If deposed Auburn running back Michael Dyer is to make a return to the FBS level, it appears Arkansas will not likely be a destination.
In an interview with KTHV-TV in Little Rock, Dyer expressed an interest in joining first-year Razorbacks head coach Bret Bielema in Fayetteville. Dyer played his high school football in the state, and said he would relish the opportunity to return home for (yet) another chance at that level of football.
“If I was given the chance, I would definitely do the best that I can for [Arkansas] and for the coaches and for the fans,” Dyer said during the interview. “To be able to play at home, I think any kid would love that dream to come back home and start over and play at home. But I’m just, you know, sitting here, I’m going to play it out and I’m going to let God do the rest for me.”
While the interest is there on Dyer’s part, it’s an interest that reportedly won’t be reciprocated. “Former Little Rock Christian and Auburn running back Michael Dyer will not be walking on at Arkansas despite the rumors saying he will,” the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette wrote shortly after Dyer’s televised comments began to grow some legs.
Dyer, the offensive MVP of the 2010 BCS championship game, was “granted a release from his scholarship” in January of 2012, one month after he was suspended for the Tigers’ appearance in the Chick-fil-A Bowl. He transferred to Arkansas State that same month in a reunion with former AU offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn; six months later, he was dismissed by Malzahn for “undisclosed violations of team rules.”
In August of 2012, Dyer landed at Arkansas Baptist, where’s he’s been since and from where he’s expected to graduate this summer.
Earlier this month, it was reported that Dyer, who rushed for 1,000-plus yards in each of his two seasons on The Plains, would take a visit to TCU. Shortly after a report surfaced that Dyer “should’ve” been declared academically ineligible for the BCS title game against Oregon, that visit was scuttled.