NCAA Waives Transfer Penalty

[tornado]

Tyler Smith, Iowa's best player, left Iowa after Steve Alford moved to New Mexico.
Smith then transferred to Tennessee and ordinarily would have to sit out a year as all D-I transfers do.....but...

In a nearly unprecedented act, the NCAA has declared Smith eligible immediately!
I wonder if any transfer to Bradley would ever get this kind of rare and almost unheard-of special treatment?

http://msn.foxsports.com/cbk/story/6951194

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=2913495

[Lakeview Brave]

"The primary reason is that Smith's father, Billy, is sick with lung cancer."

His dad might not be alive to watch him play if he has to sit a year. Good move by the NCAA IMO.

[Beninator]

"The primary reason is that Smith's father, Billy, is sick with lung cancer."

His dad might not be alive to watch him play if he has to sit a year. Good move by the NCAA IMO.

I agree... It was nice for the NCAA to do this. imo

[tornado]

Possibly, but the father had lung cancer when Smith decided to play ball in Virginia and in Iowa.
And I take it that you don't believe Smith's high talent level entered into this?

I did an exhaustive search for any examples of players who have gotten the NCAA to waive the one year sit-out penalty.
NOPE..allowing this kind of transfer is all but unheard-of......
I can find cases where the NCAA DENIED IT! even though it was for the same reasons.

BUT it has happened a few times when programs were placed on severe penalties (like at Baylor/Dave Bliss a few years ago) and the players were allowed to transfer without penalty.
And it happened a couple times to players who were displaced or affected by Hurricane Katrina....but those cases differ severely from this individual case.
(as do the recent few cases of graduate student who took advantage of a now rejected rule that allowed 5th year players to transfer without penalty, and when Birmingham Southern went from D-I to D-III their players were allowed to transfer to other D-I's with the penalty and only one did.)

I looked for similar examples as this where a star player wants to leave a program where the present coach has left...and found NO SUCH EXAMPLES, ever.
I challenge you to find such a case.......

There are a few cases where a player pled that he needed to be closer to home due to illness in the family, but in EVERY CASE I could find (and there were only a handful) it involved BCS schools, or it was complicated by something like the Katrina tragedy.

A Vandy to Purdue football transfer

http://www.jconline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070519/SPORTS020101/705190337/1046/SPORTS020101

And a case of a football player going from Colorado to Colorado State in which the writer also says:
"After a lengthy search, I could not find a case involving a football player in which it did happen"

http://calbears.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4191/is_20030817/ai_n10024267

(and they couldn't find a single basketball example except for all the way back to 2002, when there were five and those were the Baylor transfers.)


As "nice" as this might seem to some, it is a virtually unprecedented move, and allows one of the top players in the nation to go immediately to a team that already had Sweet Sixteen potential.


Here is the real reason for the transfer.......
"If Smith wins his NCAA appeal he could be the piece of the puzzle that elevates the Vols to unprecedented heights. Tennessee has never reached a Final Four. It???‚¬?„?s never been to the Elite Eight."
"Rick Stansbury, Mississippi State???‚¬?„?s veteran coach, believes Smith rockets Tennessee into a strong Final Four threat"

http://tennessee.scout.com/2/648437.html

[Lakeview Brave]

What motivation does the NCAA have for Vols to get bettter this year as opposed to next year? Do you think this only happend because Tennessee is in the SEC? Anytime something happens for the first time its unprecedented, not everything is a BCS conspiracy. What if his father didnt have lung cancer when he left for college? What if his father has only be give 6 months to live?

[Bravesguy]

I am suspicious of this.
It does fit the pattern, special treatment for the big boys.

[tornado]

I have never said the NCAA has any special agenda favoring certain institutions.
I believe they DO have a bias favoring the schools that generate lots of revenue for the sports and for the NCAA.
Please note my prior evidence as reported in the NCAA's handling of numerous cases such as the Reggie Bush impermissable payments, and the granting of eligbility to BCS recruits.
I have been very consistent and I believe convincing in supplying the evidence and the examples.

[georgethedog]

What motivation does the NCAA have for Vols to get bettter this year as opposed to next year? Do you think this only happend because Tennessee is in the SEC? Anytime something happens for the first time its unprecedented, not everything is a BCS conspiracy. What if his father didnt have lung cancer when he left for college? What if his father has only be give 6 months to live?

Yes, there are some things in life that are more f.....g important than rules! Most of the time "higher ups" make decisions like this the wrong way just to not set a precident. Who cares. So now there is a precident set that will do nothing but maybe help someone else in a similar situation someday and I say "way to go NCAA" as this is one of only a few good decisions they have made in a while!

[Beninator]

I havent heard, but is anyone from the University of Iowa complaining? Why should past issues or a lack thereof dictate what a decision should be for a current case? The kid should be close to his family and the NCAA made a "class" decision in this case.imo

[bert notorius]

Normally, I'm not a firm believer in absolutes. Every rule could have an exception. Except if it's Bruce Pearl. Then I make an exception to my own rule that he should get no exceptions.

[Lakeview Brave]

I have never said the NCAA has any special agenda favoring certain institutions.
I believe they DO have a bias favoring the schools that generate lots of revenue for the the sports and for the NCAA.
Please note my prior evidence as reported in the NCAA's handling of numerous cases such as the Reggie Bush impermissable payments, and the granting of eligbility to BCS recruits.
I have been very consistent and I believe convincing in supplying the evidence and the examples.

So in your opionion they would NOT have made the same decsion if the player wanted to transfer to Loyola, or Butler?

[MacabreMob]

The door is open now. Won't be long when everybody is complaining of their hardship and setbacks and deserving a favorable decision like this. Who is to say how hard a hardship REALLY is for someone, or if someone's is harder than someone else's... it all becomes so very subjective. May as well just let everyone transfer freely.

Oh well... at least it was for the Pearl. I LOVE the Pearl.

[tornado]

That is correct, LB

The best example of how easy and forgiving the NCAA can be if you are a BCS school is in this discussion.
Tell me if that was Bradley, they'd have been so easy.
The worst thing Bradley was guilty of was Dick Versace's rudeness, and they gave BU worse than they gave Georgia even with their institutionalized cheating.

http://www.bradleyfans.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=3892

this example alone should convince just about anyone even those who have a pro-BCS bias.

[PTTB]

Didn't Luke Recker get some sort of exemption in transferring? I believe he transferred to Arizona, redshirted, and never played, and then transferred to Iowa and was eligible immediately. It's not the same thing as what the NCAA just did, but it is similar.

This is definitely not something that I can recall otherwise happening before.

http://www.nba.com/draft2002/profiles/luke_recker.html

[MacabreMob]

Didn't Luke Recker get some sort of exemption in transferring? I believe he transferred to Arizona, redshirted, and never played, and then transferred to Iowa and was eligible immediately. It's not the same thing as what the NCAA just did, but it is similar.

This is definitely not something that I can recall otherwise happening before.

http://www.nba.com/draft2002/profiles/luke_recker.html

Hey... in my book, Iowa gets a free pass as well.