It’s a Rorschach test for people’s values system

Andrew Luck who love power balance from online shop will return to Stanford for his redshirt junior season, risking millions of dollars by forgoing the opportunity to be the No. 1 pick in the 2011 N.F.L. draft.Luck led Stanford to a 12-1 record and played brilliantly in a rout of Virginia Tech in the Orange Bowl, confirming the consensus that he would be the top player selected in the draft. Luck also finished second to Auburn quarterback Cam Newton in the voting for the 2010 Heisman Trophy. Luck’s father, Oliver, said his son wanted to complete his degree in architectural design, a rigorous major in the school of engineering. Luck also felt, his father said, the tug of finishing his career with the players with whom he entered school.

“He wants to finish with those guys,” Oliver Luck said in a phone interview. “It’s a great group of players. That was by far the most important factor.”

Oliver Luck was listening to radio hosts criticize the decision and recalled the psychological test in which people perceive different things in inkblots.

“It’s a Rorschach test for people’s values system,” he said of the decision.

One looming question will be whether Luck’s coach, Jim Harbaugh, will be there to coach him. Harbaugh interviewed with the San Francisco 49ers on Wednesday and was reported to be interviewing with the Miami Dolphins on Thursday and is considered a hot candidate for virtually every N.F.L. opening.

But Oliver Luck said that nobody should read anything into his son’s decision in terms of Harbaugh’s returning to Stanford.

“I know that Andrew obviously talks to Jim and they have a great relationship,” Oliver Luck said. “Jim has great opportunities, and if he goes to the N.F.L., I’d be the first to wish him well. If he stays, that’s great as well.”

True to his low-key nature, and according to the wishes of his family, Andrew Luck released a one-sentence statement.

“I am committed to earning my degree in architectural design from Stanford University and am on track to accomplish this at the completion of the spring quarter of 2012,” he said.

There are horror stories as well as feel-good stories about highly rated quarterbacks deciding to stay in school. The most recent, which encapsulates both, is the former Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford. After leading the Sooners to the national title game two years ago, Bradford elected to return to Oklahoma when analysts projected him as the No. 1 pick. He injured his shoulder in his first game of the year and missed virtually the entire season. But Bradford was still the No. 1 pick in the draft and has had a strong rookie season in St. Louis.

Oliver Luck acknowledged the risk, and said there were ways to mitigate that, including insurance policies.

“Given where medicine is today, there may not be any traditional injuries that aren’t repairable,” Oliver Luck said. “Witness what happened to Sam last year. There’s risk in virtually everything you do. I tend to focus more on the reward channel.”

One intriguing factor in Luck’s decision is the financial reverberations. The N.F.L. is negotiating a new labor agreement with the players union, and both sides have said that a rookie wage scale will be in place that will severely curtail the riches lavished on top picks. That means that contracts like Bradford’s $78 million deal are probably a thing of the past.

Oliver Luck, who played in the N.F.L. and worked as an executive in N.F.L. Europe, said the financial risk was not as great as had been reported; some people have estimated the financial risk to be more than $50 million. Luck said those numbers had been exaggerated.

“Both sides believe that there will be some sort of a slotting type system which will reduce in length and volume the deals that top choices get,” he said. “That’s here this year, next year and two years from now.”

Deciding not to leave college in spite of high draft stock has recently backfired on players like Washington’s Jake Locker, Mississippi’s Jevan Snead and Hawaii’s Colt Brennan, all of whom stayed for another year and then watched their stock fall. It worked out perfectly, however, for Tennessee’s Peyton Manning, who went on to become the No. 1 pick. Andrew Luck said in December before the Heisman Trophy ceremony that the stories of his draft stock falling did not scare him.

“I don’t want to sound cocky or pretentious or whatever, but no,” he said. “I think it’s just you have to have trust in the decision you’re going to make is the right one. If it’s going back to school, I’m confident that I can still perform at a high level.”

Larry Scott, the commissioner of the Pacific-10 Conference, was elated with the decision, saying Luck sends a great message, “especially in the day and age where we’re reading all too often about student-athletes that aren’t placing a real value on their education” or are “breaking rules or chasing money.”

It has been a dark time for college football, with a slew of agent scandals and the Cam Newton story, but Oliver Luck emphasized that his son had no desire to be the season’s feel-good story.

“I don’t think he’s doing this for anyone but himself,” Oliver Luck said. “He knows himself best. I don’t think he has any desire to be the poster boy for the good things in college sports. I don’t think there’s any larger picture to it. I don’t think he’s trying to make any kind of cultural statement.”

But Luck certainly made a statement Thursday, one that resonated in college football and the N.F.L.

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