA president Charlie Baker’s just a figurehead. Until there’s real leadership, these problems will persist.
A few of the immediate solutions should be fairly straightforward:
- Don’t allow any player back in the NCAA if they declare for the NBA Draft past the college (if they’re in college) or the international deadline
- Those dates are two separate dates; Last year’s, for example, the Early Entry deadline for collegiate athletes was May 28, while it was June 15 for international players.
That automatically makes players who were drafted (Nnaji), players who have signed NBA contracts and, thus, who have played NBA games automatically ineligible to return to the NCAA.
If players — like Bailey or Nnaji — are allowed to go through that process while still returning to the NCAA, those Early Entrant deadlines mean absolutely nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zero. And thus, an incredibly poor precedent is set.
Bailey should not be allowed to return to the NCAA; if you exhaust your eligibility in any way, you shouldn’t be given a second-chance just because your NBA career momentarily flamed out. The same applies to should Nnaji, who literally heard his name called on draft night before playing twice in Summer League.
The NCAA set up some guard rails regarding Bediako. But that’s not enough, and any gray area will likely have to be collectively bargained in the near future. At the end of the day, the NCAA can run, but it can’t hide.
