2025/26 Transfer Portal Thread

[screenthis]

I've been listening to 99.1 Knoxville Sportstalk off and on this morning and the concensus is that long time UT fans are over college football in general.
1
Ainge said J Ross was shopping himself around during the season LAST year. As a donor/fan, how do you keep giving money to some of these players and get nothing in return?

I don't even care about winning anymore. I had no joy in that basketball win last night because I don't care about our players.

Fix the transfer portal, cap everybody (players, coaches, and ADs), and get some common sense rules into place before next season.

but but..this is the free market working. 1,000 thumbs up for you, sir.

 

[PlanetVolunteer]

I hate losing depth/experience but Ross has also disappointed.

For. 5 star, still was a gold player and I expect him to be really good

Now we have ZERO edge rushers.

 

[1world1love]

I'm still confused why the NCAA took the one thing they could sort of regulate (transfers) they decided to step away.

I'm not sure that they could regulate it after all of the losses in court. By regulating transfers, you are effectively restricting a free market. If a player can make more money via NIL by being at a different school, the NCAA can not arbitrarily limit those opportunities.

The rub is that if you are an ART major on scholarship at UT, you can freely transfer to NYU because there are more opportunities for you there. Or if you are a robotics wiz kid at UT engineering school and a group at MIT wants you to join their lab and help with a startup, there is nothing to prevent that.

So then why should athletes be any different?

 

[jpope9]

Head Coaches sign new contracts all the time and then take another job...cant blame the players.

There are buyouts for those tho. Player contracts apparently have no guardrails like that

 

[MarcoVol]

Bc nobody outside of Lubbock GAF about a Big 12 team in Lubbock

Sure do hate it for em. I guess if an LSU was doing this they’d be ok with it.

 

[knoxvol52]

Bc nobody outside of Lubbock GAF about a Big 12 team in Lubbock

Same can be said about plenty of college football teams ..nobody cares about Vanderbilt or South Carolina or Iowa ...yada yada yada

 

[knoxvol52]

Sure do hate it for em. I guess if an LSU was doing this they’d be ok with it.

Of course.... The Goal post have been moved and the big whigs.don't like it...

 

[MarcoVol]

There are buyouts for those tho. Player contracts apparently have no guardrails like that

Schools or collectives could put that language in their contract if they wanted. But they won’t do it bc players won’t sign it.

There is no regulating body saying coaches have to pay a buyout. A school could give a HC a contract with zero buyout.

 

[you]

On the QB situation.

I guess if UT starts either of the young guys, and they really well, then they’ll just go in the portal for more money. So, why risk an inexperienced QB play?

 

[Bischofshof]

All....of.....this

Leavitt at 100% might be worth getting at 3 mil or so, but not with current injury. Even then, Id take Simpson and possibly even Joey for a second year

Yeah well neither of those are real options on the table right now.

 

[Kurtastrophe]

CBS reporting that LSU WR Jelani Watkins will visit.

 

[MarcoVol]

All....of.....this

Leavitt at 100% might be worth getting at 3 mil or so, but not with current injury. Even then, Id take Simpson and possibly even Joey for a second year

How are you calculating Leavitt’s value? Curious where the number came from

 

[berryvol]

Turns out kids don't give a crap about a NFL sales pitch when they get NFL money in college. Shocking to some it seems.

As the old NCAA commercial goes, most of these kids will go pro in something other than sports. Unfortunately, the smart thing to do for 99% of these P4 players is to enter the transfer portal, max out their value, and cash in while they can. Knees aren’t guaranteed. Heads aren’t guaranteed. Shoulders aren’t guaranteed. And NFL contracts damn sure aren’t guaranteed. I won’t fault them for chasing life changing money while they can.

 

[Carp]

but but..this is the free market working. 1,000 thumbs up for you, sir.

I mean technically it is working. Only Oregon and Miami have played in a National Title game before. And only Miami has ever won a championship before. So at the very least, we're done with seeing UGA, OSU, Clemson, and Bama taking up 3 of the final 4 playoff spots every year like they were 3+ years ago.

 

[berryvol]

I agree they are powerless as a body and the cause of the problem, but the schools, conferences, networks, will find a way.

Hilarious that the NCAA’s inaction for 2 decades lead us to this. If they’d done away with their slavery model and had the slightest bit of foresight in the mid 2000s, we could’ve avoided this all together. Pure greed from the league and conferences got us here.

 

[Weezer]

Head Coaches sign new contracts all the time and then take another job...cant blame the players.

But head coaches normally have to pay a buyout. College players do not.

 

[you]

As the old NCAA commercial goes, most of these kids will go pro in something other than sports. Unfortunately, the smart thing to do for 99% of these P4 players is to enter the transfer portal, max out their value, and cash in while they can. Knees aren’t guaranteed. Heads aren’t guaranteed. Shoulders aren’t guaranteed. And NFL contracts damn sure aren’t guaranteed. I won’t fault them for chasing life changing money while they can.

I’m enjoying all this. My favorite team Prly won’t come out on top, but I’m sick and tired of Bama and UGA owning this sport.

As chaotic as it is, I find this version of college football better than years past of cheaters never held accountable

 

[MarcoVol]

I've been listening to 99.1 Knoxville Sportstalk off and on this morning and the concensus is that long time UT fans are over college football in general.

Ainge said J Ross was shopping himself around during the season LAST year. As a donor/fan, how do you keep giving money to some of these players and get nothing in return?

I don't even care about winning anymore. I had no joy in that basketball win last night because I don't care about our players.

Fix the transfer portal, cap everybody (players, coaches, and ADs), and get some common sense rules into place before next season.

If anyone is surprised to learn J Ross was being shopped during the season, they’d be really surprised to learn just about every player is being shopped year round.

 

[B EaZy40]

Can’t wait for Texas Tech to get shut out in their playoff game again next year. Reminds me of Calipari signing teams of 5 star freshmen but can’t sniff a championship.

 

[LakesiteVol]

Ty declared for the draft.

 

[VOLED]

Ainge saying Ross was shopping himself towards the end of the year, while getting paid handsomely.

Yeah people need to fix everyone on a one year deal. My goodness.

Maybe that is why he was a "no show" for the bowl game.

 

[BbwVol]

CBS reporting that LSU WR Jelani Watkins will visit.

Not to be negative but this kid has done nothing.

 

[MarcoVol]

But head coaches normally have to pay a buyout. College players do not.

What is stopping a school / collective from putting buyout language in their contracts for players?

 

[Playdo]

 

[BbwVol]

Ty declared for the draft.

Figured. That's probably why we're going after Leavitt so hard