Athletic Scholarships are only good for one year

Before going into the meat of this article, I want to mention that I got this article idea from one of my favorite recruiting writers, Andy Staples of SI.com.  Check out this article and others that he writes on the SI.com website.  While the business remains small, he is the best in the business and definitely checking out.

What Staples talked about in the article is the best advice he could offer potential recruits out there reading his article.  That advice is to realize that as a recruit signing scholarship papers, you are not signing it for a guaranteed four years.  It is a renewable contract that is signed each year and is up to the head coach if they want to renew it.

This is something vital to understand when going into the recruiting process and accepting a scholarship.  If you get a full offer from the school of your dreams and go there for a year, but don’t perform well, there is no obligation whatsoever that they renew your scholarship for the following year.

The reason that coaches do not take away the scholarships from more athletes is the negative backlash that they will get in the press.  For example, if a college has a pipeline at a high school that churns out Division I talent, my guess is that they will find a way to make a player fit even if he isn’t that good.  Not renewing an athlete on a scholarship usually ends up going public and leaves the coach in a bad situation.

What most coaches do is renew the scholarship but they make sure during the spring months that the player knows where he is at on the depth chart.  The coach might be brutally honest and say that they feel there is no way you are going to see the field, court, or diamond.  While they won’t say we want to offer your scholarship to another player, they will make it clear that your life with be hard not playing.

This happens very often when there are coaching changes.  Last year when Bob Huggins took over at West Virginia, he used that technique with at least one player to get him to leave.  What was surprising is that this athlete had major Division I scholarship offers before he decided.  But the coaching changed made things different and Huggins pushed him out the door.

It also shows that college coaches can not renew your scholarship if you are struggling academically, not working hard, or have been getting in a lot of trouble away from your sport.  It is really up to them.  While there will the backlash I did mention earlier, if it helps them win games and keep their job, coaches are willing to do it.