Dabo Swinney Suggests Transfer Portal 'Tweaks'

Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney believes adding "consequence" to transferring would curb tampering, re-incentivize graduation and protect recruits.

© ALEX HICKS JR./STAFF / USA TODAY NETWORK

"What's wrong with a little bit of development? What's wrong with a little bit of time?"

Those are two of the questions Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney asked when he addressed the NCAA transfer portal process. 

Swinney never said he was against the portal, but the veteran coach believes the process that allows any player at any point in their career to leave one school and join another without any penalty to their eligibility should come with some "tweaks" to slow down "hasty" transfers.

"We all want this microwave (playing career). We need to have a crock pot mentality," Swinney said. "The best meals come from that crock pot when you leave at about 8:00 in the morning and mama's got some food in the crockpot. You're like, oh, that's going to be good when I get home about 6:00, right? But everybody wants it in the microwave, and that's usually not the best meals, the one you just heat up.

"That's how everybody wants it to be."

Instead of being in a hurry to find the right place or playing time, Swinney suggests taking an approach that he believes will help make getting a degree more important, protect high school recruits and curb one of college football's biggest issues. 

"I do think there should be some changes from the portal standpoint," Swinney said. "I think right now a kid should, if your coach leaves, your head coach if he leaves or is fired, you ought to be able to go (to another school) and play wherever you want. I think that's great. I think if you're a graduate, you ought to be able to go and be eligible right away. You come to college to get a degree. And you've earned that, but I think there just needs to be a few tweaks. 

"If you're not a graduate or your coach is not fired, you should have to sit a year, get acclimated because I think right now we have no barriers. We have no reason for pause. We have no pain, no consequences. If your coach is not fired or left or you're not a graduate, you sit a year. Then guess what? Upon graduation, you get that year back."

Swinney said the superstars won't need the extra year anyway as they'll be heading to the NFL in three or four years anyway. 

"We would re-incentivize graduation, which is what we should be about in collegiate athletics," Swinney said. "That's my opinion. I think that would (help graduation) if there was just a little bit of pause. It would cut back on some of these hasty decisions that kids make. You know, just a little bit of pause."

Swinney thinks it would force players considering a transfer to push through a season that's not going their way and "nine times out of 10, it works out for them." A little bit of "consequence" would force players to make sure they really want to leave their current situation.

Another issue Swinney's plan would fix, he says, is tampering. Earlier this week, Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi and UNC coach Mack Brown publically said that big-time programs were offering current Tar Heel quarterback Drake Maye as much as $5 million to join another school. 

Maye isn't in the transfer portal and never has been. Neither head coach was so inclined to name the schools who made Maye offers, but it's not the first time accusations of other teams trying to poach players on a different roster have been made. It's supposed to be against NCAA rules, but it hasn't been enforced. 

"(Sitting out a year) would stop tampering because you got all this tampering going on out there because now there's this whole new pool of recruits, right? It's not healthy," Swinney said. "It's not good for the game. It's not good for anybody and so it would cut out the tampering.

"It would protect high school recruiting a little bit because again, you got a lot of these high school kids that aren't getting opportunities. I'm passionate about the high school kids and high school recruiting and development. You know, what do I know? I don't know. That's what I think."  

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