According to Kyle McCord, his decision to transfer from Ohio State to Syracuse was strictly business.

“At the end of the day, the top level of college football and then especially onto the pros, it’s a business,” McCord said on “The QB Room” podcast. “At the end of the day, Ohio State had to make a business decision they felt like was best for them. And I had to do the same thing.”

McCord entered the transfer portal after leading Ohio State to an 11-1 record, finishing the 2023 regular season with a loss to Michigan: the program’s third-straight loss to its rival.

Kyle McCord’s decision to leave Ohio State

Sources told The Dispatch in December McCord’s decision to leave was his, and that he would have been the front-runner to start for the Buckeyes in 2024. McCord instead wanted Ryan Day’s assurance that he would be the starter, which the Ohio State coach could not give. Another factor to McCord’s decision was name, image and likeness compensation.

In his one season as Ohio State’s starting quarterback, McCord finished with 3,170 passing yards, 24 touchdowns and six interceptions, completing 65.8% of his 348 pass attempts.

McCord said after his transfer portal announcement Dec. 4, he “kept the reasons close, kind of in my inner circle” as to why he left Ohio State.

“I’ve had news outlets hit me up,” McCord said. “Like i had a news outlet from Columbus that hit me up to do a story, and I didn’t answer it. Hit my family up to do a story, they didn’t answer it. Hit people up in my circle (to) do a story, nobody answered. And then the next day, you go online and they have an article published of ‘the five reasons I left.’ And you read them and it’s a bunch of B.S. They are just pulling at strings at that point. The narrative, people read that and they think it’s true, so they believe it, start positing it and it just kind of snowballs. You don’t really speak up about it. It is what it is. I think the truth will always reveal itself.”

McCord said he learned a lot from former Ohio State quarterback C.J. Stroud, who McCord said got a lot of criticism during his time in Columbus, but became the No. 2 overall pick of the 2024 NFL draft and is now having “one of the best rookie seasons of all time.”

“He said, ‘Regardless if you are good, bad or indifferent, people are going to have something to say,’” McCord said of Stroud. “So this year, I think I have done a good job of just blocking it all out and understanding it’s part of the position, especially at a school like that. There’s going to be a lot of noise. A lot of the time, you just kind of let it roll off your back, and, like I said, I think the truth will work out.”

After McCord found his future at Ohio State “just wan’t meant to be for next year,” he said he was confident that he would find a home entering the transfer portal.

At Syracuse, McCord said he connected with coach Fran Brown, who he had known since middle school, and a staff filled with connections he had previously made.

McCord called the transfer portal “free agency” and “crazy within itself,” and that the NCAA is “in over its head” with NIL, comparing it to “a cap in football.”

But in Syracuse, McCord said he found a “good home” with a “realistic chance” to compete for the 12-team College Football Playoff.

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