Midnite Madness and the Transfer Portal Madness

In this week's Midnite Madness, Tom Burke looks at how the transfer portal has reshaped roster building and what it means for TCU football moving forward.

Jul 13, 2022; Arlington, TX, USA; A view of the helmets of the West Virginia Mountaineers and the Texas Tech Red Raiders and the Texas Longhorns and the TCU Horned Frogs and the Oklahoma State Cowboys during the Big 12 Media Day at AT&T Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images | Jerome Miron-Imagn Images

College football fanatics just want to have fun. And over the past several weeks, we’ve had a blast, haven’t we?

No, we’re not talking about the College Football Playoffs and Indiana’s win over Miami in the College Football Playoff National Championship Game on Monday, January 19, despite the fact that the game drew more than 30 million viewers. This was, by the way, the highest TV ratings of any non-NFL sporting event since 2016, and a 36 percent increase over the 22.1 million who watched last year’s Ohio State-Notre Dame title game.

However, as every die-hard college football fan knows, the real college football action in January was the hilarious insanity created by the player transfer portal, which recently closed for another year.

For the lack of an official nickname or acronym, we will call the transfer portal process the “Rent A Player Sweepstakes,” or RAPS, since, through the portal process, players can switch schools every year if they so desire.

RAPS is the biggest crap shoot in college athletics. It is college football’s version of free agency.

Players seek their fortunes. Coaches put their livelihoods on the line. It’s January Madness, instead of March Madness. And never has there been so much hope for so many. 

How the Transfer Portal Actually Works

Players could enter the transfer portal from January 2-16. Players on the 2026 College Football Playoff National Championship Game teams could also enter the transfer portal from January 20-24.

About 4,500 players entered the portal. That’s roughly one-third of the active Division 1 football players on scholarship and more than the roughly 1,700 active rostered players in the National Football League (NFL).

Silliness, but fun!

Once players are in the portal, they can commit to a school anytime, even beyond when the portal period closes. But most players try to make their decisions quickly, so they can enroll in their new schools and be eligible to participate in spring football practices. 

According to the NCAA, about 30 percent of Division I athletes who enter the transfer portal do not join a new program. About 7% of those who enter the portal withdraw. In those two scenarios, a player risks losing his roster spot and, maybe even his scholarship, if he is not allowed to return to his current team. If a player does not find a new home using the transfer portal, he might seek opportunities to play at smaller schools or at non-NCAA programs. In some cases, players leave the sport if they aren’t able to transfer.

Foolishness, but fun!

The transfer portal process produces winners and losers.

It’s immense fun watching players play head coaches and general managers of various teams against one another, as the players jockeyed for their best contracts and Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) opportunities, and millionaires and billionaires, whether alums or not of a particular institution, stroked their egos by flaunting their bulging wallets.

In an evil kind of way, it was enjoyable seeing the transfer portal totally decimate some teams and require their head coaches and general managers to completely rebuild their rosters.

When the Portal Swung Open and TCU Stayed Put

During the height of the transfer portal process, there also were some teams that barely tickled the funny bone, such as TCU.

The Horned Frogs lost only one full-time starter to the portal and only three others who played significant snaps during the 2025 season. So, head football coach Sonny Dykes and staff focused on spending the majority of the Frogs’ monetary resources on maintaining and continuing to develop the core of a team that defeated USC in the Alamo Bowl, finished 9-4, and earned a 25th-place ranking in the season’s final Associated Press (AP) poll.

TCU brought in only 12 transfers to plug some offensive and defensive holes. Within the Big 12 Conference, that was the second-fewest number of transfer-ins, next to BYU.

The Frogs’ biggest loss to the transfer portal, of course, was record-setting starting quarterback Josh Hoover, who hightailed it out of Funkytown and signed with national champion Indiana.

Hoover’s big payday and notoriety come with tons of pressure from within a program and a fan base that just experienced an undefeated national-championship season, led by an all-time Hoosier favorite, Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Fernando Mendoza, who is headed to the National Football League (NFL).

Good luck filling those shoes and expectations, Josh!

To replace Hoover as TCU’s starting quarterback, Dykes' offensive coordinator Gordon Sammis and quarterbacks coach Brad Robbins surprised transfer-portal watchers by signing Harvard quarterback Jaden Craig, who will have one year of eligibility at TCU as a grad transfer. Craig has spent the past four seasons at Harvard, which, incidentally, does not pay its athletes, does not provide athletic scholarships, and does not accept grad transfers. So, Craig has no Power 4 Conference quarterbacking experience. Not even Group of 6 (formerly Group of 5) experience.

No joking!

Welcome home, @jadencraig13!#GoFrogs 🐸 #CarterBoys26 pic.twitter.com/kfibxinDzc

— TCU Football (@TCUFootball) January 7, 2026

Quarterbacks at the Center of the Portal

Supposedly, the 6-3, 230-pound Craig is the real deal. The two-time All-Ivy Leaguer established Harvard career records with 52 touchdown passes and 6,074 passing yards. He was an integral member of teams that shared three Ivy League football championships. In 2025, Craig led the Crimson to its first-ever appearance in the Football Championship Series (FCS) Playoff.

Some Harvard and Ivy League observers include Craig in discussions about the best Harvard quarterback of all time, with perhaps only Ryan Fitzpatrick (2005) ranking higher. After Harvard, Fitzpatrick was a quarterback in the National Football League (NFL) for 17 seasons. He started at quarterback for nine teams. 

Transfer portal fun centered on quarterbacks. Hoover and Craig were two of about 200 quarterbacks who entered the transfer portal.

In addition to Hoover, other notable Big 12 quarterbacks who entered the transfer portal were Cincinnati’s Brendan Sorensby, Arizona State’s Sam Leavitt, and Iowa State’s Rocco Becht.

Sorensby left the Bearcats for a big contract from 2025 Big 12 champion Texas Tech. Leavitt chose LSU and its new head coach, Lane Kiffin. Becht followed former Iowa State head coach Matt Campbell to Penn State.

Oklahoma State and Baylor created some excitement for their suffering fans by signing quarterbacks from the transfer portal. North Texas quarterback Drew Mestemaker followed former North Texas head coach Eric Morris to Oklahoma State (Morris replaced Mike Gundy, who was fired early in the 2025 season). Mestemaker led Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) quarterbacks with 4,379 passing yards this past season. Baylor landed DJ Lagway. The 6-foot-3, 245-pound, former five-star started two seasons at Florida. He threw for 4,179 yards and 28 touchdowns for the Gators.

When College Football Stopped Feeling Like College Football

Oklahoma State, Iowa State, and Baylor had to restock their rosters with transfers because of transfer portal losses. The Cowboys had over 60 players enter the transfer portal. New Iowa State head coach Jimmy Rogers was greeted by over 50 Cyclones entering the transfer portal.

At least 20 former Iowa State players are now at Penn State. Baylor had at least 30 players enter the transfer portal. Some of their fans referred to the exodus as “rats fleeing the sinking ship,” since the ship’s “captain,” head coach Dave Aranda, is on a flaming hot seat in Waco.

Utah weathered the storm of its head coach, Kyle Whittingham, leaving to become the head coach at the University of Michigan. About 20 Utes entered the transfer portal. At least five of them followed Whittingham to Ann Arbor.

Two of the most humorous transfer portal stories involve players outside of the Big 12. University of Miami (Florida) linebacker Mohamed Toure announced he is returning to Miami for his eighth collegiate season!

Miami Hurricanes linebacker Mohamed Toure (1) reacts after a defensive stop against the Ole Miss Rebels during their Vrbo Fiesta Bowl matchup at State Farm Stadium on Jan. 8, 2026. | Joe Rondone/The Republic / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Toure is eligible for an eighth season because, in addition to the three seasons he played (2021 and 2023 at Rutgers, and 2025 at Miami), he took a redshirt season in 2019 at Rutgers, had the COVID-19 season in 2020 at Rutgers, and lost two seasons to injury (2022, 2024) at Rutgers.

And then there is TJ Finley. Through the transfer portal, he has signed with his seventh collegiate football program. This season, Finley will play quarterback for Incarnate Word, a Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) school located in San Antonio, Texas. He will turn 24 during spring practice. COVID-19 and a series of injuries provided Finley with the additional years of eligibility, along with an off-the-field incident that had him kicked off the Tulane football team before he played a game for the Green Wave in 2025. His other schools were LSU, Auburn, Texas State, Western Kentucky, and Georgia State, to which he transferred this past season after leaving Tulane.

All of this transfer portal folly can be attributed to schools desperately wanting to seize one of the coveted spots in the next College Football Playoff.

For the 2026 season, the playoff format will remain at 12 teams, since the SEC and Big 10 conferences could not agree on expansion. However, in 2026, for the first time, the Power 4 conferences will each be guaranteed a spot for their conference champion, along with one spot for the highest-ranked Group of 6 (formerly Group of 5) conference champion. In addition, Notre Dame will be guaranteed a spot if it finishes ranked in the top 12.

As fun as the 2026 college football transfer portal process has been, it’s too bad college football fans have to wait nearly a year before once again enjoying the RAPS madness.

And Then Basketball Season Showed Up

In the meantime, the transfer windows for collegiate men’s and women’s basketball teams are approaching. The portals open for 15 days starting the day after their respective NCAA Tournament National Championship game. That means the transfer portal opens on April 5 for women and April 6 for men.

College basketball fans must be licking their chops!

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