You probably know better than I do, but I'll throw in my $0.02 - I would rather take a chance on high school recruits for IDL than rely on the portal.
(1) Good, proven DTs in the portal are worth a fortune and recruiting them seems to always a ridiculous amount of time and money. They're also rare. I think we had a "great" DT haul from the portal last season and we got 2 contributors and a bust. Our best IDL were still homegrown dudes.
(2) It's not just about S&C development, it's about culture too. Guys who've been here for 2 or 3 years are bought in and understand what we're about much better than a merc. They're not just players, they're leaders. They love their teammates and are loved by them. You just don't get that from the portal.
(3) Just based on how recruiting vs. portal has gone since 2021, we have gotten too many busts from the portal for me to trust it. In aggregate we've probably pulled more busts from high school, but we've also gotten more hits and probably paid less for them too.
The allure of the portal (for any position) is you can get proven talent - you know what they can do because you've seen them do it. But you have to pay a premium for it, and I still think there is better value overall in high school recruiting. That may be less true with a position like WR, but I think it's more true with DT and OL. Really any position that has a longer development and S&C timeline.