Dabo Swinney doesn't hold back on potential CFB walk-on change

There have been plenty of changes in college sports over the past few seasons, from players being paid millions via NIL deals to a transfer portal that has essentially become college free agency.

College football, specifically, is barely recognizable from five years ago. Throw in the fact that conferences have changed so much that the Pac-12 as it was doesn't even exist anymore, and that's reason to feel that enough is enough.

No more change. Give us a minute to take it all in.

That sounds like something Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney was thinking when asked the other day about another proposed change to the game. There's a world in which walk-on players could be eliminated completely as scholarship restrictions would go away, but with that change would be a restriction on the amount of players allowed on a roster.

That would mean more scholarship players, but it would also mean your "average joe" going to the college and trying to walk on to the team would be no more.

That's a world Swinney wants nothing to do with.

“I literally just heard that for the first time the other day, and I can say that’s probably the worst thing I’ve heard since 1988,” Swinney recently told The Clemson Insider. “Of everything that’s happened in my entire career since 1988, that’s probably the worst thing I’ve ever heard.”

Swinney may be attached to the idea of the walk-on because he, in fact, was a walk-on. He joined Alabama football as a walk-on before earning a scholarship. He took a chance as a non-scholarship player, and look at how that chance paid off.

Without walk-ons, we wouldn't have players like Stetson Bennett, Baker Mayfield, J.J. Watt or Clay Matthews. They never would have even made the team because their spot would have gone to some 2-star recruit.

“I certainly wouldn’t be here if I didn’t have an opportunity to chase my dream and prove that I could do something,” Swinney explained. “That is probably another lawsuit. Everybody talks about lawsuits and all that stuff, that’s probably another one that will be coming down the pipe.”

Lawsuits and litigation. That's the state of college football in 2024. It's already bad enough. At least let us keep our walk-on heroes.