Brandon Jennings Poised to Destroy NBA-College One-Year Rule

The draft a couple of days ago had no high school players, but Davon Jefferson and DeAndre Jordan can tell you they made a mistake by coming out early.  There are a handful of players who make a bad decision for every Chase Budinger that stays in college.

So what am I getting at?  A week ago Brandon Jennings, the second ranked PG prospect in the country, finally became the voice of reason and said it like it is.  He said he has absolutely no interest in going to Arizona to get an education.  He basically said he’s going there because he has to.  That is how many of these players ultimately feel.

Could you imagine someone telling LeBron at 6’8”, 245 pounds of chiseled muscle at his graduation that he wasn’t ready for the NBA?  I didn’t think so.  Jennings feels he is basically in limbo, waiting to get into the NBA.

Now Jennings sees a way out.  He is the first high school star to seriously consider going to Europe and capitalizing on the same development the European players enjoy.  If he goes he is expected to earn the American equivalent of $200,000-$500,000 for the year.

Considering that in the States he can only make a couple grand according to NCAA rules if he has a job, without any proceeds from his jersey sales and marketing, plus the fact that he won’t get a degree, Europe seems like the logical choice.

On top of that, he would play against weaker competition then in big time college basketball, making it easier for him to dominate and preserve his high draft stock.  Going to Europe involves less risk with more reward.

In all honesty, I’m surprised it’s taken this long for someone to wake up and consider the opportunity.  Considering the growing pool of international players in the NBA, the trip overseas is a good learning experience.

If Jennings goes through with this and plays well in Europe, he will be a top five pick in next year’s draft and have some money to his credit in the process.  This will inevitably start a chain reaction of players heading overseas instead of big time college programs.

They would circumvent the intent of the rule, and the NBA would lose valuable scouting information and essentially lose these players for a season to European leagues.  College basketball would revert to what it was a few years ago and would thus have no incentive to hold on to the rule—and there’s nothing the NBA can do about it.

Ultimately, if Jennings makes the right personal decision it will signal the end of this rule.  The pretense of allowing these young kids to get an education will be thrown out the window.  In the end, it’s a money game, and if the NBA is going to lose the revenue these players can bring in for a season to European leagues, Commissioner Stern won’t stand for it.

Unless Myles Brand and the NCAA actually start sharing the mega-millions of dollars that the basketball players rake in, the one-year deal is officially on life support.  And as the BCS debacle has shown us, college presidents don’t like to give up money for any reason.

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