One Transfer Is Enough for College Football

A starting quarterback commits in December. By spring practice, he’s gone. Chasing a better NIL deal across the country. What once looked like opportunity now has turned into chaos. 

The transfer portal has reshaped college athletics, but without limits, it has also stripped away stability. Allowing athletes to enter the portal multiple times has turned roster building into a revolving door where it seems a school can never fully develop a team.

Over 10,500 NCAA football players entered the transfer portal in the 2026 cycle across all three divisions. When there are roughly 75,000 total football players playing in the NCAA it really puts the number of players that transfer into perspective. 

Playing collegiate sports should never be about money. It should be about bettering yourself as a player and setting yourself up for a bright future. Chasing NIL deals and making collegiate football about money is what’s wrong with college today. Limiting players to one transfer would force more deliberate decisions. Being able to transfer once is still critical for a player to have success. It allows the athletes to leave a poor team fit or to find playing time. However after the first transfer commitment becomes part of the equation. Players must invest in a system, and programs can invest in players without fearing constant turnover.

Letting players transfer one would not eliminate movement, it would give it meaning. Players would choose their next team carefully. Coaches would be able to build systems around returning players. Along with that fans could watch a player grow their talent over many years rather than watching them walk out the door.

Most importantly, the game itself would benefit. Players would be able to grow connections with one another and develop into better players. Football is a team sport, and how it is right now with the wide over transfer portal players are only thinking about themselves.

Limiting the transfer portal would also give players more stability. In 2022 only just over half of the total players in the portal ended up enrolling in a new school. While the rest of the players either withdrew their name, still remained in the portal, or for most of the players enrolled in a school that did not have a football team which led to these players leaving their sport. 

As of right now, the transfer portal prioritizes immediacy over development. Rather than rewarding players with long term growth as an overall player and individual it rewards quick exits. It is not good for the game if players know they can just leave their program to chase more money whenever they want. The imbalance that this causes threatens the core of college football as a whole.

The idea of the transfer portal is a good thing. It gives players an opportunity to seek a new opportunity. That is why the solution to fixing the transfer portal is not to close it. Rather the solution is to define it. Giving the players an opportunity to transfer once gives them freedom to seek a different opportunity.

College football does not need less opportunity, it needs more commitment. Giving the players the opportunity to transfer once is enough to provide both.