You see Colorado bringing in 43 transfers and Oklahoma State grabbing 50 new faces and it just makes me think about the walk-on program Coach Stallings built in the early 90s. We had kids who showed up unannounced with a duffel bag and a dream, sleeping on training room tables, and by their junior year they were starting in the secondary agaiinst Tennessee in the Third Saturday in October. That culture is dead. Completely dead.
Nobody walks on anymore. Why would they when you can portal somewhere else and get a bag? I remember when we had a kid from some tiny Alabama town nobody ever heard of, worked his tail off in the weight room for two years, and ended up blocking for Shaun Alexander on that 1999 SEC Championship run. You cannot manufacture that kind of loyalty with a NIL check. You earn it by sweating in the August heat with nothing promised.
This bipartisan Senate bill they are talking about might fix some things but it will never bring back the walk-on tradition. That is gone forever. And that breaks my heart more than any realignment or playoff expansion ever could.