A Dallas judge just handed the Kansas City Chiefs an unusual roster wrinkle. Two Chiefs players are among 41 plaintiffs covered by a restraining order barring the NCAA and SEC from blocking their return to college football for one more season.

“Among the other football players granted TROs today: Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Wesley Bissainthe, Chiefs wide receiver Omari Evans and SMU first-team All-ACC safety Ahmaad Moses,” CBS Sports’ Matt Zenitz posted on X.

Well, this is one of those NFL offseason twists nobody really saw coming. A Dallas judge signed off on a restraining order Thursday that stops the NCAA, the SEC, and commissioner Greg Sankey from blocking a group of athletes from returning to college sports. We’re talking 41 plaintiffs total, and Bissainthe and Evans are both on that list, along with Dallas Cowboys receiver Jordan Hudson and SMU safety Ahmaad Moses.

Bissainthe spent four seasons at Miami, developing from a promising freshman into a steady off-ball linebacker and earning Third-team All-ACC honors as a senior. Evans took a different route, starting his career at Penn State from 2022 to 2024 before transferring to Washington for his final season, where he closed out a solid four-year career.

Both Bissainthe and Evans went unselected in the 2026 NFL Draft and signed with Kansas City as undrafted free agents afterward. Now, thanks to this court order, they technically have a path back to campus if they want it, since the ruling says they can’t be denied eligibility based on transfer portal rules or the fact that they briefly sat on an NFL roster.

The legal reasoning behind all this traces back to a rule change the NCAA made back in June. Athletes used to get four years of eligibility within a five-year window. That got bumped to five years within five, which sounds simple enough, except the NCAA decided not to apply it to a specific group of outgoing seniors, arguing it would eat into opportunities for incoming freshmen.

Naturally, a bunch of those players pushed back in court, and more than 100 athletes have now joined lawsuits over the decision. In his order, Judge Martin Hoffman put it plainly.

“As long as they would have been eligible to continue playing college sports in the following semester if they had a fifth year of eligibility, they are eligible today,” Hoffman wrote.

That’s a bigger deal than it sounds, because just this week, all four power conferences voted in new rules meant to do exactly that, essentially blocking teams from playing anyone who previously signed a pro contract.

It was a direct response to a similar situation last week involving LSU, where a Louisiana judge’s order let players like Dae’Quan Wright and Zxavian Harris walk away from NFL rosters to join Lane Kiffin’s LSU.

However, for Bissainthe and Evans, none of this guarantees they’ll actually suit up in college this fall. It just means the door is legally open, at least for now.

The Complex Picture Behind Major Ruling Against the NCAA

Beyond the individual players caught up in this, there’s a much bigger mess playing out behind the scenes.

According to reports, the NFL has informed the teams that any player returning to college this year will not be able to re-sign with any NFL team in the 2026 season. Any player who does that would become a free agent for the 2027 season.

Conferences, meanwhile, are scrambling to protect themselves. The SEC’s new policy hands commissioner Greg Sankey the power to punish member schools that break the rules, and the penalties aren’t small. Reports point to a 50 percent suspension for head coaches, a 50 percent cut to that sport’s budget, and lost voting privileges within the conference.

Coaches aren’t thrilled either. Several have voiced concerns that these rulings could create a permanent revolving door between the NFL and college rosters, something the sport has never really had to deal with before.

With the college football season kicking off in a matter of days, there isn’t much time left for either side to sort out where things stand for good.