Saint Mary’s blocking four-star recruit/potential Michigan target Zion Sensley’s release from his NLI
From Ethan Kassel: I’ve been told Saint Mary’s is blocking four-star recruit Zion Sensley’s release from his National Letter of Intent. He announced his intention to decommit following associate head coach Justin Joyner’s departure for Michigan. Sensley will need to file an appeal with the NCAA for his release.
Why does shit like this always happen with us?
Couldn't he transfer before the fall semester worse case? I thought just about everyone let's people out of their NLI at this point.
I’m happy that St. Mary’s is playing with fire here. The impending lawsuit will establish that no, in fact, you CANNOT force an athlete to play at an institution against their will.
We need mutually-binding contracts, or mutually-non-binding contracts
This is a bad look for St. Mary's as well. Good luck with recruiting after this!
That's exactly the big picture issue the idiots at St. Mary's are totally missing here. It will do them more harm than any good in the short term.
How do you bind a college student to a school? Even if you ruled that the players are employees, they’re also college students. That doesn’t stop being the case. From a legal standpoint it’s absurd that a student couldn’t be allowed to transfer.
The student is not bound to a school they are bound to play athletics for 1 year/season at that school. They can leave tomorrow but hey can't play athletics at the new school right away
Why couldn't he play right away, though? Everyone gets 1 free transfer without sitting out. I guess maybe he wouldn't be eligible until the following season if he has to start the fall at St. Mary's?
I don’t believe he’s enrolled yet, therefore cannot transfer. I didn’t think NLI’s meant anything anymore though, so this story is a surprise especially with a coach and recruiter leaving. Prepare to lose this one St. Mary’s.
He should just enroll at Michigan and dare St. Mary's to challenge his eligibility. The courts (and most likely NCAA but also who the hell knows with them) will not be on St. Mary's side.
I was going to say the same thing. Seems his NLI only matters because Michigan would choose to honor it, not because of any legitimate legal claim.
I wish people would stop confusing legal issues with NCAA issues. An NLI is binding under NCAA rules, not under the law. Yes, many NCAA rules have been overturned by the courts on anti-trust grounds, but anti-trust law is complex and not every NCAA rule is subject to it. A school probably couldn't challenge an on-field rule of play in court and get it overturned, for example.
Michigan wants to play sports against other schools. And the only viable way to do that is to submit to the authority of some kind of overarching organization that organizes these contests and the surrounding rules. Right now that organization is the NCAA.
You might argue that other schools have ignored NCAA rules and gotten away with it, which is true, but many others have not gotten away with it. At the simplest level, other schools have to want to play sports against Michigan. And if Michigan ignores the agreed-upon rules of the game, then the other schools can choose not to play sports against Michigan. That probably wouldn't happen, but the relationships between schools are complex, and not playing nice with others in one sport can have consequences that impact relationships across all sports and even academia. Basically, ignoring the rules is a political decision, not a legal one. Oftentimes ignoring the rules can be a politically advantageous decision, but only if you play the PR game around that choice well, and honestly, if you get at least a little lucky, too.
It's not St. Mary's that would challenge his eligibility, it's Michigan State, etc. And while he'd probably win, that requires Michigan to decide to put in a player that they know is ineligible unless he wins his court case, which is dangerous--the case presumably wouldn't be resolved before the start of the season.
Because Michigan is a threat to basically every other academic/athletic institution in this country.
Pick a situation and there is a gif of George Costanza.
And also Michigan State
I love chickens
"Low maintenance, high production".
Jim Harbaugh
Has Harbaugh ever talked about eggs as part of his diet?
I just thought - with all those chickens - high production - etc. - that eggs must be part of the equation.
https://247sports.com/player/zion-sensley-46118640/
6'8" small forward, #91 player nationally on the composite.
6' 8" and 170 lbs? Give that man a ham sandwich.
Give him 3 or 4! And some biscuits and chocolate milk to go with it...
Just no cheeseburgers
Maybe subs. That would be crazy.
Neither 247 nor On3 have him listed as a St Mary’s commit. Seems strange.
Any idea if he got a haircut and passed through the Atlanta airport recently?
What color skin does his dad have?
This comment should get at least 100 upvotes people.
If there was a comment that deserved to be bumped to the top of the list, this would qualify.
RobM wins MGoBlog - and the entire internet - for the day!
Coach can leave for a better opportunity with no problems, but 'student athletes' who are amateurs and definitely not employees can't do the same? Yep, that sounds like the NCAA I know and loathe. Time to get that attorney who is laying waste to the NCAA on the case.
it's a great idea to force someone who doesn't want to play for you to play for you. If it was the kid, I would be like "Ok. bet. hope you like shitty attitudes, zero effort, and a miserable locker room, cuz that's what I'm bringing this season"
Actually, coaches sign contracts and have to pay to leave. The same should apply for players - you want to leave, fine, but you're going to have to pay us to get out of your contract.
Actually, it would be what the player and the school agreed to contractually. The players are likely going to be employees and have employment contracts.
Guess it is a good thing that the FTC is ruling most noncompete clauses provide for a restraint of trade.
What contract do players have today? The NLI (National Letter of Intent) binds a kid to play at a certain school, per old-ish NCAA 'rules' that the Transfer Portal flouts every day. In this particular case, though, the terms of the NLI have changed - the coach the kid was recruited by, and possibly committed for, has left. The conditions of the NLI as proffered by the school have changed. Ergo, the kid should be free...
FREE THE KIDS!!!
My comment suggests in the future, does it not? "it would be."
That has nothing to do with this kid's situation. But thanks for the hypothetical.
Uh, you're missing the essential piece, here. You gotta be paying them in the first place. Then let's talk.
Have you not heard about player compensation, both current and former and the various NCAA lawsuits as well as what has been posted on this blog?
Stop being so smug.
Yeah, the only viable way forward will be for schools to sign players to employment contracts (four or five years, including costs of schooling and some kind of revenue share), with some kind of pre-determined compensation for players who transfer. Instead of functioning as development leagues for the pros, pro teams who want to draft players early will have to negotiate, the way MLB has to do with Japanese professional teams that own their player's contracts.
Sounds like this is more St Marys in this case. I'd actually imagine the NCAA is more likely to tell St Marys to knock it off because this would again probably be struck down in court if it comes to it
Okay but that’s not a good comparison.
Coaches aren’t allowed to leave for better opportunities with zero penalty. They have to pay a buyout to be released from their contract. A recruit being released from their NLI is a penalty-free release.
Not saying schools should block a release request, but it’s really not comparable to coaches leaving.
Coaches never pay their own buyouts, their new employer does that.
I don’t think who pays the buyout is really relevant. The point is there’s no penalty-free movement for the coaches. There is compensation to the previous school, whether that comes from the coach or the new school doesn’t matter. It’s simply not a good comparison to a player being released from his NLI, where there is zero penalty.
The penalty is that the Student is giving up his Scholarship at St. Mary's, which is the agreed upon compensation to play. Giving up tens of thousands of dollars is not nothing, so it is comparable. Or are you saying that the Scholarship is not compensation to play? In this case, Michigan has agreed it will pay for his college. If St. Mary's was paying his tuition at Michigan, then I think you'd have a better argument.
That makes zero sense.
Giving up your free education (that you haven’t even received yet) isn’t a penalty when you’re being compensated… a free education. The student-athlete isn’t being penalized at all. He has given up nothing, he simply chose a different source for his compensation.
It’s absolutely wild for you to sit there with a straight face and say Michigan giving him a free education instead of St. Mary’s is a penalty… by that logic, DeBoer’s “penalty” for leaving Washington for Bama would be giving up a job at Washington and not, ya know, the $10 million buyout Washington received.
I don't understand the reasoning. Unless there's some legal basis for denying a transfer—and it doesn't seem there is anymore—why would a university put itself on public display being petty?
Are you brand new?