The Athletic\u2019s\u00a0transfer portal top 25<\/a> this year is missing two brand names: Alabama and Georgia.<\/p>\nNine other SEC teams were in the rankings, and eight of last year\u2019s CFP teams were. The exceptions: Those same two Group of 6 teams \u2026 plus Alabama and Georgia. The SEC\u2019s last two teams to win a national title, the dominators of the old recruiting ways, now dinosaurs, doomed to extinction from elite status?<\/p>\n
That would be way too premature, if for no other reason than Kalen DeBoer\u2019s and Kirby Smart\u2019s teams were in last year\u2019s portal rankings, so it\u2019s not a philosophical hang-up.<\/p>\n
But for both, their offseason approach and how they do in 2026 is a test case, and in Alabama\u2019s case, it\u2019s an effort \u2014 perhaps an unwanted one \u2014 to buck a trend.<\/p>\n
Alabama<\/p>\n
Scholarship players added\/lost: 18\/21
Career snaps added\/lost: 12,169\/8,810
Career starts added\/lost: 150\/55<\/p>\n
Everyone\u2019s aiming to have an older team now, with Indiana reinforcing that importance. And yet when DeBoer met the media last week at the Senior Bowl, he made clear the Crimson Tide were going in the opposite direction.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not by design: Two years ago, Alabama lost nearly 40 players after Nick Saban\u2019s retirement, then 25 after DeBoer\u2019s first year. This year, the number was down to 22, but that included four starters. And that doesn\u2019t count veteran players such as quarterback Ty Simpson, linebacker Deontae Lawson, defensive tackle Tim Keenan III and offensive tackle Kadyn Proctor.<\/p>\n
And though Alabama does add 17 transfers, DeBoer acknowledged many are on the younger side with the aim of developing. In particular, Alabama will have a young offensive line, even with the addition of Mississippi State transfer Jayvin James.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Alabama did just sign the nation\u2019s No. 2 high school recruiting class \u2014 behind only Southern California \u2014 a year after signing the No. 3 class. So there will be a hope for younger players improving, with DeBoer mentioning a quartet of rising sophomores: wide receiver Lotzeir Brooks, cornerback Dijon Lee Jr., offensive lineman Michael Carroll and defensive lineman London Simmons. Keelon Russell, one of the nation\u2019s top recruits a year ago, is also expected to compete for the vacant quarterback job.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s also receiver Ryan Williams, who looked like a star as a freshman in 2024, didn\u2019t have the expected leap last year but still has immense promise.<\/p>\n
\u201c(We\u2019re) probably younger again, but that\u2019s something we got to use as an edge and try to make kind of our thing,\u201d DeBoer said. \u201cLet\u2019s continue to grow up faster.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s an emphasis because being so young last year \u201cprobably led to some of the inconsistencies we had at times,\u201d DeBoer said, especially when they were facing older teams. Being young again was not the aim: Alabama tried to get star receiver Cam Coleman, who went to Texas, and briefly had a commitment from running back Hollywood Smothers, who flipped to the Longhorns.<\/p>\n
It all paints a worrisome picture, but DeBoer struck an optimistic tone.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel good about the guys that we brought in, and I feel great about the guys that decided to stay, because they really want to be here, and they\u2019re important players,\u201d DeBoer said. \u201cFrom guys that started to guys that had a lot of extended playing time, that are looking to extend their roles, (I\u2019m) really looking forward to this spring.\u201d<\/p>\n
Georgia<\/p>\n
Scholarship players added\/lost: 9\/14
Career snaps added\/lost: 7,447\/5,273
Career starts added\/lost: 102\/64<\/p>\n
Smart\u2019s offseason was the reverse of DeBoer\u2019s: The high school recruiting class, by Georgia standards, was down, ranking No. 6 with only one five-star. Though the transfer portal class wasn\u2019t star-heavy, the damage was contained.<\/p>\n
Georgia focused its dollars on retention, and it worked. The only player it lost, rising sophomore cornerback Dominick Kelly, the team really worked to keep even though Kelly wasn\u2019t expected to start in 2026.<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs did make some targeted additions: Receiver Isiah Canion (Georgia Tech\u2019s third-leading receiver), tailback Dante Dowdell (Kentucky\u2019s second-leading rusher), defensive back Khalil Barnes (Clemson starter) and edge rusher Amaris Williams (five-star recruit in the 2024 cycle).<\/p>\n
Georgia\u2019s strategy was to hold on to the nucleus of its team, and it did that. The defense, on paper, should be very strong next year, with returning players accounting for 63 percent of tackles, 65 percent of sacks and seven of the nine interceptions.<\/p>\n
The offense returns quarterback Gunner Stockton and three offensive line starters. But where Smart and his staff did the most work was with the skill position players. That\u2019s where the test for the overall strategy might lie.<\/p>\n
Georgia lost Zachariah Branch, who in his one year on campus set the single-season record for catches. He gave the offense the go-to receiver it lacked in 2024. Rather than splurge for Coleman or another immediate No. 1 receiver, Georgia added Canion, who fills a void at the outside receiver spot.<\/p>\n
More interestingly, Georgia spent to keep younger receivers, including Talyn Taylor, Thomas Blackshear, CJ Wiley and Sacovie White-Helton. Between their development, Canion\u2019s addition and the usual array of good tight ends (Lawson Luckie, Elyiss Williams, Jaden Reddell), the coaches hope either a new No. 1 target will emerge or the group will be so deep it doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n
As almost a backup plan, Georgia also spent to keep tailbacks Nate Frazier and Chauncey Bowens, and bring in Dowdell. Miami showed you can still win with a good, physical running attack, and it\u2019s a safe assumption Smart would love to win that away again, if possible.<\/p>\n
But when he was at the Senior Bowl last week, Smart made clear in an interview on the NFL Network that he knew this was a new era.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have to play players faster now. \u2026 It\u2019s much closer to free agency in the NFL,\u201d Smart said. \u201cYou pay for a player, you have an NIL player, you better get them on the field quick, or they\u2019re going to be gone. We call it use \u2019em or lose \u2019em. So if you don\u2019t use them, they\u2019re going to be gone.\u201d<\/p>\n
So Georgia will use them. But it will also hope that its retention strategy results in an older, veteran team \u2014 much like Indiana, even if the way to get there was different.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There was once a day, believe it or not, when the college football industry believed the transfer portal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":728732,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[930,331,7,450,49,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-728731","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-alabama-crimson-tide","9":"tag-college-football","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-georgia-bulldogs","12":"tag-ncaa","13":"tag-ncaa-football"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116012349173275015","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=728731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728731\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/728732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=728731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=728731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=728731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}