ATHENS — College football calls the current period of player transactions the “transfer portal,” but Nick Saban refers to it as “chaos.”
More than 4,000 college football players, including more than 120 starters, per Saban, have entered their name into the portal alerting their own and other programs of their intention/willingness to change schools.
“We created a system that only allows you to gain advantage if you want to leave,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said during the lead up to the Bulldogs’ CFP quarterfinal in the Sugar Bowl last week in New Orleans.
“You’ve created a system that inherently rewards what defies a team concept, and in a team sport, it just makes no sense.”
But it does make dollars for some players who make themselves available to the highest bidder, via collegiate sports’ version of free agency.
There was some optimism last June when the House vs. NCAA case was settled that collegiate athletes could find some order with a then-$20.5 million “cap” put in place for schools to pay out to student-athletes.
Roster sizes were to be reduced, but there would be no scholarship limits and an exception was in place for student-athletes to secure their own NIL deals outside of the school’s cap, provided it met the standards as determined by a clearinghouse.
“This new framework that enables schools to provide direct financial benefits to student-athletes and establishes clear and specific rules to regulate third-party NIL agreements marks a huge step forward for college sports,” NCAA president Charlie Baker penned in a letter in response to the case settlement.
It seems like so long ago, and now, here we are after a season that saw 11 Power 4 coaches fired before the end of this season, including five from the SEC — and a sixth change when Lane Kiffin left Ole Miss before the start of the College Football Playoff to accept the LSU head coaching job.
Saban, citing the unprecedented scenario currently playing out at Ole Miss, said it’s a matter of the football “calendar” of events, which includes the early signing date (Dec. 3-5) and the transfer portal window date (Jan. 2-16).
“Ole Miss has six (assistant) coaches going to LSU, trying to take guys to LSU from their (current Ole Miss) team,” Saban said on College GameDay. “But they’ve got to play a game.
“Is that chaos, or is that chaos? So this whole college football calendar needs to change, that would be my New Year’s resolution.”
To Saban’s point, Ole Miss did beat Georgia 39-34 in the Sugar Bowl to advance to play Miami in the College Football Playoff Fiesta Bowl semifinal at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday in Glendale, Arizona.
In the meantime, Kiffin is working to rebuild the LSU roster with transfer players who, no doubt, will be wanting to meet and talk with the Rebels’ offensive coaches who plan to join the LSU staff once Ole Miss is eliminated from the CFP.
Clearly, it’s not an optimal situation for the student-athletes, even as some of the current Ole Miss players are considering transferring elsewhere.
There’s no alternative, however, with the playoff schedule and transfer portal overlapping.
Indiana, the CFP No. 1 seed that will face Oregon at 7:30 p.m. on Friday in the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl semifinal, has already received a commitment from TCU quarterback Josh Hoover among five other transfer portal additions, per reports.
“The NCAA doesn’t seem to be in control of the way things are happening right now, and I think if we’re going to change things in college football, we’ve got to get Congress to have some kind of antitrust legislation because the NCAA can’t enforce their own rules,” Saban said. “So even if they tried to change this, somebody might sue, and they might not be able to do it, that’s how we got where we are now.”
Former Auburn basketball coach Bruce Pearl proposed on TNT programming that collegiate eligibility needs to be capped at five years, with no appeals.
Further, Pearl echoed Saban on the matter of congressional oversight, which could lead to players signing enforceable contracts of two or three years to eliminate the year-to-year free agency turnover.
Saban, a seven-time championship coach at Alabama and LSU, suggests the transfer portal date be moved back to May, in line with the academic calendar, and that offseason football training be moved from the spring semester to the summer semester.
“You can get your team together and work over the summer, just like an NFL team does — they don’t have their team together until after the (NFL) draft and after free agency, in May,” Saban said. “So do the same thing in college football and you wouldn’t have these issues with coaches changing jobs, because everybody could finish the season with their team, which is what’s best for the players.”
Smart, who led the charge at SEC spring meetings for the January portal date, admits the situation is overly complicated.
“I wish I could solve it, everybody will tell you there’s an answer,” Smart said. “I can tell you that the answer isn’t currently where we stand. I can promise you that.”
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