The 30-day transfer portal window will open for Virginia Tech and UCLA tomorrow. Neither played 4 games, meaning players are still eligible to redshirt. https://t.co/wMrfFrdlE6— Pete Nakos (@PeteNakos_) September 14, 2025
Basically, the entire roster is now eligible to transfer out for the next 30 days starting on Monday. If they do it this week, they are eligible to redshirt this season at their new school.
Depending on how the next few days go, it's not out of the realm of possibility for us to lose enough players in the portal we have to forfeit the remainder of the season.
Forums:
DISCLAIMER: Forum topics may not have been written or edited by The Key Play staff.
Comments
Thats a huge oversight by whoever came up with the portal rules. Like, it sucks for the kids if their coach gets fired but they should be committed to the program, not the coach. Also, if you don't want your coach fired, maybe play a little harder
We are about to see how much of this team is just NIL mercenaries. Many of them did not improve their worth over the first 3 games.
That ship has sailed my friend. It's now just a quaint memory. This is no longer an amateur sport. It's NFL minor league with PAC money for teenagers. Portal giveth and portal taketh away.
Exactly why my football fandom status is showing cracks.
Phillip Montgomery first presser:
"We would like to announce open tryouts will be held on Wednesday to ensure we have enough bodies to meet the minimum requirements of our television schedule. Experience NOT required."
That'd be somethin'
The NCAA is about to look absolutely negligent for allowing this portal window during the season. I guess the only good thing is now our players and coaches are basically trying out for the rest of college football, maybe we will see some effort. I hope the NIL money wasn't front loaded.
Its the prelude to what is eventually coming.--in-season transfers.
Laugh now, but just wait until a smarmy Lawyer crafts an Anti-trust Argument and it happens.
Most bowl/playoff games occur after the fall semester...so not a huge leap.
Also wouldn't have to go into portal this week. Would just have to not play if they are deciding. Team is going to have alot of hamstring issues in practice. Works even better for any that haven't played in a game or three so far. They could use the available games to make a decision.
These portal rules are so F-ed up. Who came up with this shit?
The NCAA wears kneepads for the players, but this screwed up situation does not help them either.
So shortsighted.
Another reason I am losing interest in this BS.
The NCAA didn't get much choice in any of this. This gun was put to their head by the courts. And until Congress prepares a framework in federal law by which the schools (as represented by the NCAA or otherwise) can collectively bargain restrictions on movement with players, this is what college sports is now.
Yep, this is the point.
The NCAA is and has been a bad actor for years, but not everything in College Sports is their fault. A lot of the current hatred is misplaced.
The NCAA sat on their hadns for FAR too long, but now, pretty much any effort they make to reign in the Pay-for-Play and Transfer Whenever Shitshow that we now have is met with Injunctions from the Legal System.
So now, College Football rules are essentially set by individual lawsuits which (no matter what you think of the NCAA) ---most reasonable people can agree is absolutely the most dysfunctional way to do so.
They had their choice in choosing to do nothing. They put their heads in the sand and quintupled down on "student-athletes", and ceded the decision making to the lawyers and the courts.
This isn't remotely accurate. I can fault the NCAA for quite a few things but they have been asking Congress for an anti-trust exemption for nearly a decade but the current Score Act amendments are the closest they have come to get Congress to act. Mark Emmert really started beating the drum for it in 2020 but again Congress chose not to support it. They really have no forcing function to make Congress act. They clearly arent getting the support from State leadership as at least half the court cases brought against the NCAA in the last five years have been started or pushed forward by State Attorney Generals. Without that exemption they really are at the mercy of the courts.
Nearly a decade? So, like, right after they lost the Ed O'bannon case?
The NCAA has been doing something that is obviously illegal in this country, and arguably unethical for decades now.
I mean, it literally got to a point where schools had so much money that they didn't know what to do with it. Schools were putting lazy, rivers and waterfalls inside of locker rooms. Rebuilding meeting rooms every five years. Taking private helicopters to visit recruits. All of this in an effort to dazzle recruits without giving them cash.
In an effort to win football games, NCAA schools accepted athletes who would've never been admitted to the school on their academic ability, and then hired an army of tutors to help them pass classes by any means necessary.
It never rains in Tiger Stadium took place in 1976 I think? NCAA versus OU board of regents was in 1984? Spurrier was calling to pay players in the 90s.
Sure, Things have accelerated recently, and the underbelly of the sport is now impossible to hide. But the NCAA chose to stay on the "amateur student athlete" path over and over and over again for 40 years now.
There was ZERO effort made to change the status quo until they started getting sued.
Finally, just remember who the NCAA is: it's not Mark Emerert, it's not Charlie Baker, it's the hundreds of school presidents who represent universities comprised of students, alumni, professors, and fans. It's the president of Ohio State, the president of Alabama, the president of Miami, the president of Virginia Tech, etc. those supposed "leaders" could have fought for change at any time, but they didn't because they were either enjoying the spoils of their riches, or they were too stupid and detached from reality.
Can't wait for the 30 for 30 that comes out in 25 years about how the Cadets filled in after the whole team portals out. They go 2-7 in the remaining games and still manage to beat UVA.
If there's one thing that remains true. VT will beat UVA.
1) until lawyers are involved, you can only RS once. That's only a handful of players like Reddish, Greene, and Woodson. Most have used their red shirt.
2)If you aren't on the team does that void the NIL deals? I would think there is some language in those contacts. I dont care about Mansoor Delane the LSU tiger, I care about the hokie version. His NIL is now worthless to me.
3) If you want more money next year you need to play because right now who would want any one from this team.
Guys who had offers last off-season will have them now -- no one's going to isolate individual performances from the last three games as indicators of anything.
And I'm not sure the redshirt matters that much if you have any eligibility left. If you have it, great, but even guys with one year left might get offers. And if you have a spring transfer offer in hand and your NIL deal for this year has been paid (which I suspect most of them have been), why would you risk injury/future earnings for a program that is going to get cleaned out down to the janitors in the off-season?
Why would you pay NIL deals in lump sums?
Historically that's how scholarships were paid and how bags got delivered.
I could be wrong and there's a much more structured setup now especially on larger deals, but my understanding was there really wasn't much in the way of performance clauses even allowed -- thus, for example, guys bailing out on bowl games.
So this year is a bit of an abnormality... Collective money is subject to scrutiny/the clearinghouse (that Deloitte is running) as of this summer. And Revenue Sharing (money coming directly from the school, AKA House money) can start being paid this summer.
So what a lot of schools have done is front load Collective money (ie; paying it upfront) and backload House money (or send it to other programs). This is how Texas Tech is funding their $53m NIL program - $20m from Rev Share, and $33m from the collective before the cutoff went into effect.
No #sauces or intel, but I'm guessing that this is how we landed our basketball roster - Triumph funded football, and basketball got a bigger bag than it otherwise would have because we had the opportunity to double dip this year.
Next year, this will not be possible.
Also, this is just how it goes... if a handful of programs are willing to pay lump sums, then that's what you have to do to compete :shrugs:
Let's be honest, the only way to "fix" NIL is to basically have an endowed position. The QB playing makes X dollars, the WR's playing get X dollars. If you can't keep your position in practice you lose out on the game day check.
So not seeing this, anywhere - yeah, players can transfer under the rules, but as far as academics, the last day to add classes at Tech was 8/29 and I imagine similar at other universities. So, as someone else pointed out, since most players have already used their redshirt season, they'd have to sit out a semester because they can't take classes, and you can't play if you're not taking classes.
Plus, most teams have their rosters set, even if they could get into classes somewhere else. And not sure if they'd get NIL money part way through the season, and even so, it would probably be prorated. If they leave Tech, I'd guess that would be like breach of NIL contract and may have to return whatever money they were going to get here. If what they get is prorated, seems like it might make more sense financially to stay.
ALSO - how many of the kids with NIL was Tech their best offer? So they're not going to go somewhere else for less, right? And if they were offered more somewhere else, what are the optics of them saying, "hey, remember how you offered me that money to come, but I said no, is that offer still good?" (Especially since the university probably filled the roster spot they said 'no' to)
So I'm thinking not nearly as many players will leave as we think. It seems like there are more reasons to stick it out, try to prove their worth for bigger NIL deals next year.
Brenden hill should know.
They have to finish the semester and stay in good standing to transfer. Apparently a red shirt clause is common as well
I hope Short and Keller end up at UVA Wise so it will improve Emory's chances of victory.
Keller was a 2021 recruit, been in the program for four years. I've watched a lot of college football in the 30 couple years i've been a fan, and he is arguably the worst D1 player i've ever seen on the field. That's saying something because we're only one season removed from Parker Clements.
Fully expect some P4 team to take a flier on Keller and he turns into a world beater for said team.
Good coaches can do that. We don't have those.
Would be yet another indictment agains this staffs questionable ability to get LBs to do anything at all
An old HS friend of mine has a son playing at Emory (Senior this year). Every time I see him post some pictures and clips I think about you. lol
My father went to E&H. My son played football at Bridgewater and played E&H before they want to D2.
My Dad is so proud of going to E&H. He loved his time there. I've been there twice with him. Once as a youngster and once when Bridgewater played them there. Both times, he gave me a tour of the campus. He has such fond memories of E&H.
And, the campus is beautiful.
My high school always did our band camp at E&H. The cafeteria always had really good food. Lots of core memories made on that beautiful campus.
I just hope JC Price's DL go ham the rest of the season and he gets hired on somewhere. I love the man but I really think the best path forward for VT is a completely clean slate with 0 hold-overs. The last two coaches kept pieces in place and we've seen how that's worked out. JC Price must know this. I hate it for him but he's gotta move on
Hope the same for Adibi. Hate that he got dragged into this bullshit, because the Hall + Adibi combo was such an incredible tandem to watch.
I'd be much more concerned about kids just sitting out than actively transferring now. Very few teams have the time now to adequately evaluate whether all our players are trash or they just got coached to play like trash, so it's unlikely even a verbal deal for next year gets negotiated in the next 30 days.
And so it begins
Let's be honest here, probably going down to a lower level.
If he isn't good enough to start over who we are putting out on the field now, no intelligent P4 is going to offer.
Friendly reminder to all: Portal entries/incomings are worthy of their own post.
So I did that and it was deleted?
French posted it between my comment and your post, so it was a DRINK situation if you posted it as well. I did not intend my original comment to be a scolding, and I hope it did not come across that way. I've posted that comment many times in portal/recruiting threads as a simple reminder to everyone.
Link
He showed a lot of promise in previous years.
I wonder what the effect Siefkes' rotation is having on players like Lovett. It seems like they are not staying on the field long enough to get a feel for the game. We are swapping out the whole Defense in the middle of a drive. I like the idea of rotating players, but have we gone too far?
Hopefully we can retain his mom