One of the great VFL stories would have never happened in transfer portal era
One of the great VFL stories of the last 20 years probably wouldn't have happened for the Tennessee Vols in the NCAA transfer portal. That's one of the unfortunate byproducts of this new era of college football that is heavily centered around massive NIL deals and the transfer portal. VolQuest's Brent Hubbs joined 104.5 The […]
One of the great VFL stories of the last 20 years probably wouldn't have happened for the Tennessee Vols in the NCAA transfer portal.
That's one of the unfortunate byproducts of this new era of college football that is heavily centered around massive NIL deals and the transfer portal.
VolQuest's Brent Hubbs joined 104.5 The Zone's "Ramon, Kayla, and Will" on Friday and he laid out an example of a great VFL story from the mid 2000s that would be nearly impossible to happen in 2023.
"The transfer portal has made the recruiting side even harder for parents, because you may think you got a shot to go somewhere, it may fall your way at the end," explained Hubbs. "And how many times did you see when you (speaking to host Ramon Foster) were coming through? You know, maybe the guy wasn't the highest recruited guy. But suddenly in January, the (recruiting) board at that school kind of dwindled down and it sort of fell to them and created an opportunity."
"That doesn't happen as much as it used to, because instead of falling to the point where you take a chance — that's maybe a risk — on a kid, let's say an Inky Johnson, for example," continued Hubbs. "How did he get to Tennessee? Well academically, a lot of people were concerned, but Tennessee had a plan for him. And then Tennessee ended up with a spot they weren't expecting to have. And they said, 'hey, we'll take a chance on this guy'. In this day and age, does he get that same chance? Or does that school go you know what, let's go get a guy out of the transfer portal that's played a couple of years at Southwest Louisiana, or played at a smaller school, that we think could step up. Because we aren't going to take a chance on a kid that we're not sure is big enough or good enough to play here. We're going to go with someone that we think is a little more safe. That's happening in recruiting. And that's unfortunate because it is going to cost some some kids some opportunities to get a chance at a bigger school that they would have gotten several years ago."
Inky Johnson, an Atlanta native, made the most of his opportunity after receiving a chance late from Tennessee. Johnson was on a path to reach the NFL before a devastating injury in 2006 ended his football career. He's since become a well-known motivational speaker that's met with hundreds, if not thousands, of teams to share his inspiring story.
In the portal era, there's a good chance that Inky Johnson never ends up at Tennessee. It's just one of the unfortunate realities of the current state of college football.
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