Class Dismissed for One and Dones'

Kentucky's Brandon Knight."I'm outta here bruh!"

 At a speaking engagement in Indiana on Saturday, Bobby Knight criticized the policy of allowing players to go to the NBA after one season and incorrectly said that during the 2009-10 season, the starters on Kentucky's NCAA tournament team did not attend class during the spring semester. "My overall point is that 'one and dones' are not healthy for college basketball," Knight said. "I should not have made it personal to Kentucky and its players and I apologize."
Even though Coach Knight apologized to Kentucky for his comments directed toward them. I completely agree with him for saying that it's not good for college basketball in general. I just believe that if a kid is good enough to play in the NBA at 18 years old, then he should have the right to go straight into the league right out of high school.

Let's stop playing games like these kids are going to class if they are in fact "one and dones' ". If players like John Wall, for example, were my child, my advice to him would have been to take a light load in the fall. Take all classes pass/fail so therefore he wouldn't have to worry about getting a certain grade in those classes. I would've advised him to take a public speaking class, a personal finance class and an interviewing class. These are all relevant to his future career and wouldn't be a waste of time.

During the spring semester the plan would be to only play basketball. Spend all of your time in the gym and weight room so that you'll be in the best shape of your life for NBA draft in June. I'd hire a personal trainer to come in and work him out during the day while everyone else is in class. It doesn't matter if he flunks all of his classes during the spring semester anyway. The draft is in June and if the kid is still alive in a few months he's going to be a lottery pick which guarantees a 3 year deal of $10 million, not to mention the endorsements that may follow.

Before you guys dive all over me, we're only talking about the kid that is only in school because the NBA forced him to go because of this stupid rule. If the rule didn't exist he wouldn't be in school anyway. So I'm not telling a kid to skip school that would otherwise be going.

Brandon Jennings, now of the Milwaukee Bucks, pulled he ultimate power move and didn't go to college at all. He went to Europe and played professionally for one season, only to come back and get drafted tenth overall in the NBA draft in 2009. Genius! Essentially, that one year was and should be viewed as an internship.
Now keep in mind that this argument only applies to about 3 or 4 people in the world, annually. This isn't meant for everyone but some people don't need to go to college. People like Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Beyonce' or Venus and Serena don't go to college when they possess a talent at a very young age that few people are blessed to have. The Brandon Knight's of the world, who by the way just declared for the NBA draft yesterday, are 1 in 10 million. How much of a waste of time would it have been for LeBron James to be forced to go to class at let's say Ohio State?

I think it's completely unfair to the kid that doesn't get offered a scholarship because the university goes after the "One and Done". The student that really wants and needs to go to class to represent the true essence of being a student-athlete misses out because the "One and Done" takes his place on the roster. Now the phenom is in school when he had no intension of going to class in the first place.

So again, Coach Knight was spot on in his assessment of the rule but his delivery as usual was wrong.  I won't beat him up for this one because I know I've got plenty of opportunities to pile on when he really says something crazy. Although, he's been pretty tamed since he's retired from coaching.

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Jay Graves
Follow me on Twitter: @jaygravesreport
Information from the Associated Press was used in this article.