Everybody loves a 5th year senior. You'd take Jake Ryan over some unproven POS freshman and so would I.

But the tradeoff is never that simple. Last week Seth wrote a thoughtful lament of "burned redshirts" in recent Michigan history. Many others take a default "red-shirt until you can't" mentality. This is my all-due-respect counter-argument to this philosophy.

Top 10 Reasons to Play All Your Freshman*

or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Burn

*almost

1. It Helps Recruiting

Playing is great and waiting sucks. Immediate opportunity matters, especially to elite recruits. "We don't redshirt" is awesome marketing. "Come workout real hard, study for a year, and then we'll see" is not. Every coach will insist that the best will play, regardless of age, and Every Coach will challenge a recruit to not fear competition. Teams that differentiate have an advantage.

That's not to mention avoiding the unfortunate depth chart evaluation: "Oh that guy? Yeah we red-shirted him, so he'll be around for 4 more years to fight you for playing time"

2. Special Teams Matter

Coaches seem to care a lot more than fans. It's clearly important to Harbaugh (see: Baxter & Durkin) and Hoke used starters regularly on special teams (e.g., Blake Countess). If your best and most athletic freshman play, your team benefits.

Playing freshman on special teams can mean better results on special teams, fresher starters on O and D, and prevented injuries to your most important players. Replacing veterans with freshman on special teams not only reduces their injury potential but also reduces the need for rotating in backups because they stay fresh.

Next time someone argues a guy was "wasted" because he ONLY played on special teams, don't automatically discount his contributions.

3. Accelerated Player Development

I believe most development happens on the practice field, but one has to acknowledge that some marginal development happens in game as well. Playing a guy, even 'just' special teams, helps them grow and understand the difference between college and high school.

Jarrod Wilson probably isn't the player he was the last two seasons if he doesn't get his feet wet as a freshman.

4. Redshirts Are Failure

The best case scenario is an NFL caliber player who comes in right away and makes your team better. Red-shirting means the optimal scenario is out the window. Because we follow recruiting so closely we've probably already accepted it, and built it around the rankings, but the fact remains. A redshirt is a failure from the start relative to the optimal scenario.

The coaches failed to land the NFL caliber 4-year player we and they wanted and now you're left crossing your fingers, hoping that one day, 4 years later, it pays off.

5. Redshirts Are Wasteful

Even if it does payoff, you've invested more to get the payoff. The second the red-shirt determination is made you've committed to spending 5 years of scholarships to get the same 4 years of production you could have had otherwise, and that's in a best case scenario.

Scholarships are a limited resource. You have a budget of 85. Red-shirting is spending one year where you are guaranteed to get nothing in return.

6. The Redshirt Payoff Is Uncertain

To get the payoff on a red-shirt season, a 5th year senior must produce two scholarships worth: the one he gets his 5th year AND the one he got as a freshman.

In most cases the payoff doesn't come. Guys transfer, get kicked off the team, or just aren't good enough. In the case of Bellomy and Heitzman (and many more) we don't flinch when they aren't invited back. It's just the nature of the game. We toss aside the losing bet slip and write it off as a sunk cost. We've had four years to figure this out and already gave up. The blow is softened to the point of not being felt. But the cost remains on the books - Michigan gave up something and got nothing that year. Maybe Bellomy and Heitzman wouldn't have made any contribution as freshman, but whatever they would/could have done would be more than what they'll bring to Michigan in 2015.

Then there are the guys Michigan DOES want back. Coming back in year 5 is a two-way street. This off-season we've already lost two in Jack Miller and Justice Hayes. Michigan invested a red-shirt season scholarship in them and the payoff never came. This wasn't a big deal in the past, but with grad transfers becoming football free agents Michigan has become a consistent supplier of talent for other teams (e.g., Ryan Mundy, Mike Cox, Josh Furman, Justice Hayes).

Then of course there's the NFL draft. Michigan easily could have red-shirted Devin Funchess - too raw, too skinny, and unrefined as a blocker. He made some contributions his freshman year but nothing like his soph and junior years. It was argued at the time that his hypothetical 5th year contributions would have been so much more valuable to Michigan than what he did in 2012. But those contributions would never have been realized. Michigan made the right choice in playing Funchess as a freshman. As Urban Meyer oh so eloquently put it: "If you're a great player, you're gone, so play them."

7. Redshirt Opportunity Cost

This is really just points 1 and 5 again, but it's worth discussing a specific example that Seth raised: Raymon Taylor. Taylor easily could have red-shirted in 2011 and Michigan wouldn't have lost much.

Taylor was a good player. Any M fan/coach would like to have him back in 2015.

However, it has to be acknowledged that his departure created an opportunity for someone else. His starting spot was nearly filled by Iman Marshall (recruit seeing an opportunity) before it was ultimately filled by Wayne Lyons. Lyons may or may not be better than Taylor but it's reasonable to think that getting a crack at Marshall before 'downgrading' to a similarly experienced player of Lyons caliber (i.e., may not be a downgrade at all) is a net win for Michigan as compared to just getting Taylor back in year 5.

In the end, Michigan got a season's of special teams contribution from freshman year Taylor, accelerated his development, and got a shot at an elite recruit in 2015. All it 'lost' was swapping out one veteran player for another -- one that was more highly regarded as recruit 4 years earlier anyway.

This is a quintessential example of why it's never as simple as trading a 5th year guy for a freshman.

8. You Get More Players

It's math. Over a 10 year span, you get 850 scholarship-years. This is an inflexible maximum that applies to every NCAA team, and is unaffected by recruiting class sizes, NFL draft entries, transfers, walk-ons or injuries. The only possible change is moving the number down due to sanctions.If you have zero attrition and everyone red-shirts you will have 170 players in those 10 years, the smallest number possible (again, ignoring sanctions). The maximum is 850 players (if you swap out your entire roster every single season) but nobody is doing that (though Kentucky is wading into these waters in basketball). If you don't red-shirt anyone (all 4-year players) your new minimum is 212.

The red-shirting team in this attrition-free scenario gets 42 fewer players. The non-redshirting team increased the number of players passing through their program by up to 25%.

That's up to a 25% higher chance of finding the next Carter, Howard, Biakabatuka, Woodson, Edwards, Hart, or Robinson. It's what Alabama is trying to achieve by oversigning and medicaling people.

Red-shirting is a self-imposed sanction. You're voluntarily decreasing the number of players coming through your program. In other words you're UNDERsigning, and you're doing it by choice.

Now, obviously the above statements are obtuse hyperbole. We don't live in an attrition-free world and head coaches retain the ability to not invite 5th year players back. But hopefully you get the point -- every 5th year senior who is invited back takes the spot of someone else for a year. He makes recruiting classes incrementally smaller. Four 5th year seniors are the equivalent of one lost scholarship over a 4 year span.

9. Avoid The Redshirt That Burns You

Mike Cox played against Michigan. UMass lost, but there's a hypothetical situation where UM faces a guy and the outcome isn't so happy (e.g., Boren). What if Justice Hayes becomes the 3rd down back at Oregon State and they come to AA and pull off an upset in September? How would we be feeling about that red-shirt decision then? Michigan spent 4 years building them up, feeding them, training them, educating them, and now someone else gets to experience the pinnacle of their collegiate performance. And in some cases, you get to face it.

The guy may hurt you indirectly as well. Consider a hypothetical where Michigan was in the national title picture last year and got bumped out of the championship by Josh Furman's Oklahoma team. Maybe these situations are low probability, but stranger things have happened.

It's better to be consuming these grad school transfers than producing them. Not red-shirting people encourages this.



10. Flexibility & Insurance

Morgan and Countess got 5th years from injuries that occurred after their freshman seasons. If they had red-shirted as freshman they'd still be back in 2015, but we would have lost the production that they delivered in the 2011 season.

6th year players do exist, but are very uncommon. I have the impression the paperwork is onerous and leads to roster uncertainty due to the long response timelines. The cases of previously redshirted players losing a year because of injuries may be a lot more common than we think.

11. Motivation (Since 7 is sort of redundant, I give you a bonus)

The DO IT NOW attitude inherent with the no redshirt approach instills competition and urgency. No lollygagging in the weight room or practice field because you won't see the field for another year. Less favoritism for guys who've been around the program, more meritocracy.

Conclusions

Redshirts are wildly overrated. Redshirting is a suboptimal and wasteful resource allocation. Redshirting is a recruiting handicap. Redshirting is electing to undersign in an era of oversigning. Redshirting means self-imposing voluntary sanctions for good behavior. Red-shirts are scarlet letter Fs for failure.

Some of the list above are marginal points, it must be acknowledged. But taken together their effects are additive and significant. The benefit cost ratio on redshirts has shifted significantly in the last 10-20 years due to grad school transfers and changing expectations of student athletes.

Redshirting should be considered Plan B.

Exceptions

Kids who aren't going to play AT ALL: OL typically require physical development and QBs typically require mental development. Keeping your options open is fine, as long as you realize there's a very good chance that the redshirt a) isn't that good and you'll ask him to leave anyway b) is good but will leave by choice for another opportunity or c) will be subject to other attrition and never get to year 5. Keeping such a guy around comes with a lot of indirect costs.

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Did I convince you? Probably not, but there are valid reasons why the sport has evolved this way and some of the most successful coaches (e.g, Pete Carrol, Urban Meyer) were/are not redshirting it as a matter of policy.

According to Seth only 12 guys over the last 4 years are regretable at Michigan. Many of them fell under "pick one" category where Michigan needed help, it just didn't know who could help more (i.e., hindsight). Others where significant special teams contributors (e.g. Houma, Thomas). Some of the guys in more recent classes probably won't be around or asked back by then anyway. You're really down to one or two guys a year who you really can point to with regret. For all we know they got promises and wouldn't be here otherwise.

The 5th year guys who are back this year are...none. We have two former walk-ons and two guys that got injured last year.

I'm done worrying about it. Any RB, WR, LB, DB who is physically mature should be playing special teams instead of red-shirting. The only kids I want red-shirting in this 2015 recruiting class are the 3 OL, Washington (physically underdeveloped with high upside IMO), and Gentry (upside QB).

Attrition should be embraced. It is desireable. Michigan has recognized that at RB for decades. They'll recruit 2 guys every year, let them battle it out, pick a "primary" back, and then the buried guy eventually figures it out and leaves or moves to fullback. Harbaugh does this with his QBs too. Everybody applauds the competition, because the truth is somebody has to lose, and that's just life. Why not do it for every position?

Not redshirting is a way to be explicit about the reality of competition. There isn't a pot of playing time gold at the end of the 5-year rainbow for everybody. The pot is there, in front of your face, right now.

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Finally, I realize this argument shits on the notion of letting people mature as student-athletes and humans. It's an enormous shift from the "freshman have to sit out a year" history of the NCAA. But the sport has evolved so far away from emphasizing student welfare. Fighting the prevailing trends and rules of the game means swimming upstream. Most players don't want to sit out a year, most programs lose out by doing it... so what's the point?

