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Dr. Saturday

Fri May 13 09:18am EDT

Tate Forcier’s second act in Miami is over before it began

By Matt Hinton

Tate Forcier came, he saw, he changed his mind: Barely three months after signing a financial aid agreement with Miami, the former Michigan starter turned sulky backup turned academic casualty turned sought-after transfer has informed the U that he won't be enrolling this summer, after all. The official explanation: "Personal reasons." He never returned to Coral Gables after his initial recruiting trip in February.

At that point, though, the signature of a veteran Big Ten starter seemed like a bit of a coup — Forcier canceled the remainder of his Tour du Forcier of interested schools after the first stop to sign with the 'Canes — mainly because UM had just let a pair of coveted local recruits, Teddy Bridgewater and Jacoby Brissett, escape to Louisville and Florida, respectively. In the meantime, the new staff has welcomed a second quarterback transfer, 6-foot-6, 220-pound South Florida native Ryan Williams, who decided to bail on Memphis when coaches decided to install a spread offense.

Williams started every game for the Tigers last year as a true freshman, but it's not like he's insurmountable competition: Memphis finished 119th out of 120 teams in scoring offense and failed to top 20 points in any one of a nine-game losing streak to close the season. If anything, Forcier would be competing for the starting gig in 2012 with Stephen Morris, who earned a little goodwill last year after casting off a redshirt to take the reins from injured starter Jacory Harris and exited spring practice still deadlocked with Harris for the top spot this fall. Morris' remaining two years of eligibility after this season will overlap with Forcier's, and there's a 50/50 chance he's going to open 2012 as the incumbent.

But that was already the case when Forcier signed up three months ago, and he was obviously down for the competition then. What changed? The best guess is someone at Miami finally took a longer look at Forcier's grades, the apparent neglect of which were at the root of his exit from Michigan. But that is only a guess by an outsider, and in no way a qualified assessment of his official academic standing. Now: Who's in the market for an undersized scrambler with moxie and a lot of baggage?

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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.

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