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LSU baseball lands commitment from Alabama transfer pitcher Kade Woods

ns_headshot_2024-clearby:Nick Schultz•06/23/23•

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Alabama transfer pitcher Kade Woods
Gary Cosby Jr.-Tuscaloosa News / USA TODAY NETWORK

LSU has secured a commitment from former Alabama pitcher Kade Woods out of the transfer portal. He announced the decision via Twitter Friday night.

Woods spent two seasons in Tuscaloosa, but missed the 2022 campaign due to injury. This past year, he had a 4-1 record with a 5.52 ERA in 17 appearances, including one start. When Alabama faced LSU, Woods allowed three earned runs in 2.2 innings as the Tigers beat the Crimson Tide 8-6 in April.

Because he took a redshirt in 2022, Woods — a Monroe, La. native — will have three years of eligibility remaining.

Woods’ addition is quite a pickup for Jay Johnson, whose LSU team is currently preparing for the College World Series finals against Florida. He’s the second portal pickup for the Tigers this month, joining former Xavier pitcher Justin Loer, who committed June 18.

Transfer portal background information

The NCAA Transfer Portal, which covers every NCAA sport at the Division I, II and III levels, is a private database with names of student-athletes who wish to transfer. It is not accessible to the public.

The process of entering the portal is done through a school’s compliance office. Once a player provides written notification of an intent to transfer, the office enters the player’s name in the database and everything is off and running. The compliance office has 48 hours to comply with the player’s request and that request cannot be refused.

Once a player’s name shows up in the portal, other schools can contact the player. Players can change their minds at any point and withdraw from the portal. However, once a player enters the portal, the current scholarship no longer has to be honored. In other words, if a player enters the portal but decides to stay, the school is not obligated to provide a scholarship anymore.

The database is a normal database, sortable by a variety of topics, including (of course) sport and name. A player’s individual entry includes basic details such as contact info, whether the player was on scholarship and whether the player is transferring as a graduate student.

A player can ask that a “do not contact” tag be placed on the report. In those instances, the players don’t want to be contacted by schools unless they’ve initiated the communication.

The portal has been around since Oct. 15, 2018 and the new calendar cycle within the portal begins each August. For example, the 2021-22 cycle started Aug. 1. During the 2020-21 cycle, 2,626 FBS football players entered the transfer portal (including walk-ons). That comes after 1,681 entered during the 2019-20 cycle and 1,709 during the abbreviated 2018-19 cycle. In comparison, 1,833 Division I basketball players entered the portal during the 2020-21 cycle after totals of 1,020 in 2019-20 and 1,063 in 2018-19.