Coach Jonathan Smith on How the Transfer Portal Impacted MSU This Offseason

Few college football programs were as impacted by the transfer portal this offseason as Michigan State. Coach Jonathan Smith explained how much of a factor the portal was to Michigan State's football team.

Michigan State head coach Jonathan Smith looks on during the Spring Showcase on Saturday, April 20, 2024, at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing. / Nick King/Lansing State Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK

Michigan State and Coach Jonathan Smith have begun fall camp. He has used the summer to implement many changes heading into the upcoming season.

As is the case with any new coaching staff, especially one with as many new players as Michigan State does, Coach Smith expects a learning curve during fall camp. However, he hopes the time he invested with the roster this summer was enough for his roster to understand his expectations of them heading into the season.

"They met through the summer [to] get around the coaches and things,” Smith said after the Spartans' first practice of fall camp on Tuesday. “We try to do a thorough job explaining what practice should look like and how we should be going about it, and then they gotta go out and experience it. I thought you didn't notice, to me, a bunch of new guys out there."

While Michigan State lost nearly 20 scholarship players, including multiple starters, to the transfer portal earlier this offseason, Smith and his coaching staff negated some of the losses by securing what 247Sports ranked as the 12th-best transfer portal class in the country. Their ability to successfully secure talent in the transfer portal after losing a large portion of their roster gives Michigan State hope this upcoming season. Their success in the transfer portal has allowed Smith to hit the ground running during fall camp in August.

"I don't know if [the number of transfers changes things] a ton,” Smith said. We've got a rhythm in August. We get 25 of these practices. The approach, in regards to our teaching and installation, goes into individual periods, and then you put them in a whole group. Study the tape, [and] have a few scrimmages. So I don't know if it's dramatically changed August."

The transfer portal allows players to find a change of scenery and potentially better opportunities. It also provides college football programs a way of quickly improving their teams with players who have college football experience. The portal is a precious tool for first-year head coaches like Smith.

This season, he will depend heavily on many of the players Michigan State secured in the transfer portal earlier this offseason.

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