Christian McCaffrey, Leonard Fournette Decide to Skip Worthless Bowl Games

On Monday morning, Stanford running back Christian McCaffrey announced that he would be foregoing a chance to play in the vaunted Sun Bowl against North Carolina next Friday. McCaffrey said he made the decision so that he could "begin my draft prep immediately." He also tweeted that he had the full support of his teammates, which will of course keep all the televised gasbags in double windsors from shouting about quitting on your team.

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— Christian McCaffrey (@CMccaffrey5) December 19, 2016

A few days prior, LSU running back Leonard Fournette and his coach Ed Orgeron announced together that Fournette would be sitting out the second cousin twice removed of bowl games, the Buffalo Wild Wings Citrus Bowl.

Fournette's decision was an easier sell, since he spent much of his junior year battling injuries, and has not really been full strength. McCaffrey, on the other hand, just came right out and said (sort of) that these bowl games are a waste of time, with literally no upside and a whole lot of downsides. Both probably recall Notre Dame's Jaylon Smith, a projected top-five pick in the 2016 draft before he tore his knee to shreds in the Fiesta Bowl against Ohio State and dropped into the second round. Like Smith*, Fournette and McCaffrey would have been playing for nothing—some Buffalo Wild Wings and Hyundai swag, respectively.

Earlier this season, Oklahoma DT Charles Walker left the team early to prepare for the draft. He played in four games for the Sooners before suffering a concussion in October against TCU and never played again. Walker made the decision with two games left in the season, prompting his defensive coordinator (and the head coach's kid brother) Mike Stoops to say, "Quitting on your teammates is hard to take as a coach."

Players are slowly trying to re-shuffle the balance of power in the game they play for everyone else's entertainment. They don't get paid, can get cut for no reason, and get punished if they transfer, whereas year-to-year they might have no idea whether the coach who recruited them will run off for greener pastures at no personal cost. All they have is their ability to play. It makes all the sense in the world that they don't want to risk losing that this close to an actual payday.

*Updated to reflect that the Fiesta Bowl was only part of the New Year's Six, not an actual playoff.