re: Brandon Kennedy transferring

I'm pretty sure the NCAA requires that schools' NLI agreements obligate the school to provide a scholarship for a minimumum of 4 years, and maybe even a 5th year too if they're redshirted.

The school spends one of their 25 annual Initial Counter spots and 85 total scholarship spots to get a 4-5 year player, and then invests extensively in educating, supporting and developing them.

The SEC has a policy against student athletes transfering to other schools within the conference. It's also my understanding that schools' typically include their standard transfer release restrictions in their NLI agreements, meaning the student athletes have already agreed to those on day one.

The SEC policy also provides that a student athlete may appeal to the SEC to override transfer release restriction(s) that a school is unwilling to waive.

The purpose of the restrictions is to protect the school (and its other members) against the adverse impact of players transfering to schools that compete directly against them in their conference or on their schedule. A student athlete getting an undergrad degree early does not invalidate the transfer release restrictions that were agreed to in the NLI.

What I've described is pretty standard across FBS conferences and schools.

NCAA Bylaws (rules) contain a grad transfer provision that allows for a transfer release restriction to be overridden if the school does not offer the grad degree that the student desires to pursue.

It's my understanding that Kennedy got his undergrad degree in 3 years, redshirted his freshman year and also got a medical redshirt for 2017, and thus has 3 years of eligibilty remaining.

He's also already taken grad courses at UA, so it's apparently not a case of him needing to transfer to UT or AU in order to pursue a grad degree UA doesn't offer.

Instead, it smells like a case of tampering by UT and/or AU with a valuable UA player, enticing him to transfer by promising him he'll be their starting center for the 2018 season.

Reportedly, Kennedy wants to transfer to UT. Kennedy has appealed to have the restriction overridden by the SEC. UT is of course hoping media and public sentiment will win the day like it did with Mo Smith leaving UA for UGA.

One thing that worked in Smith's favor was that UGA and UA were not scheduled to play each other. That's not the case with Kennedy seeking to go to UT.

There's a significant number of players who get their undergrad degrees in three years. If the SEC overrides the restriction and allows Kennedy to transfer (after only being at UA for 3 years) to UT, simply because he got his undergrad degree early, they're setting a dangerous precedent.