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1. Can a school accept a LOI that has an out clause for the player if the coach leaves, and is it valid? Or does the ncaa have power to control that?

2. Should a coach be allowed to take players to his new school when they have already signed loi's with his old school, out clause or not?
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Okay, if a school accepts that kind of provisional LOI, they should have to honor it. They would not be seen as a party to an agreement that was not sophisticated or competent.

The problem in my opinion is that these kind of clauses open up extreme leverages for coaches who seek new positions, and who use the "following" recruits as bartering coins. The NCAA is going to have to regulate these kind of agreements to prevent more chaos than already exists.

The other problem is the collateral damage to the existing players on the team the coach is moving to. By bringing in an array of new highly regarded players, and who were used as leverage to get the new position, there may be a scholarship crunch, making existing players expendable. There could be very bad reprecusions from all this.

My problem is not with whether a player can be released (Indiana did that last yr), but with the repercussions of released players following a coach. They can become bargaining chips then in searching for a new position. But maybe my most pressing concern is the impact this kind of scenario would have on existing players where the new coach would bring his players. Many of these players might would have gone someplace else if they had seen this happening in a normal recruiting situation. As far as Memphis, if they left an out clause in the LOI, then they have no complaints about eventual releases.

There are those who wish the players to have freedom to break a loi and leave if they wish, but want the school to still be bound by the loi offer. It just does not work that way. That is the problem now with our society, too many people want others to be bound but not them, or wish to have their cake and eat it too. If the school is bound by the loi to issue a scholarship, so should the player be bound. Unless of course both parties agree to part ways.

However, beyond that, if they let Calipari get away with this, then no school or it's players could feel safe for the near future. Bedlam indeed.

It's definitely going to be very interesting to observe how the NCAA chooses to handle these situations in the future.

I suspect they are watching the developments at Kentucky very closely.