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Assessing Green-Beckham’s Waiver Chances at Oklahoma

Oklahoma more or less confirmed on Twitter that Dorial Green-Beckham signed a financial aid agreement thus enabling his visit to Oklahoma during a dead period after the school announced that the former Missouri Tiger would be joining the team. Joe Schad of ESPN posted on Twitter that Green-Beckham was exploring a waiver to play immediately and brought up the NCAA’s run-off waiver recently granted to former LSU men’s basketball player Anthony Hickey after his transfer to Oklahoma State.

But the run-off waiver will be a tough sell. Green-Beckham was dismissed from the football team back in April. The comments from Missouri combined with the fact that Green-Beckham was suspended indefinitely just before he was dismissed make it unlikely that his inability to play for Missouri this coming season was “for reasons outside the control of the student-athlete.” Missouri would have to explain away those statements show that Green-Beckham was dismissed not for disciplinary reasons, but because he essentially was not good enough.

If Missouri decided to do that, produced the required documentation, and supported the waiver, I doubt the NCAA would question it. But that might be asking too much from Missouri especially if his dismissal from the team was in fact due to disciplinary reasons. And if he was dismissed from the university in addition to the football team, that would trump whatever Missouri’s athletic department might say.

The name others have jumped to is Dez Wells, the Maryland basketball player who was expelled from Xavier but not charged in a sexual assault case. Wells was granted a waiver to play immediately at Maryland. But what I’ve been told about the Wells case is that it was not the run-off waiver and more complicated than simply the fact that Wells was expelled from Xavier but not charged with a crime. Without knowing the other factors in the Wells case, trying to extrapolate from that waiver to Green-Beckham’s situation is impossible.

It is also important to note that Schad’s tweet says Green-Beckham, not Oklahoma, is exploring the waiver options. Perhaps Oklahoma will file a long shot waiver on his behalf but we’re not even at the point where the institution has decided to pursue this path. That is the first step, which may never be crossed if Oklahoma instead decides it is best for Green-Beckham to sit out for a year and hope he decides to stay for another year.


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