Clemson football: Dabo Swinney lashes out about transfer portal in all-time rant
By John Buhler
Nobody in college athletics despises the transfer portal more than Clemson football head coach Dabo Swinney.
While it has been well established that Dabo Swinney does not care for the transfer portal even one little bit, the Clemson football head coach unleashed an all-time rant about this newfangled recruiting method taking over college athletics.
Clemson does things differently under Swinney. Whether is it only doling out committable offers, to having a player shut down his recruitment upon committing, to never dipping into the transfer portal, Clemson is incredibly old school and tradition-laden. That is fine and all, and admirable to some extent. However, the college football world is changing and Swinney has to adapt or die.
Clemson is coming off its worst season of the College Football Playoff era, as the Tigers went 9-3 and are playing the Iowa State Cyclones in the Cheez-It Bowl in Orlando on Dec. 29.
Dabo, on the transfer portal: "It's chaos right now. Tampering galore. Adults manipulating young men. Education is like the last thing now." Calls for the return of one-year sit for transfers, and get that year back upon graduation. "Keep the focus on graduation/education."
— Larry Williams (@LarryWilliamsTI) December 15, 2021
Clemson football: Dabo Swinney rips the transfer portal in an all-time rant
Is the transfer portal a tad slimy? Of course it is, but it is now part of the college football landscape. This is the closest thing to one-and-done college football has ever seen. While a program can continue to conduct itself in a manner believing it is above certain recruiting tactics, don’t come crying when the best players in the country pick a rival over yours to go play football.
Though Clemson still recruits at a high level under Swinney, he did lose his top two coordinators to Power Five head-coaching gigs in Brent Venables to Oklahoma and Tony Elliott to Virginia. While they may adopt some of the principles they learned from being under Swinney at Clemson, what happens once Miami and Florida State get things rolling in the ACC? Where will Clemson be then?
Swinney may have his reasoning to never dip into the portal, but he is in the business of winning.
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