The world according to Jim:
• If the following isn’t the essence of college sports in 2026, I don’t know what is.
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On Tuesday, the NCAA announced that its Division I Cabinet had approved a new, time-sensitive eligibility rule. No more redshirts, and no more waivers with exceptions for military service, religious missions or pregnancy. From now on, athletes will have five seasons of eligibility, with the clock beginning either when they enroll or at the beginning of the academic year following their 19th birthday, whichever comes first.
Sensible, right? Uncomplicated. All involved parties should buy in, no?
No. …
• A group of 15 men’s and women’s basketball players, who had entered college in the fall of 2022 and used four years of eligibility under the old rules – and thus were deemed not eligible for that fifth year – promptly filed a lawsuit in Hamilton County, Ohio. And according to Amanda Christovich of Front Office Sports, the attorneys who filed those suits – and have had previous cases before the court against the NCAA – will be filing many more similar suits.
The issue involved here: In drafting the new rule, the NCAA decided, for whatever reason, that those athletes who had already used four years of eligibility without using a redshirt year under the old rules shouldn’t get that fifth year. Doesn’t that go against the spirit of the rule they just approved? …
• And, of course, there’s another issue at play here. That’s one academic year’s worth of NIL and revenue-sharing money those athletes won’t get. You think they won’t be asking for financial damages as well?
So let’s see if there’s a settlement and if it involves those athletes getting that year of eligibility after all. (If so, imagine the angst of coaches who have spent the spring and summer roster-building only to have to tear it up and start over.) …
• There was another announcement this week that likely created some nervousness: The PGA Tour’s format change, beginning in 2028, will split the tour schedule into “Championship” and “Challenger” tiers, with promotion and relegation and a significant difference in purse sizes: $20 million per tournament for one tier, $4 million for the other.
And I hate to say it, but I fear the mid-January stop in the Coachella Valley, still associated with Bob Hope even though it hasn’t had his name attached since 2011, will be among those downgraded to the second tier. For so many years, largely because it fell right after two tournaments in Hawaii, its fields suffered from less star power because so many pros coming back from Honolulu took that week off. (Yet Scottie Scheffler, No. 1 in the Official World Golf Ranking both then and now, won in January, and Jon Rahm won in 2018 and ’23 before defecting to the LIV tour.)
I hope it stays as part of the championship tier. But I’m not optimistic. …
• Today’s quiz: Hope’s name was attached to the tournament for 47 years, during which it was a 90-hole pro-am tournament played on four different desert courses, with one pro and three amateurs (either celebrities or those well-heeled enough to afford the entry fee) comprising each group. Who won the first edition of the tournament known as the Bob Hope Desert Classic, in 1965, and who won the last one with Hope’s name attached in 2011? Answers below. …
• John Canzano, in his “Bald-Faced Truth” Substack column, noted that the Mountain West Conference is unveiling a new slogan: “Built Bold.” Something tells me that the Big West, which changed its motto to “Only The Bold” a few years back, would like a word. …
• A belated thank you, by the way, to all of those who responded to my recent request for ideas on fixing sports (which gave me material for three full columns). I referred to you as Assistant Commissioners of Everything, and our Inland columnist, David Allen, noted: “They are ACEs!”
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That works. …
• It is not an accident or coincidence that the NFL will not hold a supplemental draft this year. The only applicant was former Texas Tech quarterback Brendan Sorsby, who gave up the fight for one last year of college eligibility and opted to turn pro, but whose betting history while still a player made him a flash point for the whole issue of legalized gambling (and the sports industry’s embrace of same).
In effect, 2026 amounts to a one-season suspension for Sorsby, which is as it should be. Maybe, hopefully, he’ll be wise enough to use it as a recovery year. …
• Someone should have filled Sorsby in. This was the league that, under Pete Rozelle, suspended stars Paul Hornung and Alex Karras for a season in 1963 for betting on games and associating with known gamblers. It may have been over 60 years ago, but it’s still a precedent. …
• Quiz answer: Billy Casper won the first Bob Hope Desert Classic in 1964, finishing 12-under and winning by a stroke over Tommy Aaron and Arnold Palmer. The total purse was $80,000, and Casper’s winner’s share was $15,000. Jhonattan Vegas won the final tournament with Hope’s name attached in 2011, at 27-under in a playoff with Bill Haas and Gary Woodland. The purse then was $5 million and the winner’s share $900,000.
(By contrast, when Scheffler won the American Express by four shots five months ago, the total purse was $9.2 million and the winner’s share $1.656 million.) …
• Worth checking out: The Armenian national basketball team plays an exhibition game against Ireland at 5 p.m. Saturday at Cal State Los Angeles.
Why here? Armenia’s head coach is Rex Kalamian, who spent two tours as a Clippers assistant coach (first under Bill Fitch, Chris Ford and Alvin Gentry from 1995 through 2003, and later on Doc Rivers’ staff from 2018-20) and most recently has been on Milwaukee’s staff. Kalamian played two seasons at East L.A. College (1987-89), finished his studies at Cal Poly Pomona, went back to ELAC as an assistant coach in 1990 and has been an NBA coach since Fitch hired him with the Clippers in 1995. …
• A couple of years back, we made the observation that the folks in San Diego who renamed a highway after Ted Williams might have chosen the wrong one. They attached Teddy Ballgame’s name to State Route 56, a number more synonymous with Joe DiMaggio and his record hitting streak.
But we have one closer to home that seems to be begging to be renamed, and it’s entirely appropriate. State Route 2 runs from Santa Monica through Echo Park and Glendale, and ultimately becomes the Angeles Crest Highway that ends east of Wrightwood at State Route 138.
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Shouldn’t the L.A. portion, at least, be renamed the Tommy Lasorda Highway?