FSU Football not being held hostage by transfer portal decisions

FSU football has seen several players use the portal as a way to manipulate more time or other moves, but they aren’t playing that game of chicken.

One thing college football has had differentiating itself from the National Football League is fact that free agency is not supposed to exist, at least in theory. That is been part of its intrigue that makes people love it so. Once the letter of intent is signed to FSU football or any other school a player is committed, and no matter who starts over whom, they stay.

With the NCAA change to the transfer rules in 2018, long gone are the days of a freshman quarterback sitting out until his junior year and then starting, and some strange type of new free agency has descended on college football, named the ever-famous transfer portal.

Florida State has fallen victim to the mysterious portal this year with the news that Amir Rasul and Naseir Upshur have indeed left as well as George Campbell and the scare that James Blackman had entered the portal and Landon Dickerson was but has removed his name to stay at Florida State.

How did all of this come about and are there any checks and balances over this portal to help college football keep some semblance of the days gone by? In 2018, the NCAA changed the transfer rules to allow student-athletes to enter their name into this “portal”. What that meant is they could do so and other schools would be able to contact them without their current school being able to stop it.

At first, the only check on this system was the fact that a transferring player, meaning undergraduate as graduate transfers are eligible immediately, would have to obtain a “waiver” to be able to play the next year wherever they transferred, or they would have to sit out a year.

However, with Tate Martell and Justin Fields easily obtaining waivers, it would appear they may not be so hard to get. That would bolster the free agency issue unless somehow the waivers become harder to obtain.

What is worse about the entire situation is lawyers will likely be involved in those waivers, and if a player is unable to afford one, then they may be left stranded. Actually, they very could be because the school that they are transferring from are now under no obligation to keep the player on the roster, can revoke the player’s scholarship, or can cancel financial aid outside of that.

For players who have worked extremely hard to get into college through extremely tough economic times and are unable to afford an attorney, it could be devastating.

The reality of the situation is kind of the reason the transfer portal exists at all. Most players want to do whatever it takes to make sure they have a shot at the draft, and that is why most people understand graduate transfers over undergraduate ones because it is their last shot.

The same is true of the portal though. For years, coaches and athletic directors blocked any hope of transfer, and some players did not get their best shot. However, what was intended for good is now to some a system that is being taken advantage of as freshmen transfer as soon as they realize they may not start right away. This is way different from the era of players sitting and learning the system and starting behind another player after they graduated.

This could be trouble though because schools are only able to take up 25 scholarships per academic year, and cannot go over 85-total. That total includes high school players and all transfers. In the end, a player may get their wish, or a school may run out of an option to even give them.

So how is Coach Taggart handling the situation? According to James Coleman, former Florida State player and now sports journalist with Fifth Quarter and 36 Degrees in Tallahassee, and Sports Den 1010XL radio in Jacksonville:

"“He is allowing them every possible way to make an impact on the team while letting them know they will not hold the program hostage.”"

That is exactly what Coach Taggart needs to do in this situation. That leadership reflects an understanding of why there was a transfer rule change in the first place, but also a hard line that Florida State will not allow the system to be abused at its expense.