Clearly, he is mainly saying he needs to play against better players than he finds in CUSA.

If he does well in this next year, he could bump his draft position up two or three rounds, maybe to the first round. Seems like a good decision to me.

Of course, if he doesn't do well, it could hurt his draft status. Always a chance of that, but the coaches at Michigan, Texas, Auburn, and a lot of other places don't think that will happen.

He came to Rice and took care of business, both on the field and in the classroom. Good for him. From a selfish POV, I would like him to stay. But he has what he came for, a Rice degree in something meaningful, and he has kept his end of the bargain, by giving us those four years. This year is optional.

We had an all-conference performer a few years back pass on his last year of eligibility because he graduated and got a tremendous job offer. Nobody at Rice thought he was making a mistake or being ungrateful when he took the offer. I see this the same.