What if nobody's wrong in the Nick Saban/Maurice Smith transfer tug of war?
What if Saban, as the University of Alabama head football coach, is right to defend the Southeastern Conference's current in-league transfer rule as a matter of principle?
What if Smith is equally right to challenge it since he's already graduated from the Capstone, in three years, and his former defensive coordinator with the Crimson Tide, Kirby Smart, is now the head coach at Georgia, where Smith wishes to use his final season of eligibility?
By any reasonable standards, the fact Smith has earned his diploma and now wishes to play for Smart would seem a unique circumstance, one that would provide the SEC the exception it needs to grant the player's transfer wish.
On the other hand, in a college landscape that looks less civil by the minute, the SEC transfer rule within the league - which demands approval from the school on graduate transfers to avoid sitting out a year - also has merit.
Can you imagine the uproar if a running back decided to transfer from Auburn to Alabama, then scored the winning touchdown against the Tigers in the Iron Bowl? Forget what life might be like for the player. Think what it would be for the Auburn coach, who - at least in the minds of War Eagle Nation - created an environment that encouraged the player to jump to AU's most bitter rival.
Pardon me, but that's unnecessary heat to place on anyone. Beyond that, consider that however much they sometimes taunt each other internally - fans, coaches and players alike - the SEC is something of a family. That 14-school unit equally splits up revenue of more than $400 million a year. Whether or not they always like each other, they do need each other to continue the outrageous success the league has enjoyed both financially and on the courts and playing fields.
That said, Smith's clock is rapidly ticking unless he's willing to sit out a year per Saban's unwillingness to allow his transfer, then play the 2017 season with the Bulldogs.
If college athletics is still supposed to be about helping its student-athletes at least as much as enriching the bank accounts of its coaches and sometimes bringing joy and pride to its fans, shouldn't this be settled by the end of the week, so that he'd still be able to join Georgia's preseason practices?
How petty do Saban and the entire athletic department look if they deny Smith this opportunity to chase his dreams? He made 15 tackles last season. He barely left the bench in the two years before that.
Could he help the Tide this season? Probably. Could he help the Bulldogs more? Possibly, especially since no one in the program will know Smart's system better than Smith.
Yet if this is really only about - as some suggest - Saban being upset that Smart took the UGA job, then the Tide coach has many more issues than Smith. If you can't be happy for a guy who's returning to his alma mater as head coach after he loyally served your program for nine seasons, you just might be the most petty, ungrateful guy on the planet.
There's also this from the New Orleans Times Picayune, which has reported that Smith wrote the following in an appeal after Saban blocked his transfer:
"On Friday, June 17, I arrived at the athletic facility locker room to find my locker cleaned out and all of my personal belongings in the trash (photo attached) underneath trash. These personal items included my family photos, written goals, inspirational and sentimental items memorializing my deceased former friend, roommate and teammate, Altee Tenpenny, and items of personal value from my former teammates."
If that's true, and it can be proven Saban had any hand in it, not only should Smith be granted an unconditional release, the SEC should force the Tide coach to allow all graduate student transfers without prejudice for at least two years.
Yet before everyone piles on Lord Saban and the fact he let Chris Black transfer to fellow SEC member Missouri a few months ago after Black became a grad transfer, consider an early Smart move upon taking the Georgia job this past winter.
When UGA running back A.J. Turman - though not a grad transfer candidate - wanted to transfer, Smart granted him a limited release, including restrictions transferring to other SEC schools, Georgia Tech or Miami, where the man Smart replaced, Mark Richt, is now coaching.
In an Athens Banner Herald newspaper article, UGA athletic director Greg McGarity - long a proponent of letting athletes transfer wherever they wanted - was quoted as saying Smart "educated" him about today's transfer culture.
Said Smart in the same article: "Greg realizes that the recruiting world has changed and he's on the same page with me."
Now Smart apparently is on a different page. He wants Smith to become a Bulldog, which is understandable. He may even see a public relations bump among future recruits if Smith can make this a bigger issue.
Or as the player eloquently, if somewhat naively, stated Monday to AL.com: "I believe that this will not only help me but help anyone else who comes into my situation in the future. That's why I say it's almost bigger than me, because not only am I stepping out on faith but I'm trying to get a point across that if you do everything right you should be awarded."
It's a good argument. A fair argument. Especially for the players.
But as long as coaches such as Smart are putting their own transfer limits on players such as Turman, whether they're grad transfers or not, it's a little hypocritical to single out Saban as the SEC's lone despot.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.