How a single National Signing Day in February will fix college football's calendar problem

Dan Wetzel of Yahoo Sports joined On3’s The Andy Staples Show on Friday to discuss some of the ongoing issues in college football with roster movement, and the timing of National Signing Day.

On Thursday, Tom Wistrcill, the Big Sky commissioner who also serves as the chairman of the National Letter of Intent subcommittee, told Nicole Auerbach of The Athletic that there’s been “advanced discussions” about moving the early signing period to the Wednesday before conference championship weekend. In 2024, that would be Dec. 4.

By moving the early signing period up, it would allow coaches to lock in their early signees before the transfer portal window opens – a big topic of conversation this past December.

Additionally, there have also been discussions about adding a summer signing period prior to athletes’ senior seasons – much like basketball’s calendar. That would be in either June or August and also give athletes another opportunity to sign NLIs.

Speaking on National Signing Day with Staples, Wetzel had some other ideas, proposing one singular signing day positioned in February, after the coaching carousel finishes, as a way to allow players to make the most informed decision possible on their football future.

“This cracks me up. It’s tinkering with the formula. We’re going to move it up to after the conference championship game, or before it. First off, in two years you’re going to be signing contracts with these players. There’s no National Signing Day. Okay, great. Signing day, there should be one signing day, and it should be in mid-February, if not later,” Wetzel explained. “I know there’s spring practice situations. I know like Michigan would go early because [Jim] Harbaugh wanted to start spring practice on Valentine’s Day, because they love football. I’m going to miss the guy, I’m sorry. I mean, you can’t get that out of every coach. So there’s got to be a balance.

“Coaching carousel just ended. We just had our final coach hired, we think. You want your high school player to make his college decision with the most information possible. You want your college coach to make an offer to that high school player with the most information possible. That will cut down on what these guys hate the most apparently, which is transfers. Guys who didn’t work out. So you want to wait until they see, after the transfer portal goes through, what spots available. Did they recruit over me? Did my coach leave? Did my coach retire? Did my position coach leave?”

Dan Wetzel on potential NSD changes: ‘All you’re going to do is create more problems’

Continuing, Wetzel used the example of early-enrollees to make his point, along with the way things shook-out for many teams this offseason, as reasons for the change to prevent the chaos we’ve seen over the last couple of months.

“You don’t have to sign a Letter of Intent to enroll in January. If you’re one of those guys who want to enroll, that’s the ultimate Letter of Intent. It’s funny, they sign a Letter of Intent on like, December 22. They move into their dorm on December 27. Like, you probably didn’t need to sign the thing, okay. Didn’t really do a lot. Like, if you’re so committed you want to come in early, and you finish high school and you want to get there for the whole spring, fine. Great. Don’t have to sign a Letter of Intent. You’re just going to sign a contract, but you just enroll in the school. So anybody who wants to enroll early, can enroll early. Everyone else, you’re signing in the middle of February, so everything can sort out. The more information, the better the decision,” Wetzel added. “So you sit there and say, ‘Man, I am going to come from Seattle, Washington, and I’m going to go play for Alabama, this is great. I’m 100% committed.’ Guy retired. ‘Ugh, well I was going to play for Nick Saban.’ Now I’m not happy. Now I’ve got to hit the transfer portal. This isn’t what I was looking for, whatever. Totally understandable information. Nobody did anything wrong. Nobody. But you’re now locked in, because you signed before the coaching carousel finished. Before that announcement got made.

“Now they’re saying we need one in the summer. All you’re going to do is create more problems. … It creates more swirl, which is what they’re trying to stop. … So the signing day should be in February. Not these other ones, that just increase the swirl, and the churn of roster movement.”

Alas, Dan Wetzel makes some fascinating points. We’ll see if his proposition ever gets some serious consideration, but perhaps it could help solve the problem college football has been dealing with over recent seasons.

On3’s Nick Schultz contributed to this article.