Written by Ell
| 10 June 2008
With the first summer term under way at Alabama, and many of the 2008 signees already on campus, the scholarship numbers are starting to become a little more clear.
The MLB appears to have cost Bama two incoming players, as both
Destin Hood (2nd round to the Washington Nationals) and
Melvin Ray (33rd round to the Los Angeles Dodgers) have opted to play baseball professionally.
At the moment, current Bama signees
Kerry Murphy, Ivan Matchett, Brandon Lewis & Devonta Bolton have yet to enroll.
Details after the jump.
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Lewis has said that he will attend Hargrave Military Academy, though rumors have surfaced that he might actually be taking a class this summer that could allow him to enroll for the fall.
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Matchett is evidently taking summer school classes in the hopes of raising one grade in order to enroll in the fall.
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Murphy does not have either a qualifying standardized test score, nor does he have the grades to enroll. He does have more opportunities to increase his test score, but regardless, he will either have to attend Prep School again (without playing football), go the Junior College route, or head to a school that requires less to gain admittance. It doesn't look good for his chances to play at Alabama.
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Bolton is a bit of a mystery at this point; the flow of information has come to a halt. That is a bad sign regarding his current academic situation. However, it is possibly a good sign regarding his willingness to rid himself of all distractions as he attempts to get qualified.
With
Chris Jackson and
Corey Smith counting towards the 2007 class due to enrolling in January, that means Bama had 30 players to fit into 25 spots. With
Ray and
Hood opting for baseball, and
Murphy definetly not qualifying, that gets the number down to 27. If any pair of
Lewis, Matchett, or
Bolton fail to qualify, then Bama will have reached that magic number of 25... if 2 or more do qualify, someone will have to delay enrollment, with
Wesley Neighbors and
Brad Smelley being the 2 most likely candidates.
If you assume that everything will work out regarding the 25 number, however, there is still the problem of the overall scholarship limit of 85. Here is the current breakdown, by class:
Seniors (12): Will Oakley, Nikita Stover, Jimmy Johns, John Parker Wilson, Lionel Mitchell, Zeke Knight, Rashad Johnson, Antoine Caldwell, Marlon Davis, Travis McCall, Nick Walker & Bobby Greenwood.
Juniors (21): Roy Upchurch, Chris Rogers, Cory Reamer, Prince Hall, Marquis Johnson, Ali Sharrief, Justin Woodall, Javier Arenas, Eryk Anders, Glen Coffee, Baron Huber, Sam Burnthall, Evan Cardwell, Andre Smith, Mike Johnson, Drew Davis, Mike McCoy, Colin Peek, Brandon Deaderick, Lorenzo Washington & Brandon Fanney.
Sophomores (15): Kareem Jackson, Greg McElroy, Rolando McClain, Terry Grant, Charlie Kirschman, Charlie Higgenbotham, Travis Sikes, Chavis Williams, Brian Motley, Taylor Pharr, David Ross, Earl Alexander, Milton Talbert, Preston Dial & Luther Davis.
Redshirt Freshmen (15): Marquis Maze, Demetrius Goode, Brandon Gibson, Darius Hanks, Nick Fanuzzi, Tarance Farmer, Jeramie Griffin, Jennings Hester, Alfred McCullough, Nick Gentry, Patrick Crump, William Vlachos, Chris Underwood, Alex Watkins & Josh Chapman.
So if you add those numbers, plus Chris Jackson and Corey Smith, you get to 65. In order to bring in the full 25 in the fall, Bama has to get that number down to 60.
So, doing the easy math, that's just 5 more players that have to be removed from scholarship for all of the numbers to work out. Considering that two players (
Zeke Knight &
Lionel Mitchell) missed the majority of the spring due to injuries, and one player (
Prince Hall) is suspended indefinetly, the numbers appear to be very, very close to working themselves out.
Which is what Nick Saban said would happen the first time he was asked about it.
