Tennessee pitcher Chase Burns to enter NCAA transfer portal

Tennessee pitcher Chase Burns is set to enter the NCAA transfer portal per Ben McKee. He was effective out of the bullpen this year for the Vols after moving from a starting role.

Burns, a preseason All-SEC selection, had a 5-3 record with a 4.25 ERA in 18 appearances, including eight starts, this season. He found a groove after moving to the bullpen in April, amassing an 8-1 record since April 21 with two saves and saw his ERA drop from 5.26 to 4.25 in that time. He also earned SEC Co-Pitcher of the Week honors on April 24.

One of Burns’ biggest performances came at the College World Series when he threw 6.0 innings of relief, striking out nine and allowing just two hits to propel Tennessee past Stanford for the Volunteers’ first victory at the CWS since 2001.

As a freshman in 2022, Burns made 14 starts and had an 8-2 record to go with a 2.91 ERA. He’s a big loss for the Vols, who could also lose Chase Dollander to the MLB Amateur Draft.

Tennessee finished with a 44-22 record, including a 16-14 record in SEC play. The Volunteers’ season came to an end against LSU with a 5-0 loss.

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.