7n7 & Oversigning complaint that the current SEC proposal is too weak

His complaint is that the rule doesn't address the 85 and only moves the annual number from 28 to 25.

My response:

In some ways isn't a per year limit better than an 85 limit? I think the annual number should be lower than 25 though.

If the main worry of oversigning is that kids are being pushed out of programs unfairly then isn't the 85 limit part of the problem?

My thought would be to get rid of the 85 limit altogether and just set annual limits.  25 per year is too high so perhaps each school should only get around 23 per year which gives schools no incentive to push a player out the door unless they were a serious problem. Under that scenario if a coach kicked a player from a team, you'd know it was because of cause and not to make room to get under the 85 cap.

If you assume that a team uses all 25 signees in every class along with 50% redshirts that gives you 113 potential players without any attrition ((25 x 4) + (25 x 50%)). That means to stay at 85, schools in the SEC couldn't have an attrition any higher than 25% (1 - 85/113) or they'd run into Houston Nutt's current problem. I looked at most of the top 20 FCS teams last year and the average attrition was around 25% with the SEC higher so is the SEC proposal that bad?

In other words, if this rule passes most of the schools in the SEC couldn't afford to actively cut players since they will struggle to stay at 85 if they continue their past practice of recruiting borderline students and players with questionable character.  Mississippi can't even do that today.

Some quick math at different per year limits:

28: 34% (28x4)+(28x50%) = 128 -> 85/128
24: 22% (24x4)+(24x50%) = 108 -> 85/108
23: 19% (23x4)+(23x50%) = 104 -> 85/104
22: 15% (22x4)+(22x50%) =   99 -> 85/ 99

FWIW Ohio State is one of the best in the country at about 13% attrition (including players leaving early).  Most SEC school are over 25% with LSU/Mississippi leading the way closer to 35% and only Georgia unaffected though admittedly I didn't look at every school (I'd assume Vandy won't be affected by this either).

In a perfect world I'd prefer it if the NCAA changed their rule to an annual limit of 23 signee's with no roster cap as well as the ability to reward 2 players every August that have paid their own way for at least 2 years with a "walk-on" scholarship. Until then I don't think the SEC proposal is all that bad because it will make "cutting" players that much tougher and because it closes the 2/1-5/1 signing period loophole that many are exploiting.

No doubt I'd prefer they'd made the bill stronger and I'm sure the coaches in the SEC will find loopholes.  Ultimately the NCAA will need to come up with something more comprehensive so keep fighting the fight 7n7!