I will die on this hill: the transfer portal has turned fall camp into a glorified tryout for mercenaries and I miss when a scholarship meant something more than a temporary lease agreement.
You watch these kids show up for camp and half of them have one foot in the portal before the first two-a-day even ends. I remember when Barry Alvarez would take a kid from Waukesha who had zero stars next to his name, put him through four years of Camp Randall winters, and by his senior year that kid was pancaking defensive ends in the fourth quarter against Michigan State. That is not a fairy tale. That is how we built the 1993 Rose Bowl team. That is how we built the 1998 squad that punched Ohio State in the mouth. You cannot build that kind of grit when every spring you are wondering if your left tackle is going to bolt for a $200,000 NIL bag from some school he cannot even find on a map.
I look at our depth chart right now and I do not even recognize half the names. We have kids from three different programs in the offensive line room alone. How are you supposed to develop chemistry when the guy next to you was at Purdue six months ago? The 2005 team that went to the Capital One Bowl had linemen who had been eating dinner together for three years. They knew each others' families. They did not need a transfer portal to find playing time. They earned it in the weight room at 5:30 in the morning when it was 12 degrees outside and the snow was piled up on Monroe Street.
The worst part is that the portal has destroyed the walk-on program. That used to be our identity. Every kid in Wisconsin grew up knowing that if you worked hard enough at Arrowhead or Homestead or River Falls, you could walk on at Madison and maybe, just maybe, earn a scholarship by your junior year. Now those kids are being pushed out for portal transfers who have no loyalty to the program and no connection to the state. I remember when Jim Leonhard walked on. I remember when Mark Tauscher walked on. Those guys did not transfer anyywhere. They bled red and white until they had to be dragged off the field.
And do not get me started on the NIL angle. You have 18-year-old kids making more money than my first house cost and they are still entering the portal because they want a better deal somewhere else. I remember when a scholarship was the deal. That was the reward. You got your education paid for and you got to play for the University of Wisconsin. Now these kids are treating it like free agency and we are all supposed to pretend that is healthy for the sport.
I will be at Camp Randall this fall watching our new transfers try to figure out how to run the power sweep in 20 mile per hour wind off Lake Mendota. And I will be thinking about the 1994 team that would have laughed at half these kids for not being tough enough to earn their spot.