STARKVILLE — Michael Carr is no longer a member of the Mississippi State University football program.
The wide receiver, who would’ve had two years of eligibility left with the team, has been ruled ineligible for competition for the 2013 season and won’t be on the roster. School officials didn’t know Sunday if Carr was enrolled at MSU for the upcoming fall semester.
West Point High School Athletic Director and football coach Chris Chambless wouldn’t comment July 31 if Carr had left the MSU football program. He said he wasn’t sure if Carr was enrolled at MSU.
Carr went on a “personal leave” from MSU’s football team, according to coach Dan Mullen, and missed the final five games of the 2011 season. On March 21, 2012, MSU announced Carr had decided to leave the MSU football program, citing a lack of devotion to the game.
“He just doesn’t really want to play football any more,” Mullen said to the media two days before 2012 spring practices started.
In the first media conference following a 34-20 loss to Northwestern University in the 2013 Gator Bowl on New Year’s Day, Mullen said he had talked to Carr about returning to the program.
“Michael, obviously, left under some tough issues,” Mullen said Jan. 11 at the Leo Seal Family Football Complex. “It wasn’t an issue in what he’d done wrong within the program, and it wasn’t an issue in his dislike of the program. It was just some personal things he had to get figured out in his life.”
Carr re-joined the program last spring as a walk-on and had three catches for 41 yards, including a diving touchdown, against the third-team defense in the 2012 Maroon-White spring game.
Mullen had no further comment about Carr on Sunday after MSU’s practice — the last one that was open to the media — in the Palmeiro Center. The practice was moved indoors due to the heat.
Carr, who lost his scholarship after leaving the program a second time, had shown more signs of being physically fit to MSU strength coach Matt Balis.
“He’s always been a good worker,” Balis said March 19 in his spring preseason media session. “I think he’s in better shape because he’s been more consistent with his workouts.”
Carr, The Dispatch’s 2009 Large Schools Offensive Player of the Year and 2009-10 Athlete of the Year, was a four-star prospect, according to Rivals.com coming out of high school. He caught four passes for 74 yards as a freshman in 2010. He had three catches for 65 yards, including a 31-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter, in a 52-14 victory against the University of Michigan in the 2011 Gator Bowl.
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