My 2019 grad has gotten some JUCO offers but is not good enough yet to get a D1 offer. For his college career his ultimate dream is to play for Bama. He hasn’t gotten any D2 offers mainly because he hasn’t actively made contact with any D2 schools to let them know he would like to play there. His mindset has been to go the JUCO route and hope he improves enough to get an offer from Bama or another D1 school for his last two years of college. If that fails he can always go D2/D3 or NAIA. Now he is getting word that some D2 schools are interested in him so we have to figure out what all his options are.
Transferring from a JUCO to a D1 school does not require the athlete to sit out of year. Transferring from a D2 school to a D1 school requires the athlete to sit out a year with some exceptions. What I am trying to figure out are the exceptions. According to the NCAA website, a D2 baseball player transferring to a D1 school may be eligible to compete immediately if they were not recruited by their original school and they have never received an athletic scholarship.
My son is going to get a full ride tuition scholarship regardless of what level he plays at thanks to the Alabama GI bill so whereever he plays it will be as a walkon. What exactly does the “if they were not recruited by their original school” mean? Schools at all levels recruit walkon players all the time. Coaches invite walkon players to take official visits to the campus and they communicate with via phone calls and texts. Does all that count as getting recruited?
If my son plays for a D2 school as a walkon and that still requires him to sit out a year if he transfers to D1 then he may just stick with the JUCO route.