You can't trust NCAA to do right, but it did in giving spring athletes extra year | Estes

A simple rule of screenwriting: Do not introduce an item for no reason.

You shouldn’t, for example, randomly put a pistol or a $50 bill in the scene without having a way for that gun or that cash to be included in the plot.

And so, on Monday, once word got out that the NCAA Division I Council was discussing and voting on an extra year of eligibility for spring sports, could it not follow through as it did, allowing schools to adjust financial aid rules and indeed offer an additional year for spring athletes impacted by the COVID-19 crisis?

Such a decision was wholly justifiable and somewhat predictable. Well, as much as NCAA rulings can be.

I mean, who would be more likely than the NCAA to get hopes up and then offer a “Nope, just kidding” wrapped in administrative red tape by one of its faceless committees?

Even by the NCAA’s own standards, though, that would have been callous. You couldn’t have the possibility out there and not make it happen. At least not for spring sports like baseball, softball, golf, tennis – the ones that didn’t get anywhere near a 2020 NCAA championship.

Winter sports? That was different. There were many basketball teams, for instance, who already had concluded seasons when cancellations hit. Even without an NCAA Tournament, no one was holding their breath for a rule change. As Belmont coach Casey Alexander said last week, “I would not be opposed to it in any way, but I don’t see that even really within the realm of possibility.”

But for the spring sports, the NCAA needed to grant that additional year of eligibility for athletes who barely had a 2020 season, especially when it made it clear to those athletes that it would be possible.

Congratulations to the NCAA for getting this one right. Such an occurrence is notable for an organization so bogged down by its own rigid bylaws that it often lacks the flexibility to help those who need help the most – its students.

We’re told by the NCAA that collegiate athletes shouldn’t be treated the same as professionals.

A staunch, unyielding notion of amateurism stands in the way of athletes being able to benefit from their celebrity. That debate is a long way from a conclusion, but new financial challenges that confront college athletic departments – like everyone else – via this crisis certainly don’t make change any more likely.

Meanwhile, if social distancing guidelines end up wiping out the NBA or NHL postseasons or even the entire Major League Baseball season, it’ll be painful. Pro players will lose a year off their careers and teams off their contracts, but there is no eligibility clock forcing anyone to retire. Most can simply turn the page to the next year.

College athletes don’t have that luxury, and that’s a huge difference. The vast majority of senior players are not headed to the pros or the Olympics. They’ll be done. And if differences between amateur and pro matter so much to the NCAA in its own policies, then this should have, too.

With how the NCAA likes to do things, there aren’t many easy decisions.

But this was one of them.

Reach Gentry Estes at gestes@tennessean.com and on Twitter @Gentry_Estes.