COLLEGE BASEBALL: Scramble for scholarship dollars
Kevin Vance had a piece of paper in one hand, a pen in the other and a clear picture of his baseball and educational future within reach.
He was sitting on a plane heading home to San Diego after an official recruiting visit to the University of Connecticut last summer. It was time to decide where he would play after his senior year at Torrey Pines High —- Connecticut or Utah, the two schools that offered him financial aid.
Vance chose Connecticut, but it wasn’t an easy decision. He drafted a list of both universities’ pros and cons, with a main factor being the scholarship situation at each school.
New rules that will be implemented on Aug. 1 —- this year’s high school seniors are the first players to be affected —- have made it harder for baseball players to earn financial aid at Division I schools. Last April, the NCAA board of directors approved several rule changes that place stringent regulations on the distribution of scholarship dollars. Programs are allotted 11.7 scholarships to fill a 35-player roster.
In the past, schools could distribute the money as they desired. But beginning with the 2008-09 academic year, which encompasses the 2009 college baseball season, no more than 30 players will be allowed to receive financial aid, and those players must be given at least 25 percent of a scholarship. In the 2009-10 academic year, the number of players eligible for aid will drop to 27.
Baseball players currently receiving scholarships worth less than 25 percent of a school’s annual expenses will not be subject to the new edict.
So while Vance was mulling the conference affiliations of the Utes (Mountain West) and Huskies (Big East), their coaching staffs and each school’s program in sports management —- the field Vance plans to major in —- the elephant in the room was the amount of financial aid each school offered.
Connecticut pitched a 25 percent scholarship, which would save Vance and his family roughly $8,000 on UConn’s $31,636 annual out-of-state student expenses. Utah offered 35 percent, knocking nearly $7,000 off the school’s $19,730 annual out-of-state bill.
“The money was a huge part of the thought process,” said Vance, a shortstop and outfielder for the Falcons. “I wanted to go somewhere different and experience something new. The money part of it definitely weighed me toward Utah, and I wanted to help out my parents as much as I could, but I guess I was kind of selfish.”
The baseball scholarship situation is a tape-measure home run away from the environment in which Division I football and men’s and women’s basketball programs operate. Football programs can offer 85 scholarships, while men’s basketball can hand out 13 and women’s basketball has 15.
In 2007, the San Diego State football team had 100 players on its roster, 85 percent of whom received financial aid. The Aztecs men’s basketball team carried 14 players, while the women’s squad had 13. The Aztecs’ women had more scholarships than players.
San Diego State’s baseball team, however, will provide financial aid to only 29 players this season, leaving six without any scholarship assistance. If the Aztecs chose to divide their financial aid evenly, each player on their roster would receive approximately one-third of a scholarship. But some players receive more aid than others. The Aztecs’ coaching staff wouldn’t say how much each player receives.
The number of scholarships baseball teams can offer has been at 11.7 since 1991, when a reform package was adopted to reduce the costs associated with operating intercollegiate athletics programs, according to Jennifer Kearns, an NCAA associate director of public and media relations.
From 1973 to 1990, baseball teams were allotted 13 scholarships —- except from 1974-76, when programs were briefly allowed 19 scholarships. Before 1973, Kearns said, schools were allowed unlimited scholarships “providing they followed other NCAA rules.”
Because baseball programs can no longer parcel scholarships below a certain dollar amount, fewer high school players will have the chance to earn any financial aid.
“The rule will help some guys, because now no one is going to be getting less than a certain amount,” Aztecs baseball coach Tony Gwynn said. “But for ‘that guy,’ the middle-tier guy who’d only get a small amount, it’s going to be a lot tougher.”
Many talented high school baseball players think a scholarship is a get-into-college-free pass. Once their name is on a school’s radar and scouts frequent their games, they think their road to baseball glory is paved.
“It was definitely a little surprising to be choosing between the 25 and 35 percent scholarships,” Vance said. “A lot of guys who are good players in high school kind of expect to have their choice of big offers.”
San Diego State pitching coach Rusty Filter, the baseball program’s main recruiter, has dealt with numerous players who think that every scholarship will result in a full ride.
“Most kids come in and don’t really know how scholarships work, so one of the first things we do is break down the rules,” Filter said. “We explain what the cost of the school is and how much kids are allowed to get.”
In the past, Filter could offer less skilled or more financially secure players 5 to 10 percent scholarships to help pay for books or class fees. But a 26-member committee —- which included three NCAA head coaches and Dave Keilitz, the executive director of the American Baseball Coaches Association —- concluded that the minimally fractioned scholarships led to baseball’s troubles with the Academic Progress Rate.
Baseball’s APR score, a statistic established by the NCAA to measure a program’s ability to graduate its student-athletes, is third-lowest among Division I sports. The committee said baseball players often transfer schools in search of more financial aid and playing time, hindering their ability to keep pace academically and thereby lowering baseball’s APR.
Keilitz said there was overwhelming support for all of the rule changes except for the 25 percent mandate, which was opposed by 46 percent of the committee members.
“Guys would transfer all the time because they were sitting on the bench, and then after changing schools they wouldn’t take as many classes as they were supposed to,” Keilitz said. “That used to lower the (APR), so we came up with a system that we thought was fair to both the programs and the student-athletes.”
Now, high school baseball players hunting for financial aid at San Diego State can either get a sizable financial boost —- 25 percent of one year’s in-state expenses for on-campus students is worth $3,520 —- or receive nothing.
“There are schools across the country that might have the name recognition where, in the past, they could offer five guys 5 percent,” said Filter, who remains on the fence regarding whether the changes are beneficial or detrimental.
“Of those five guys, if only one of them panned out, the school could get rid of the other four and give 25 percent to the one kid. That’s why this rule is in place. Twenty-five percent is a fair scholarship.”
Cathedral Catholic High baseball coach Gary Remicker said players tend to fall in love with any school that initially offers them financial aid. But programs often cut players two weeks into the fall season —- leaving them without a team, a scholarship or a sense of dignity.
“They sort of feel like their school lied to them,” Remicker said. “Now that won’t happen, and that’s a good thing.”
Remicker said the regulations won’t affect top-level major league prospects because “if they’re good enough, they’d already be getting a 100 percent deal.”
He thinks the changes might hurt players who previously would have struggled to find any financial aid while helping those who, in the past, would have been offered minimal partial scholarships by numerous programs.
Without the new rules, Vance might have received substantially less than 25 percent. Because Vance likes the Huskies’ coaching staff and the competition he will face in the Big East, he was leaning toward attending UConn regardless of how much it offered. In previous years, the Huskies might have offered Vance a smaller deal.
San Diego State sophomore catcher Matt Parker, a Rancho Bernardo alumnus who joined the Aztecs as a walk-on, is on the other side of the spectrum. He will struggle to net any scholarship money during his career.
Parker was the Broncos’ MVP as a senior, batting .325 with 40 RBIs, and had offers to join San Diego State as a walk-on or play for UC Riverside with at least a partial scholarship.
“I really wanted to come play for SDSU, for Tony Gwynn and everything,” Parker said. “Once they told me I could play, scholarship or no scholarship, I was set on coming.”
Parker, currently injured with a stress fracture in his foot, started 12 games for the Aztecs last year and is the only catcher on the roster with collegiate experience. If the new scholarship rules prohibiting limited financial aid didn’t exist, Parker likely would have received at least a partial scholarship this season. Instead, Parker will get shut out for a second consecutive year.
“There are going to be (fewer) offers to go around,” Remicker said. “(Fewer) kids will get any kind of a deal.”
Another rule instituted this year makes it less likely that Parker would jump to another Division I school that offered him scholarship money. Beginning this season, if a baseball player wants to leave one Division I program for another, he must sit out a year and lose a season of eligibility.
In the past, baseball players typically changed schools more often than athletes in other sports because of the limited financial aid they’re offered and the varying rates at which they develop.
“There’s a lot more accountability that goes with picking your school now,” Filter said.
Added Gwynn, “When you decide to go to a school, it has to be the right place —- even more now than before.”
For Vance, the rules weren’t an impediment. But he knows the rules won’t break the same way for everyone else.
“Getting at least some money was definitely a part of the whole college-choosing process,” Vance said. “I’m always going to play my hardest wherever I am, but of course the scholarship is going to be in the back of my mind. It’s like that with everybody.”
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