It’s was the first Saturday of fall, college football is celebrating, and NBA training camps are slowly opening.
In other words, sports are thriving.
There’s never a dull moment in the world of sports, and today, LeBron James is here to make our sports brains work a little harder.
On this fine Saturday afternoon, LeBron posed a random, but simple, question to his 52.2 million Twitter followers.
“Do I have college eligibility if I want to play a sport other than basketball?”
It’s unclear what sport LeBron is referring to based on his tweet. However, everyone assumes he’s referring to football.
“”Generally speaking,” an NCAA representative said in an email, “if a player is drafted and plays for an NBA team, he will be ineligible to compete in college basketball.” He could, however, participate in a different sport.”
The rule is formalised in the Amateur Status if Professional in Another Sport clause in Section 12.1.3 of the NCAA’s Division I Manual, which states, “A professional athlete in one sport may represent a member institution in a different sport and may receive financial assistance in the second sport.”
That means James could not only play college football, but they could also receive scholarships (not that they would need them).
However, there’s little chance it’ll ever happen – at least not for a long time, given that the college season coincides with the first half of the NBA calendar and that both players have endorsement deals and agents, which could jeopardise their eligibility.