{"id":83452,"date":"2025-05-27T20:01:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-27T20:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/83452\/"},"modified":"2025-05-27T20:01:09","modified_gmt":"2025-05-27T20:01:09","slug":"future-of-transfer-portal-takes-spotlight-as-kirby-smart-calls-it-college-footballs-biggest-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/83452\/","title":{"rendered":"Future of transfer portal takes spotlight as Kirby Smart calls it college football’s ‘biggest decision’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kirby Smart<\/a> was ready to pounce. This week at SEC spring meetings, hot-button issues include College Football Playoff expansion, the impact of the yet-to-be-approved House v. NCAA settlement and a nine-game SEC schedule.<\/p>\n

But asked about the transfer portal<\/a> on Tuesday, the two-time national champion head coach did not hold back. While commissioners and presidents debate the future of the sport, the Georgia<\/a> head coach shed light on the transfer portal discussion currently taking place among the coaching ranks. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest decision that has to be made in college football right now, by far, to me, is when is the portal window, and is there one or two?\u201d Smart said. \u201cThat\u2019s not being decided by us today. A lot of people don\u2019t even know how it\u2019s getting decided, who\u2019s deciding it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The\u00a0NCAA Division I Committee\u00a0voted<\/a>\u00a0in October to shorten the college football window from 45 days to 30. The American Football Coaches Association proposed<\/a> in January to move the transfer portal to a 10-day window in early January after bowl games, with the spring window eliminated. <\/p>\n

In recent years, the spring portal has become a contentious issue for programs. Tennessee<\/a> lost starting quarterback Nico Iamaleava<\/a> to free agency in April following a public, NIL<\/a>-fueled divorce. It\u2019s just the latest example of last-minute contract negotiations before players are locked in on rosters for the season. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe second portal, you\u2019re getting shook down twice,\u201d Arkansas<\/a> head coach Sam Pittman<\/a> told On3 last week. <\/p>\n

The current transfer portal format calls for the winter window to open in December, the Monday after the College Football Playoff field is announced. With the portal starting in the middle of December, it carries into the postseason. This last winter, Penn State<\/a> quarterback Beau Pribula<\/a> opted to enter the portal and transfer to Missouri, leaving the Nittany Lions before the start of the CFP. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really hard to be playing in a championship setting and having to deal with that,\u201d Smart said Tuesday. \u201cBut when I brought that up as a complaint, it was told to me, \u2018There\u2019s no crying from the yacht.\u2019 So if you\u2019re going to play in these environments, you have to be willing to do that. Now it\u2019s we can\u2019t do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most Power Four coaches agree that college football needs a single portal window, instead of the current two-window setup. But when exactly free agency should be is a split issue. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re asking me, I always lend to what are the professional models, and what do they look like,\u201d Texas A&M<\/a> head coach Mike Elko<\/a> said Tuesday at SEC spring meetings. \u201cIt certainly seems free agency happens once, not twice. And it happens right after the season, before you start practicing. That seems to be the landscape for every single professional league across the world. So why do we believe that this shouldn\u2019t be how this works is hard to get your head wrapped around.\u201d<\/p>\n

Texas<\/a> head coach Steve Sarkisian<\/a> echoed Elko\u2019s views on the portal. \u201cI do think we\u2019re all in agreement that one transfer portal would be beneficial,\u201d he said. \u201cAs coaches, we\u2019re team builders. That\u2019s what we do. And it\u2019s hard to build a team when you\u2019ve got two different portal windows, and you\u2019re not sure who\u2019s on your team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because the CFP now stretches into late January, some coaches believe a single portal window should be held later in January. That way, rosters will be set entering the second half of the academic calendar and spring practice. <\/p>\n

Others are proponents of a spring-only portal, distancing free agency from the postseason. But in that hypothetical, rosters would not be finalized until April or May, giving coaches less face time with players. More than 4,900 players entered the FBS transfer portal this offseason.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a large contingency that\u2019s growing now, trying to push an April, maybe May portal,\u201d Smart said. \u201cThey want to practice in June. I want y\u2019all to think about June for us. We have 10 days of high school camp in June. We believe in using those across the Southeast. We use 10 days. We also have official visits every weekend. So now we\u2019re going to practice with our team in that same window. Something\u2019s going to suffer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Next steps for how to reshape the college football transfer portal remain vague. Nothing is expected to come down before the House v. NCAA settlement is officially approved. <\/p>\n

The NCAA Division I Committee could take action. Smart believes the settlement\u2019s implementation committee should take charge. Lawmakers have even introduced legislation in the last 18 months that would restructure the sport\u2019s transfer portal. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not really talked about,\u201d Smart said. \u201cNobody\u2019s talking about the portal. They just don\u2019t think it\u2019s a big deal.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kirby Smart was ready to pounce. This week at SEC spring meetings, hot-button issues include College Football Playoff…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":83453,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,11741,49,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-83452","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-kirby-smart-95-bainbridge","10":"tag-ncaa","11":"tag-ncaa-football"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114581582036396934","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83452","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=83452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}