Swinney on players skipping bowls: 'Any game is a risk'

After Leonard Fournette and Christian McCaffrey skipped their bowl games to avoid injury and prepare for the NFL draft, many scouts claimed those decisions would hurt their stock as prospects.

That wasn't the case last Thursday: Both players were selected in the top 10 of the draft, sparking a flurry of debate as to whether skipping bowl games would become a trend.

Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney remains outspoken against players skipping bowl games, saying he never could have imagined doing so when he was a player.

"At the end of the day, any game is a risk," Swinney told Pete Thamel of Sports Illustrated. "Why play at all your senior year? Why play at all? That's my personal opinion. But to each his own. If I have someone who doesn't want to play, don't play. Just let me know so I can get the next guy ready and we'll put the next 11 out there and compete."

The cases of Jaylon Smith and Jake Butt offer more motivation for players to follow Fournette and McCaffrey's lead.

Smith starred for Notre Dame and was likely to be a top-five pick in the 2016 draft. He suffered a horrific leg injury in the Fiesta Bowl and fell to the second round, costing him an estimated $15 million in the process.

Butt tore his ACL playing for Michigan in the Orange Bowl this past season, dropping from a likely second-round selection to the fifth round. That drop cost him an estimated $2.5 million.

Clemson has made the College Football Playoff the last two years, a scenario that likely stopped the program from having to worry about players skipping bowl games. It'll be interesting to see how Swinney's NFL-bound players react if the Tigers qualify for a lesser bowl.