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The Portal is Fool’s Gold

Fastbreak

By Fastbreak
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Nivek

Nivek 16861

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Posted

JUCO, Portal, and Recruiting are 3 ways to improve the roster.  If you are skipping on any of them you are a fool.   You can have crap success with recruiting just as much as people can have crap success with portal use.   It requires attention to detail and good scouting.  

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Richard Kimball

Richard Kimball 1492

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12 hours ago, LTtxfan said:

Yeah, Baylor's OL success this year is a direct result of adding two transfers...

"Not only do Jacob Gall and Grant Miller have a wealth of experience under their belts as fifth-year transfers from Buffalo and Vanderbilt, respectively, they also have the versatility to play any of the three interior positions in Baylor's offensive line." 

 

Baylor's 2021 success tied directly to improved offensive line play 

https://www.texasfootball.com/article/2021/10/13/baylor-s-2021-success-ties-directly-to-improved-offensive-line-play?ref=article_preview_img

Added to that, Dillon Doyle is a starting linebacker, and came from Iowa when his dad got fired there. Drew Estrada has gotten extensive playing time at inside receiver. Siaki Ika came from LSU.

The first red flag for me was when Sark didn't hit for offensive linemen in the portal, deciding to stand pat. 

Also, if the UT strength and conditioning program was worth a shit, they'd have three more wins this year. The Horns need to portal in a S&C coach. 

 

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Richard Kimball

Richard Kimball 1492

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1 hour ago, Helobious said:

Where does the myth that Xavier Worthy is a transfer player come from? I’ve heard multiple people say it but it’s not remotely true.

Wouldn't surprise me to see Thompson portal out. He's been busting his ass with an injured throwing hand, and Sark hasn't defended him at all in any of his pressers, and it looks like he's looking for ANYONE to replace him. Dude's leading the B12 in touchdown passes, and he's been running for his life and wearing 275 pound defensive end necklaces all season. He's got Worthy and the butterfingers squad for receivers. Worthy's good, but you've got to have more than one guy who's a threat. 

Edited by Richard Kimball
Added more smart stuff.
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Gaffords

Gaffords 755

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15 hours ago, taybo20 said:

I agree with you for the most part. Is it possible to find a guy to portal in that is elite? Yeah sure...but that is the exception and not the rule. Most of the guys are #1 or #2 and maybe help with depth, but aren't some world beater. Are they better than what you have on campus? Possibly or likely so if you are taking them, but again that doesn't mean they are game changers. Just look at the transfers we took on defense this year. Nothing special. But then you look at a guy like Xavier Worthy and hope that you can find other guys like that.

And yes absolutely right about recruiting. You gotta find guys that not only buy in, but stick it out and play 3-4 years. You need the culture and the consistency. We certainly don't have that at all. And it desperately shows.

Our QB who got away last year just might show up in the portal before long...   He's buried on the bench full of talented QBs who have more experience.   There's been rumblings....

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MaybeACoordinator

MaybeACoordinator 8349

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It's easy to second guess coaches and say they should have fixed X in the portal last year or this year but when you look at specifics it's a lot murkier.

There was no QB out there for Strong to take in year one of his regime. As for year 2, he and most of us thought Heard might be the guy and he had Buechele coming in and Ehlinger in the pipeline down the road. Heard was a bad gamble, but almost everybody thought it was the smart move not to pull his shirt in 2014.

And now everybody is laying into Sark for not grabbing immediate help on the OL. Here is a list of OL who portaled after his hire. Lots of them ended up staying where they were, or quitting footnall.

Another group portaled downward, like our own Reece Moore to ACU and Willie Tyler to ULM -- two of Herman's busts Sark rid us of. 

Very few portaled upward -- from a G5 to a P5 or from a shitty P5 to a better one. It's not like Sark had this vast array of talent he ignored. 

A few standout name:

Jacob Gall wound up at Baylor and is listed as a starter. He was a one-year rental -- transfer from Buffalo and a Cincinnati HS product.

OT Wanya Morris was second-string at blowU and has another year to go. He is a TN transfer from GA.

LSU transfer Dare Rosenthal would have been a nice get -- he is now the starting LT at Kentucky.

But look for yourself for other guys at the link....

Looks like Sark saw LB as far more of an area of concern and while none of these guys panned out, he was not wrong that our LBs suck. Sure wish there had been a Gary Johnson in there. 

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956 Worldwide

956 Worldwide 34444

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Coaches are going to need to look at the portal as a tool, but they are going to need to balance it carefully. I think that most coaches who want to be a long-term program head will treat it as a spot to build depth and to carefully fill obvious holes that open up due to injury and other factors. Maybe a bit more of a grab bag if you need to make a culture shift and do some roster churn. 

The backbone of a solid roster will continue to be high school recruits. Veteran teams with depth will be good. If a coach gets too liberal with the portal year after year, what does that tell recruits about a program’s commitment to develop you? And what does it say about a staff’s ability to assess high school talent? 

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956 Worldwide

956 Worldwide 34444

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12 hours ago, Longboard Horn said:

SMU knows how to use the portal to their advantage. Texas needs to do the same thing. Recruit every kid, no matter what star, in their metropolitan area(even ones they know they have no chance of signing), get them on campus for multiple visits, get their family on campus to meet the coaching staff and tour the facilities, and stay in touch with them at best as possible. That way, if they committed to Bama, USC, OU, etc. and they bust or don't get playing time and end up in the portal, Sark and his staff can reach out and sell them on why coming to Texas is best. Most kids want playing time, so promise them that and it'll pique their interest. 

SMU can do damn good playing with Bama castoffs in the AAC. I gotta say, planning to compete against Bama with the kids who can’t hack it in Tuscaloosa once UT joins the SEC is a different sort of strategery all together.

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Bevo

Bevo 13527

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6 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

You can’t build an entire team thru the portal but you can find a QB, 2 starter quality OL, and 2 starter quality LB which for the 2022 Texas team could be the difference between 5-7 and 9-4.

What it does is eliminate weaknesses. Remember in 2005 when the announcer said it was all dogs on the field. Typically, there are some players than can be picked on continuously. Those guys that can be picked on should never see the field. The portal is used to eliminate those gaps.

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956 Worldwide

956 Worldwide 34444

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2 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

You can’t build an entire team thru the portal but you can find a QB, 2 starter quality OL, and 2 starter quality LB which for the 2022 Texas team could be the difference between 5-7 and 9-4.

I think that finding a decent QB in the portal may actually be easier than getting one at most other positions. Reason being that schools try to stack QBs and QB1 usually becomes “the man” in a way that no OL or LB does. A good backup at those positions will be getting reps and will see a clearer path to more PT. 

Most D1 starting caliber OL and LBs are….starting somewhere else. And, the cost to “missing” on a portal player is higher. You’re going to surrender a roster spot to someone who will not be around for and is pretty much a a finished product. 
 

Going to the portal and grabbing five starting caliber P5 players is a far taller order than it seems. 

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WhatTheBuck

WhatTheBuck 28713

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6 hours ago, Thermos H. Christ said:

Wasn’t Joe Burrow a transfer who couldn’t win the starting job at his prior school? Obviously there are diamonds in the rough to be found, but you have to be able to ID them and put them in a situation where they can shine. Plus you have to convince them to come. 

Burrow was a transfer but he had already earned his degree (after three years) so he was technically a grad transfer. It’s not that he couldn’t win the job. He had been JT Barrett’s backup until an injury to his hand set him back and allowed Dwayne Haskins to take that spot. Then when Barrett got hurt and had to leave the Michigan game while trailing in 2017, Haskins came in and led the Bucks to the comeback win. So while the QB competition was ongoing, Burrow felt that he could see the writing on the wall and decided to transfer. Not having a comeback win at Michigan on his resume like Haskins did made it an uphill climb.

Fwiw, if I took the time to search I could point you to a post of mine where I said I wanted Burrow to win the job in 2018. I could also point to a post I made during the 2016 spring game where I said that if I didn’t know better I’d think that Burrow was OSU’s starting QB rather than either Barrett or Haskins. Given how Haskins performed in 2017 it’s hard to be upset about how things worked out and I’m happy for Joe. But it would’ve been nice to see how things would’ve turned out if he’d never suffered that injury. 

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taybo20

taybo20 2815

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8 hours ago, Gaffords said:

Our QB who got away last year just might show up in the portal before long...   He's buried on the bench full of talented QBs who have more experience.   There's been rumblings....

And that's the kind of Joe Burrow-esque transfer we need... assuming he wins a NC here of course lol

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ImissWallyPryor

ImissWallyPryor 9045

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KSU built some highly-ranked teams off JUCO transfers. A solid foundation and roster depth can be had relatively quickly with smart portal pickups.

I like FCS and grad transfer players the best, along with some Keilan Robinson types who are plenty good enough for today’s Texas even if they’re not Bama good. We might catch lightning in a bottle like OU did with their string of QB transfers, but transcendent players are more likely to come from HS recruits.

Building a solid base quickly through the portal can pay off in attracting HS blue chips. How attractive is Texas to HS skill position players if we don’t have solid line play. If we lose Bijan to the portal, it’ll be because he doesn’t feel safe running behind our current OL. He won’t be around long enough to benefit from incoming HS recruits.

Edited by ImissWallyPryor
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