Tanner Thrift, a center at Baylor, announced that he's retiring from football at just 22-years-old. As of this writing, Thrift was sitting atop new head coach Matt Rhule's depth chart at the center position.
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Thrift injured his knee this spring, which resulted in him missing Baylor's spring game, but now, according to SicEm365.com, the former guard-turned-center is walking away from football entirely.
Via CollegeFootballTalk:
"A knee injury kept Tanner Thrift from participating in the Bears' spring game earlier this offseason. According to SicEm365.com — and a university official by way of the Waco Tribune — the offensive lineman has since decided to retire from the sport of football because of injury."
Thrift's departure from the team doesn't seem to be related to the university's seemingly never-ending off-the-field problems, but rather it just really being a situation where Thrift walked away for injury-related reasons.
Either way, this is not the kind of situation new head coach Rhule would like to be in, and Thrift's backup is former quarterback Seth Russell's young brother Daniel. It should be interesting to see how Rhule and the team handles changing centers heading into the 2017 college football season.
Thrift appeared in all 13 games for the Bears in 2016.
