Louisville HC Jeff Brohm Addresses Rumors Regarding NIL and the Portal

For the last few days, there have been rampant rumors surrounding the Cardinals on social media.

Sep 29, 2023; Raleigh, North Carolina, USA; Louisville Cardinals head coach Jeff Brohm watches / Rob Kinnan-USA TODAY Sports

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - It's been a wild week for the Louisville football program regarding name, image, likeness (NIL) and the transfer portal, and not in the traditional sense. For the last few days, rumors regarding NIL and the portal for the Cardinals have been running rampant on social media.

It all started on Sunday, when On3's Pete Nakos reported that four Louisville offensive linemen would be set to enter the portal when it officially opened back up this past Tuesday. Three of the linemen linked to the report - Lance Robinson, Trevonte Sylvester and Victor Cutler - have since come out and refuted it.

The next day, multiple reports were published that Peny Boone, a former running back from Toledo and the 2023 MAC Offensive Player of the Year who transferred to Louisville earlier in the cycle, would be re-entering the portal. Boone officially went portaling on Wednesday, but not before a slew of rumors surrounding his reasoning made the rounds on social media.

On Tuesday morning, 247Sports' Brandon Marcello reported that six Cardinals - five offensive lineman and a defensive lineman - would be going portaling. Two of the players linked to that report, Michael Gonzalez and Madden Sanker, refuted this report almost immediately. Marcello who go on to rescind his report entirely when it "became clear that erroneous information was provided," and even called head coach Jeff Brohm personally to apologize.

The various development over the last few days have fueled numerous rumors. These range from Louisville's NIL funds drying up, to agents working behind the scenes to convince players to jump in the portal and/or feeding bad information to media, even to a misinformation campaign spearheaded by an ACC cohort's recruiting affiliate.

Rumors go so loud to the point where, during a radio interview on 93.9 The Ville, Brohm addressed them head on. Specifically, Brohm was asked by host Drew Deener on what the motive could be behind spreading false information.

"With college football, and the lack of monitoring rules throughout, you're gonna get numerous teams that, through numerous sources, are going to spread rumors and make calls," he said. "They'll call your players, and work behind the scenes to recruit those guys. Unfortunately, some agents/street handlers of guys are going to give a lot of bad information to certain people that, if they follow it, they're going to make bad decisions.

"You can't control it all, but at the same time, we want a football team of guys that fit in, that love being where they're at that, work hard, and that understand what we're doing. If they don't believe in the same thing, then we encourage them to look elsewhere."

That last paragraph seems to be indirectly addressing Boone. On Wednesday, Boone suggested on both Twitter/X and Instagram that his reasoning for entering the portal was that he had been bumped to second or third on the depth chart. He posted various practice clips of himself in a since-deleted tweet with the caption "do yo homework," and also voiced his thoughts on the situation on Instagram

“Moral of the story, I always stand on business everywhere I go," Boone posted to his story on Instagram. "Talking about second or third (back)? Okay.”

In an interview with the Twitter/X account Cardinal Companion, Boone's agent, Bryan Miller of Peterson Sports Management, confirmed that Boone's entry into the portal was not NIL related.

"Louisville does an outstanding job with NIL," Miller said. "Peny was given top tier RB1 money and never had an issue with payments."

Going back to Brohm's radio interview on Wednesday, he went on to defend his team, support system and program as a whole, saying that he believes that Louisville has a "pretty good setup."

"You can ask our players and people that have been through here," Brohm said. "I think we have a pretty good setup here, and we do a good job and take care of our guys. We want to win here, and we're going to work hard to win, and we're going to provide an environment to get that done.

"There's a lot of other factors now that go into whether someone wants to be somewhere or not, which is fine. That's how the game has gone. But in the end, you've got to be able to play football, you gotta be able to work hard, you got to be able to be a great teammate, you gotta be able to lay it on the line. If you can, other good things could happen along the way, and that's great. We want that to happen as well."

Louisville has had four confirmed entries into the transfer portal so far in the spring window: Boone, offensive tackle Reuben Unije, defensive tackle Jermayne Lole and linebacker Jaylin Alderman.

The Cardinals will cap off spring ball with their annual spring game this Friday at L&N Stadium. Kickoff is set for 7:00 p.m. EST, and both admission and parking are free.

(Photo of Jeff Brohm: Rob Kinnan - USA TODAY Sports)

You can follow Louisville Report for future coverage by liking us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram:

Facebook - @LouisvilleReport
Twitter - @UofLReport
Instagram - @louisville_report

You can also follow Deputy Editor Matthew McGavic at @Matt_McGavic on Twitter