'I wish everybody was happy': Mid-American Conference coaches, leaders share thoughts on the transfer portal
One of the most controversial topics in college football is the transfer portal.
When a player enters their name into the NCAA transfer portal, it allows other programs to contact them. With the new model, players no longer need to request permission from their current programs to check out other programs.
However, entering the portal does not mean a player is guaranteed to transfer. It just gives them an option to look elsewhere.
In recent months, due to the massive amount of players entering the portal, some names get lost in the mix. For coaches, the transfer portal can mean being unaware of if a player will leave at any given moment due to lack of playing time, among other things.
The transfer portal has plenty of people in favor of it as well as its detractors, but what do the people leading programs in the Mid-American Conference think of the portal?
MAC Commissioner Jon Steinbrecher touched on the transfer portal during his introductory press conference at MAC Media Day. He discussed how the transfer portal has effected the conference in its first year.
“In football and men’s basketball, where the bulk of media attention is focused, approximately half of students in the transfer portal are non-scholarship student-athletes, in other words, walk-ons,” Steinbrecher said.
Steinbrecher went on to explain that, with only a year of statistics on the transfer portal, it will be hard to accurately judge its effect on student-athletes as a whole. He did say, however, that the transfer numbers from the past year, when the portal was in effect, look remarkably similar to the numbers from the two years before the introduction of a transfer portal.
First-year Central Michigan coach Jim McElwain has seen several players enter the transfer portal, as well as taking advantage of the new rules and accepting transfers from other schools since his tenure began in December.
“It’s like anything. Whatever they put in, those are the rules you play by,” McElwain said. “It gives guys opportunities that maybe things haven’t gone well for them or whatever the reason is. It gives them an opportunity to seek out a new place, which is great.”
The Chippewas have lost seven players since Bonamego departed to the transfer portal: defensive end Mike Danna (Michigan); wide receiver Julian Hicks (Akron); wide receiver Jack Combs (Iowa), defensive lineman Dante Cleveland (Central Missouri); linebacker Carlton Cleophat; offensive lineman Shawn Wiley; and cornerback Randall Harris (New Hampshire).
“I wish everybody was happy where they were at," McElwain said. "That’s just not the way life is.”
Ball State’s head coach Mike Neu sees the transfer portal as both positive and negative.
“It’s kind of a good and bad situation at the same time,” Neu said. "But if there is unhappiness and he’s not all in and he thinks potentially it might be better for him to move somewhere else, I think you’d rather know that. Instead of not knowing that (thought) is going on in that young man’s head for two or three years, and then it’s counterproductive.”
Scott Loeffler is taking over at Bowling Green, and the well-traveled rookie head coach said the idea of the transfer portal is a positive feature to college football, but there isn't enough data for people to know if it's completing the mission it was set in place to accomplish.
“I think the commissioner hit it best,” Loeffler said. “It’s so new, it’s so early we don’t have the date to say there’s a lot of positive to it there’s a lot of negative. I think everyone is trying to get to a place where if a kid wants to have another opportunity at another place then the athlete should have that opportunity.”
Central Michigan Athletic Director Michael Alford said that he is waiting to see the stats before making a judgment on the success of the portal.
“I’m interested in seeing the stats and we will get those probably around October,” Alford said. “I know we sit down with our student-athletes when they go in there and really spell it out and talk to them and really explain everything to them to make sure that they are fully educated on what the transfer portal is."
