![\"Cincinnati](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ShemarStewart-1244730376-e1752693324957.jpg\")
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Cincinnati Bengals edge Shemar Stewart could return to the NCAA<\/p>\n
The Cincinnati Bengals<\/a> and first-round draft pick Shemar Stewart<\/a> are mired in a pretty nice contract holdout. The Bengals would have the edge if experience in this area was the only criteria; they do this stuff constantly. But, Stewart seems to be weighing his options and, based on a report from CBS Sports\u2019 Bud Elliott, one of them could be returning to Texas A&M and re-entering the NFL Draft in 2026. <\/p>\n \u201cIt may not be legal yet, but then again, everything in the NCAA is subject to litigation,\u201d Elliott said<\/a>. \u201cI didn\u2019t know you could do this. I knew you could do this in baseball\u2026 I don\u2019t know why you could do it in baseball but not football. You probably have to go to court.\u201d<\/p>\n As with most stories that involve contracts and legalities, Pro Football Talk\u2019s Mike Florio is on top of it to unpack it for us. <\/p>\n \u201cThe first part of what Elliott said is generally accurate,\u201d Florio writes<\/a>. \u201cStewart has been working out at Texas A&M. (He\u2019s not \u201cpracticing\u201d with the team, we\u2019re told. Then again, fall practice has yet to begin.) Part of the second part isn\u2019t accurate; if Stewart returns to school for 2025, the Bengals would continue to hold his rights through the first draft after Stewart\u2019s eligibility expires.<\/p>\n \u201cYes, NCAA rules would prevent a return, now that Stewart has been drafted. But many NCAA rules have failed under the weight of the federal antitrust laws. Why shouldn\u2019t a player who has never taken an NFL paycheck or signed an NFL contract be prevented from going back to school?\u201d<\/p>\n Does the CBA allow a drafted player to return to school?<\/p>\n There seems to be some discrepancy as to what exactly would happen if Stewart were to return to the NCAA. Is it even allowed? While some NIL rules have muddied the waters, it used to be that if a player even signed with an agent they were immediately disqualified from NCAA eligibility. <\/p>\n Just ask Bo Jackson, who was barred from playing baseball<\/a> at Auburn after he visited with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers<\/a> prior to the 1986 NFL Draft. Ever wonder why he refused to play for them when they took him No. 1 overall that year? That\u2019s why. And it\u2019s not even the same sport for crying out loud. <\/p>\n \u201cSomewhat surprisingly, the CBA contemplates the possibility that a drafted player will instead go back to college,\u201d Florio continues<\/a>. \u201cHere\u2019s the language, from Article 6, Section 6: \u201cIf any college football player who becomes eligible for the Draft prior to exhausting his college football eligibility through participation is drafted by an NFL Club, and returns to college, the drafting Club\u2019s exclusive right to negotiate and sign a Player Contract with such player shall continue through the date of the Draft that follows the last season in which the player was eligible to participate in college football, and thereafter the player shall be treated and the Club shall have such exclusive rights as if he were drafted in such Draft by such Club (or assignee Club).<\/p>\n \u201cIn English, this means that, if Stewart returns to college football in 2025, he\u2019d be treated as a draft pick of the Bengals in 2026. Which means that he wouldn\u2019t be permitted to re-enter the draft next year.\u201d<\/p>\n Stewart is \u201cdug in\u201d on this holdout<\/p>\n Stewart\u2019s holdout and frustrations with the Bengals have led him to lash out at the team\u2019s management\/ownership<\/a> and even walk out on mandatory minicamps<\/a> last month. <\/p>\n Recently, ESPN\u2019s Adam Schefter did not paint a positive picture of his contract situation. <\/p>\n \u201cI think he\u2019s dug in on the language,\u201d Schefter said<\/a>. \u201cHe doesn\u2019t want to be the first one and be made an example of. The Bengals haven\u2019t had this language before. Other teams have had it, but the Bengals haven\u2019t, and he doesn\u2019t want to be the guy. He seems unwilling to budge.\u201d<\/p>\n Whether or not a return to college is in the cards remains to be seen. It\u2019s not known if that would be allowed and it\u2019s also uncertain what a return to the NFL would look like. <\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMicah Warren<\/a> Micah Warren has been covering the NFL – and sports in general – for more than 20 years and he began writing for Heavy in 2025. His work has been featured in Yahoo!, MSN.com, Forbes, Off the Record, GCobb.com, Blast Magazine and other sports and non-sports-related outlets. Micah also co-hosts “The Philly Pulse” podcast. More about Micah Warren<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Bengals\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Cincinnati Bengals edge Shemar Stewart could return to the NCAA The Cincinnati Bengals and first-round draft pick…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[436],"tags":[49,48,514,82],"class_list":["post-2295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\u25b6\ufe0f\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/512.png=s64.png\")
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