Report: Former Texas A&M QB Kyler Murray not restricted from Texas transfer

Roughly 24 hours after Texas A&M Aggies quarterback Kyler Murray set the interwebs ablaze once again when news broke that he was considering a transfer, the A&M legacy ultimately opted to head elsewhere on Thursday, as first reported by TexAgs' Billy Luicci and later confirmed elsewhere.

The former five-star prospect and No. 1 dual-threat passer in the 2015 class seriously considered flipping his pledge to the Longhorns before National Signing Day following a surprise visit to Austin in January, but eventually decided to follow in his father's footsteps to College Station.

Now he's on the market once again after less than a year at Texas A&M and faces several critical decisions about his future, the first of which is whether to pursue a baseball career or stick with football. If he chooses football, going to a junior college first may be his best option.

That's because, as ESPN points out, there's a critical rule that could have a tremendous impact on that choice:

National Letter of Intent rules state that once an athlete signs with a school, they must remain at that school for one academic year. Texas A&M could release Murray from his NLI, but it is at the school's discretion. If he is not granted a release, Murray can appeal. If an appeal is denied, enrolling in another NLI program would result in a penalty of one year of eligibility.

So going the junior college route and then making a decision about baseball versus football may be on the table if he doesn't want to stick around College Station for the spring semester, which seems highly unlikely given the antipathy already directed at him by spurned Aggie fans on social media.

In fact, there's already some belief that he will choose to play baseball amidst the loud chorus of observers pointing out that he would have been better off pursuing that avenue in the first place.

The same report from ESPN provides another critical piece of information -- despite being able to restrict Murray's transfer in whatever way the school saw fit, Texas A&M decided to merely bar him from going to another SEC school or any other school that plays A&M over the next four years.

So Texas obviously isn't one of those schools, even though there was speculation on Wednesday that the Longhorns could end up on that restricted list.

Given how close the 5'11, 180-pounder was to picking Texas months ago (by his own admission), it's possible that Murray would have interest in the Longhorns once again, especially because of his close friendship with fellow 2015 recruiting Malik Jefferson:

Texas LB Malik Jefferson was with Kyler Murray in College Station this past weekend. Wonder what they talked about? pic.twitter.com/NwjwV9Tkqz

— Anwar Richardson (@AnwarRichardson) December 16, 2015

But after bailing on the Aggies so quickly, his high-profile sideline incident with offensive coordinator Jake Spavital, and the fact that he didn't exactly take college football by storm in his opportunities this year, should the Longhorns take the risk that is inherent with the talented but undersized quarterback?

In the end, however, whether Texas has interest might not even matter if this decision is about Murray giving baseball his full attention.