With the implementation of the transfer portal, college football today lacks the consistency it was built on in the earlier years of its popularity. The days of having your entire freshman class all stay until at least their junior year are gone.
It is becoming harder and harder for diehard college football fans to recognize the players on their favorite team, which is an issue.
According to NCAA transfer data, over the first six seasons of the transfer portal era, the number of FBS nearly doubled, jumping from 1,561 transfers after the 2018-2019 season to over 3,700 in last season’s cycle. The issue is present at NIU with fan favorite players transferring to bigger schools at the end of every season.
As for NIU, 19 football players have entered the transfer portal so far. Among the 19 transfers, five were starters throughout the 2024 season.
Among the transfers is former Huskies redshirt senior wide receiver Trayvon Rudolph, a deep threat receiver who posted a career high 7 touchdowns and 877 receiving yards in 2021. This season, Rudolph led the team in receiving yards with 392, leaving NIU as a Huskie fan favorite.
Former redshirt junior starting quarterback Ethan Hampton is heading down south to Champaign to play for the University of Illinois. With a victory against then-No. 5 ranked University of Notre Dame, Hampton looks to beat out current Illinois starter junior quarterback Luke Altmyer.
The Huskies lost three key starters on the defense including former NIU senior defensive end Raishein Thomas, a quality pass rusher. Other key transfers include senior linebacker Christian Fuhrman – NIU’s leader in tackles this season – and redshirt freshman safety Santana Banner, who committed to the University of Missouri.
Many talented players come to NIU, have a great season and then look to a program in a Power Four conference to put their talent on further display. The idea that regardless of school, if you’re talented, the NFL will find you is now a figment of many players’ imagination.
By some football fans, college football is viewed as superior to the NFL due to its unpredictability, but with the transfer portal, smaller teams are unable to pull big name recruits. If you have the right budget, you will get the top transfers every year and be in position to be in the College Football Playoff every year.
At a national level, a large amount of the top quarterbacks this season spent time in the transfer portal. University of Colorado senior Shedeur Sanders, University of Miami senior Cam Ward and Ohio State University senior Will Howard all transferred to their current home.
In the college football playoffs, there are four quarterbacks who have spent time in the portal. Two of them – Howard and Notre Dame senior Riley Leonard – faced off against each other in the National Championship game.
The championship winning team this season, Ohio State, invested millions on Name Image and Likeness partnerships in order to recruit potential transfers. This shows college football is slowly becoming a pay to win business. Ohio State does have a very skilled roster, but without spending millions, they wouldn’t be nearly as talented.
With the top quarterbacks in college football going from program to program, the transfer portal has changed how college coaches view high school recruiting, diminishing its value. Teams that need a high quality quarterback now look for the talented disgruntled player and offer him the most money, instead of developing a high schooler for two years.
With NIL coming into the picture, college football has become more of a business than anything else. Players deserve to get paid, which is an issue I am glad was resolved, but it’s common to see players take the biggest check instead of finding the spot that’s the best fit for them.
Another thing to consider is the difficulty of developing players in the spring for them to hit the portal right after the spring game. If you can’t compete with the current landscape of college football programs, you are just giving an insane contract to hire big time coaches that can succeed in the transfer market. Colorado football head coach Deion Sanders is the best example of someone that can, luring a large amount of players through the portal.
With the 2024 rule allowing athletes to transfer multiple times with immediate eligibility yielding negative results, the NCAA should put restrictions on how many times you can transfer. Putting a limit on the number of times a player can transfer would help schools build more consistency through the evolving college football atmosphere.
