Geno blasts the transfer portal

[Viet Vet]

One's perspective of the portal will be a function of whose ox is gored. One's fine wine is another's sour grapes.

 

[LoboDays]

Entertainment is exactly what professional sports is about.

Entertainment is exactly what all sports are about. I’m sitting in my favorite chair sipping on an adult beverage. I could be watching a Lakers game, a UCONN women’s basketball game, the Cornhole semi finals, the Little League World Series, or pickle ball for geezers. I’m watching to be entertained.

 

[CL82]

Personally, I think extending a player a scholarship and a roster spot and investing all the rest of the money and time in them is worthy of more protection than free transfers offers.

In general I do not think there was much wrong with the classic model.

I hate ad hoc decision making at the NCAA but if you want to make blanket exceptions for coaching changes or probation or graduates or whatever that's fine.

I don't think some coaches leaving has a lot to do with the fairness of all players leaving.

Agree, but if we end up with de facto player free agency the little guys are going to get killed.

 

[UConnCat]

lol but if she had gone to Uconn I bet the transfer portal would not have been a problem for him, not to mention last I checked Dorka is a transfer. Again some of his quotes over the past year just seem of agitated and sour grapes. Seems like the pressure of not winning lately is affecting him

You completely misunderstood his comments. Do you think other WCBB coaches think everything is just fine and dandy when there were 1000 players in the transfer portal? Is it okay to talk about the 200 players who have nowhere to go because no school has contacted them? Do you think it's better if a coach simply says "well I got my transfer so who cares what's good for the game?" Would that impress you more?

Yes Geno has taken in transfers. Yes Geno has lost players to transfer. He freely admits that. He also thinks the sheer volume of transfers is indicative of a bigger problem in college basketball that needs to be addressed. He thinks the problem lies both with kids and coaches. I suspect more coaches than not agree with him.

 

[maccca3232]

I look at it from a different perspective. Why was there one rule for most sports and another for selected sports (Football, Mens & Women's Basketball)?

No doubt it is frustrating for some but let's not pretend there weren't already winners and losers in WBB before this change. The elite teams can sign as many top high school players as they like, with the only limit being their number of scholarships.

I would assume the majority of the top high school players already sign with an elite program and some even transfer with the 1 year sit-out. Are we saying that we should restrict the majority of players (i.e. non top-players, those that are unlikely to go pro) just to prevent the few remaining top players from possibly leaving?

I am an advocate for transparency and if that means a one time transfer for all, then so be it. If a top coach like Graves can leave Gonzaga for Oregon, then why not top players too?

 

[wolfe613]

You completely misunderstood his comments. Do you think other WCBB coaches think everything is just fine and dandy when there were 1000 players in the transfer portal? Is it okay to talk about the 200 players who have nowhere to go because no school has contacted them? Do you think it's better if a coach simply says "well I got my transfer so who cares what's good for the game?" Would that impress you more?

Yes Geno has taken in transfers. Yes Geno has lost players to transfer. He freely admits that. He also thinks the sheer volume of transfers is indicative of a bigger problem in college basketball that needs to be addressed. He thinks the problem lies both with kids and coaches. I suspect more coaches than not agree with him.

coaches leave and go to other schools I don't hear any of that being a problem, players can't do the same? Is it a lot of players that transfer obviously but if they aren't comfortable or want to be there do you really want them to be miserable and stay on the team?

 

[ConwayGmck]

Entertainment is exactly what all sports are about. I’m sitting in my favorite chair sipping on an adult beverage. I could be watching a Lakers game, a UCONN women’s basketball game, the Cornhole semi finals, the Little League World Series, or pickle ball for geezers. I’m watching to be entertained.

Not really. HuskyNan is more correct about professional sports. The "professional" part of that aspect once was the notion that it was the specific sport played at the highest level of athleticism, maturity, and knowledge base. But we've seen over the years with how the leagues of those sports operate, that it's really just a way to make the most money, and the integrity of that respective sport be damned in the end.

But your position is incorrect. Kids and young adults do NOT play sports to entertain you. Entertainment may be what it is all about according to YOU, but that's such an isolated subjective perspective. Of course, money is the evil that turns the Earth, and these days a lot of kids get into sports with the idea that one day they will be rich - used to be it was the idea that they would be "a Champion" - then the "greatest" to ever play that sport - but really, they don't care if you're entertained or not. Just that they get paid.

The transfer portal of today was a knee-jerked reflexive reaction by the NCAA out of pure, sheer FEAR: after years and decades of raking in more and more money, it's now one huge flea market of financial worship: ESPN and Fox1, and countless marketing and maneuvering to find ways to keep the money flow pouring in. ALL OF THIS should have just focused hardcore on those "professional" sports, but college sports was tapped pretty deep.

So we now glorify collegiate head coaches raking in all these millions of dollars, major university athletic departments bringing in the tens of millions by the truckload, and all the extravagant facilities being built on campuses left and right that used to only be seen in "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous" episodes.

And throughout all of this, those amateur collegiate athletes are sitting on the sidelines watching it all unfold. Nevermind that the VAST majority of revenue that comes in off of their efforts on the fields and courts, go into those facilities, and that those student-athletes directly and mostly benefit from those facilities that were paid for by the efforts of past generations of players in their programs. They actually benefit BY FAR from the generation of that revenue than ANY coaches or faculty or staff - they just don't get to pocket the money themselves. Nevermind that those facilities play a HUGE role in elite prospects coming to those programs every cycle, which gives those programs the ability to hire the big head coaches, and win the big games and titles.

They are all still big, expensive, and hyped hyped hyped all the time on social network accounts daily, if not hourly. Those amateur athletes watch all that. Then someone whispers into their ears, "hey man, you guys are the ones MAKING all that money, not them".....

 

[ConwayGmck]

As good as Dawn is, she couldn’t win a championship with Coates & Wilson on the floor at the same time and I suspect that SC will struggle against top teams if they try to play a 2-post offense with Boston & Cardoso on the court together, let alone trying to work in Amihere & Saxton.

Well Dawn has won only one championship, and the team that won it was put into position to win it with Coates and Wilson playing on the floor at the same time for most all of the regular season. But there is zero evidence that the team that won the title without Coates would be a team that would NOT have won that title with Coates. There's just zero evidence of "before and after" to compare with to form any substantiated conclusion there.

But I too would be hesitant to think that Dawn will play both Boston and Cardoso on the floor at the same time very much next season. Only in a few occasions where matchups would make that possible - against taller, slower opponents. I think a consistent rotation of Boston and Cardoso at the 5, Saxton and Amihere at the 4, and work freshman Feagin at both positions will be the most logical option....

 

[wolfe613]

Well Dawn has won only one championship, and the team that won it was put into position to win it with Coates and Wilson playing on the floor at the same time for most all of the regular season. But there is zero evidence that the team that won the title without Coates would be a team that would NOT have won that title with Coates. There's just zero evidence of "before and after" to compare with to form any substantiated conclusion there.

But I too would be hesitant to think that Dawn will play both Boston and Cardoso on the floor at the same time very much next season. Only in a few occasions where matchups would make that possible - against taller, slower opponents. I think a consistent rotation of Boston and Cardoso at the 5, Saxton and Amihere at the 4, and work freshman Feagin at both positions will be the most logical option....

but it's funny how the narrative changed when she was rumored to go to Uconn because she was "following Uconn ppl on Twitter" saw so many posts of basically guaranteeing Uconn the title, now for SC its a "ridiculous statement" again I said before it was more SC getting her than UConn not having her, but there were definitely ppl who were basically counting a title if Cardoso ha gone to UConn

 

[Littlemin]

lol but if she had gone to Uconn I bet the transfer portal would not have been a problem for him, not to mention last I checked Dorka is a transfer. Again some of his quotes over the past year just seem of agitated and sour grapes. Seems like the pressure of not winning lately is affecting him

A classic example of reading into something what you want it to be. Auriemma knocked the number of people in the portal and the “Wild West, Free For All” aspect behind the change in transfer rules; clearly he supported the concept of transferring.

 

[UConnCat]

coaches leave and go to other schools I don't hear any of that being a problem, players can't do the same? Is it a lot of players that transfer obviously but if they aren't comfortable or want to be there do you really want them to be miserable and stay on the team?

Again, not the point. No one said there should not be transfers. If that many kids are indeed miserable then perhaps that is a sign of an underlying problem, e.g., recruiting, expectations, communication.

 

[oldude]

Well Dawn has won only one championship, and the team that won it was put into position to win it with Coates and Wilson playing on the floor at the same time for most all of the regular season. But there is zero evidence that the team that won the title without Coates would be a team that would NOT have won that title with Coates. There's just zero evidence of "before and after" to compare with to form any substantiated conclusion there.

But I too would be hesitant to think that Dawn will play both Boston and Cardoso on the floor at the same time very much next season. Only in a few occasions where matchups would make that possible - against taller, slower opponents. I think a consistent rotation of Boston and Cardoso at the 5, Saxton and Amihere at the 4, and work freshman Feagin at both positions will be the most logical option....

We could certainly argue about how much better the 2017 team was after Coates injury opened up the lane to allow Gray and Davis to attack the basket and spread the floor by adding Cuevas-Moore’s outside shooting to the starting lineup. But your point is well taken that we just don’t know how SC would have done with Coates in the lineup during the 2017 title run. We do know that during the prior 2 seasons the Coates-Wilson pairing didn’t win a championship.

As for your frontcourt rotation, while it’s plausible, dividing up 80 mpg between 5 players will result in several unhappy players. The word out of Syracuse is that the mass transfer of players, including Cardoso had a lot to do with PT, or the lack there of. Cardoso averaged only 23 mpg this past season. If she gets 20 mpg or less backing up Boston off the bench how’s she going to feel about that?

Also, consider Amihere, who really started to develop towards the end of this past season. Cardoso’s transfer to SC could not have been welcome news to Amihere, and she’s yet to use her one “get out of jail free” card.

 

[Wbbfan1]

Geno would have still criticized the Number of players in the Transfer Portal even if Cardoso had chosen UConn.

I was also interested in his comment about Players who entered the transfer portal and so far haven't been contacted by another team and offered a scholarship. These players have lost a lot by entering the Transfer Portal. Should the NCAA do something about these players? Should the players be offered and opportunity to withdraw from the Transfer Portal and still retain their scholarship from the school they were previously on?

 

[oldude]

Geno would have still criticized the Number of players in the Transfer Portal even if Cardoso had chosen UConn.

I was also interested in his comment about Players who entered the transfer portal and so far haven't been contacted by another team and offered a scholarship. These players have lost a lot by entering the Transfer Portal. Should the NCAA do something about these players? Should the players be offered and opportunity to withdraw from the Transfer Portal and still retain their scholarship from the school they were previously on?

Geno is not the first top coach to remark about the “lost souls” who entered the portal and are generating zero interest from other schools. Kelly Graves talked about kids from mediocre programs that weren’t getting PT and decided to transfer having nowhere to go.

Once a kid officially enters the portal, the school has to move on. While there are a handful of kids that removed their name from the portal and returned to their existing school (13 so far), as Geno said, kids need to think about what they’re doing beforehand and have a plan in mind.

The good news is that many of the kids that are rolling the dice are 5th year seniors (342) with a degree in hand, who are just hoping that someone gives them the chance to get a free start on a graduate degree and/or avoid having to get a real job for one more year.

 

[Bigboote]

Again, not the point. No one said there should not be transfers. If that many kids are indeed miserable then perhaps that is a sign of an underlying problem, e.g., recruiting, expectations, communication.

Exactly. There are 351 Division I WBB schools. At 10-15 players apiece, 1000 players in the portal is 20-25% of all players -- one out of every four or five (I'm figuring that the number of fifth-years in the portal cancels the fact that incoming freshmen can't be in the portal). It's an average of three on every team.

I absolutely understand that a lot of 16- and 17-year-olds will make mistakes when choosing where they want to be for the next four years, but a quarter of them deciding to leave in one year seems a bit much.

 

[HuskylnSC]

Yeah he should be playing with me.. I could straighten out his golf game.

nah he should be playing with me. I make everyone look good.

 

[LwrcasefaN]

Exactly. There are 351 Division I WBB schools. At 10-15 players apiece, 1000 players in the portal is 20-25% of all players -- one out of every four or five (I'm figuring that the number of fifth-years in the portal cancels the fact that incoming freshmen can't be in the portal). It's an average of three on every team.

I absolutely understand that a lot of 16- and 17-year-olds will make mistakes when choosing where they want to be for the next four years, but a quarter of them deciding to leave in one year seems a bit much.

It is a lot, but the conditions under which this is occurring are not normal. It's a one-shot opportunity to move...without penalty. And then add in the opportunity for a fifth year (for many a free graduate degree). I'm taking that money! And not lastly, but also, the cascading impact of possibly being on a good team...that's no longer good because everyone left. Do you stay or go?

I think it would have been a smoother and less immediate impact if they allowed everyone another year, BUT if you transfer you still sit a year. I think a lot of players would have stayed put. AND...a lot of coaches would look at their rosters two years from now and decide...I can survive without receiving a transfer....who can't play for a year.

 

[HuskylnSC]

Why was there one rule for most sports and another for selected sports (Football, Mens & Women's Basketball)?

Yeah, why should the revenue producing sports be protected just because they pay for all the other sports.
It is a business and there is a need to protect the assets. As far as what do the regular kids who aren't going pro get out of it? Employers typically take a longer look at the resume with the line that says, "sat the bench for four years at Podunk U". Athletes are elevated in this country and the benefits last for years after graduation.

 

[TRUCONN76]

I thought the same until recently. Someone else posted this link on BY which caught my attention. While the report is from 2015 it shows that transferring is fairly common within the regular student population. So the perception you think exists may not be what we think athletes are being seen by their classmates.

Transfer and Mobility: A National View of Student Movements

The National Student Clearinghouse Research Center A new report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center examines trends in student transfer, with findings that complicate some assumptions about transfer patterns. The report follows the 3.6 million students who enrolled in college...

www.aacu.org

Also, I understand the loyalty comment but when you watch men's basketball and men's football, where players can leave earlier than women, I don't see a drop in loyalty from their fan bases. Coaches are still making insane money and continue to be rewarded.

I disagree with the last statement regarding the monetizing. I don't have a problem with it especially when you look at their long term earning potential as athletes. It's shorter than most of our working careers. Understanding the business aspect well in advance of becoming a pro also helps them in the long term because they're better educated. And when you look at what some former WNBA players are now able to do, it only shows how important is it to get ahead of the game now. I can't wait to see a WNBA player having a business portfolio the size of what Shaq's or Dwayne Wade's.

When you are a professional it is all about marketing and promoting yourself and negotiating the best contracts. I also understand that the majority of the TV audience have no emotional connection to the schools, however the comment that I hear most frequently from fans who watch and prefer college sports is that the reason they prefer it is that every game counts, that it is clear that the players are giving their best and the college atmosphere at the games make them more exciting.

You refer to the right of the individual athlete to maximize their earning potential and see no problem in that. Then there is the argument that the athletes need unions to negotiate on their behalf as they are being exploited. All that sounds good and may work out very well for some college athletes but the minute you consider non revenue sports, and lower level competition in many schools you have to realize that play for pay and unionization will apply to them as well. The NCAA loves to run the commercial stating that most of college athletes have careers outside of their sport. They may have to revise that ad when schools are forced to eliminate non revenue sports because they can't afford the additional costs which will be forced on them.

I do not have a crystal ball but I do believe the changes that are underway will benefit greatly a small number of athletes, but will serve to make the product less appealing to the masses and will eliminate the opportunity to participate in collegiate sports for many others. I also believe there is a risk that alumni donors will be less prevalent in the future as classes continue to graduate with a lower emotional connection to the schools.

Coaches such as Gino are recognizing that the changes which are underway will not allow them to coach and build teams as they did in the past. They will need to become more like professional coaches.

 

[ConwayGmck]

We could certainly argue about how much better the 2017 team was after Coates injury opened up the lane to allow Gray and Davis to attack the basket and spread the floor by adding Cuevas-Moore’s outside shooting to the starting lineup. But your point is well taken that we just don’t know how SC would have done with Coates in the lineup during the 2017 title run. We do know that during the prior 2 seasons the Coates-Wilson pairing didn’t win a championship.

As for your frontcourt rotation, while it’s plausible, dividing up 80 mpg between 5 players will result in several unhappy players. The word out of Syracuse is that the mass transfer of players, including Cardoso had a lot to do with PT, or the lack there of. Cardoso averaged only 23 mpg this past season. If she gets 20 mpg or less backing up Boston off the bench how’s she going to feel about that?

Also, consider Amihere, who really started to develop towards the end of this past season. Cardoso’s transfer to SC could not have been welcome news to Amihere, and she’s yet to use her one “get out of jail free” card.

If Cardoso truly is wanting to play heavy minutes every game, then it's an odd decision on her part to come to a program that was just a missed layup shy of playing for the national title, and is returning their entire starting front court plus adding a highly talented post player prospect to the mix - all without her addition.

But Staley has done this all before, you know. In 2014-15 she tried to divide 80 minutes among 5 players - Elem Ibiam, Alaina Coates, Aleighsa Welch, A'ja Wilson, and Jatari White. Only 1 player ended up unhappy, and that player didn't transfer out until after the 2015-16 season. So it will definitely be a challenge for the coaching staff to get everyone satisfactory minutes. That 2014-15 team ended up a missed layup shy of playing for the national title that season.

Damn, didn't I just say that??

 

[cancontent]

When you are a professional it is all about marketing and promoting yourself and negotiating the best contracts. I also understand that the majority of the TV audience have no emotional connection to the schools, however the comment that I hear most frequently from fans who watch and prefer college sports is that the reason they prefer it is that every game counts, that it is clear that the players are giving their best and the college atmosphere at the games make them more exciting.

You refer to the right of the individual athlete to maximize their earning potential and see no problem in that. Then there is the argument that the athletes need unions to negotiate on their behalf as they are being exploited. All that sounds good and may work out very well for some college athletes but the minute you consider non revenue sports, and lower level competition in many schools you have to realize that play for pay and unionization will apply to them as well. The NCAA loves to run the commercial stating that most of college athletes have careers outside of their sport. They may have to revise that ad when schools are forced to eliminate non revenue sports because they can't afford the additional costs which will be forced on them.

I do not have a crystal ball but I do believe the changes that are underway will benefit greatly a small number of athletes, but will serve to make the product less appealing to the masses and will eliminate the opportunity to participate in collegiate sports for many others. I also believe there is a risk that alumni donors will be less prevalent in the future as classes continue to graduate with a lower emotional connection to the schools.

Coaches such as Gino are recognizing that the changes which are underway will not allow them to coach and build teams as they did in the past. They will need to become more like professional coaches.

That's the thing. NIL rights extend beyond the NCAA as it's already been adopted by the NAIA. I think it could help athletes in non-revenue sports along with their programs. Some of these athletes already have large social media followings which schools could further leverage indirectly while the athletes generate revenue where they can.

ESPN had an interesting article a while back that talked about NIL and it's potential for the NCAA. They talked about 2 sisters who play on a volleyball team who have larger followings than some WNBA and popular NCAAW players.

Social media stardom: How changes to NIL will benefit athlete-influencers across the NCAA

A new era of NIL rights is coming as soon as this summer, and it won't be just the Heisman finalists or March Madness heroes cashing in.

www.espn.com

This section from the article caught my attention:

"When the pandemic cut short Mitchell's senior year of high school, she joined so many other bored do-it-yourselfers by trying her hand at a little renovation work on a shed in her parents' backyard in Michigan, tracking her progress on TikTok. The videos caught on, and her audience soon ballooned to more than 2 million followers.

Companies quickly took notice, and last June, Mitchell partnered with a tech company called Smart Cups, which sponsored a series of videos in which she created a bonfire lounge in her parents' backyard. The partnership was a hit, and more ads followed.

Still, the whole endeavor might have ended as quickly as it began. As she entered college, Mitchell planned to play volleyball, and existing rules would have prevented her from earning any revenue from endorsements. But Mitchell arrived at Aquinas at the perfect time. Last October, the NAIA revised its rules on NIL, and in December, she became the first athlete to profit from an endorsement, a demonstration of golf clubs on a mini-golf course she'd built for her dad inside their home."

I'm not an expert on NIL, but in some ways I think it could be beneficial to non-revenue sports. How the NCAA wants to do it is the question, but if NAIA already has there is a template that could be followed.

 

[HuskyNan]

Entertainment is exactly what all sports are about. I’m sitting in my favorite chair sipping on an adult beverage. I could be watching a Lakers game, a UCONN women’s basketball game, the Cornhole semi finals, the Little League World Series, or pickle ball for geezers. I’m watching to be entertained.

Yep. Pitchers’ duels in baseball will thrill the purists but bore the fans to tears.