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Transfer Cycle 2025-2026 - Eloi! Eloi, lama sabachthani!

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IT

Here’s where we’re at with agents:

One DT that Texas has had “some” interest in is asking for $900K. He’s a mid-rotation sort of guy. He has one offer for $600K and one for $500K. Wants $900K.

One guy at Texas agreed to one amount, then turned around and asked for a bigger number to which Texas reluctantly agreed, then he asked for almost 4X the original number he agreed to. He is free to walk. (This isn’t about Bo Barnes).

This is just where agents and/or players are. From Texas’ vantage there are thousands of options in the portal. Texas will negotiate with terrorists but only to a certain point. And they will happily spend for stars, starters, and immediate depth.

3 minutes ago, Voluminous Banality said:

I mean, we have 1 junior LB on the roster and 3 freshmen, 2 of whom are lower-rated fliers. Even if we take a LB from the portal, is there not room on the roster for 3 contributors at the LB position? Is every player going to leave who isn't atop the depth chart at his position?

Barnes was a borderline 5 star HS player. Those guys generally have expectations of playing time. He didn't get it whether it was guys ahead of him or he simply he wasn't ready yet. Sark and Muschamp clearly felt the need to go get LB. The Wisconsin guy will be drafted and looks to be a high level LB. If you had to pick between him and Barnes, who do you pick? If you're Barnes, do you sit another year knowing a stud in Atkinson is on the way that is going to take reps and seeing how the staff is already looking for a starter? This stuff is going to happen in the portal era. Roster churning and guys leaving due to NIL or playing time is a problem for every team. I'd say Texas has been one of the few teams that has actually kept it's roster together. But yeah, if I were Barnes, I'd probably portal out too knowing I'm going to have limited playing time my sophomore year.

48 minutes ago, Hiphopopotamos said:

Bobby/Gerry mentioned yesterday that generally Texas isn’t looking for Portal guys from lower levels because they want guys ready to step in and play right away (why they also avoid players who have been injured). Trey Moore was an exception but a good example of a player that took more than half a season to adjust to the new level of competition.

29 minutes ago, satyanash said:

All this tells me is that Flood won't (or can't) scout very well.

Oregon picked up Isaiah World and Alex Harkey via the portal from Nevada and Texas State last offseason. World and Harkey are now their current starters at LT and RT, and the Ducks are in the CFP semifinals.

This is just lazy as fuck from Flood and the staff. Talent is talent, regardless of where they are coming from. I guess this is why the NFL only has players from the bluebood college programs. Oh wait....

From the results on the field to the shit I read about Flood, why the fuck does Sark keep this disphit around. Can you imagine Smart or Saban keeping dead weight on the staff because he's a buddy? Yes I know Flood was on Saban's staff, but if Flood had underproduced like he has this and last year, Saban would've already kicked his ass to the curb.

The Barnes thing has to be someone tampering with him, right? Definitely seems like he was in our plans for next year. Will be really interesting to see where he ends up.

7 minutes ago, warhorn8 said:

Seems like a major fuck up by us. I would be pissed too, borderline 5* and barely touch the field. Plays in a game and does fairly well and then all the talk is about bringing in a guy or two in front of you.

Why would you be pissed sitting behind an all American linebacker as a true freshman? He’s not transferring for lack of opportunity because he was more than likely in line to play a lot this upcoming season. He probably tried to strong arm the staff after the game (like Christian Clark is doing) and they didn’t come to an agreement.

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Charlie Williams (IT Mod who reported the Barnes transfer)

Bringing clarity to the Elijah BO Barnes situation:

Barnes intends to enter the portal. I'm told Texas tried to renegotiate the original HS deal based on 2026 expectations. Barnes was open to renegotiating, but the revised number from Texas was too big of a pay cut for his side. They didn’t see eye to eye and couldn’t align. This was a business decision.

Just now, tokamak said:

The Barnes thing has to be someone tampering with him, right? Definitely seems like he was in our plans for next year. Will be really interesting to see where he ends up.

If you aren't tampering in this period, you are going to get left the fuck behind. Sounds like we're doing our best to tamper and still not getting our top choices. Got to play the game.

3 minutes ago, UncleSonny said:

Tell me, what is our long storied history of letting big time prospects walk and missing out our primary targets as replacements?

And if your answer is “Wisner” or “Livingston”, don’t bother.

im not sure much longer this will remain true because we are in a new world, but historically near 0.

Buechelle and Gilbert - neither of which would have been successful here are pretty much the only 2 i can think of

Just now, Hookem2147 said:

Charlie Williams (IT Mod who reported the Barnes transfer)

Bringing clarity to the Elijah BO Barnes situation:

Barnes intends to enter the portal. I'm told Texas tried to renegotiate the original HS deal based on 2026 expectations. Barnes was open to renegotiating, but the revised number from Texas was too big of a pay cut for his side. They didn’t see eye to eye and couldn’t align. This was a business decision.

We are Temu Joneses. We don't have any more money than other programs.

2 minutes ago, victory88 said:

Barnes was a borderline 5 star HS player. Those guys generally have expectations of playing time. He didn't get it whether it was guys ahead of him or he simply he wasn't ready yet. Sark and Muschamp clearly felt the need to go get LB. The Wisconsin guy will be drafted and looks to be a high level LB. If you had to pick between him and Barnes, who do you pick?

I get it. We've gone through a similar thought exercise several times lately with other departures. Either there is a problem with retention or a problem with evaluations or both.

4 minutes ago, BurntEyes said:

Is the system broken or is Texas' system broken? I'm not being a smart ass nor sarcastic. Are these types of issues common at all the top universities. Is there negative press about Bo I don't know? I recall him being well regarded coming out of HS and don't recall issues since. So why is he shopping and why is that a system problem and not a Texas problem?

We aren’t the only school losing young talent that we want to keep.

We played him (even started a game as a freshman!) and surely have communicated that his role will continue to grow over the years. I guess someone offered him more money, but I can’t imagine that our offer was anything to sneeze at. I just have no idea how teams (any team, not just ours) are supposed to keep a roster of 100 players happy in this era. Again, I’m sure we will benefit more often than not in this structure, but holy shit anyone who volunteers to be a coach in this profession is a certifiable psychopath.

2 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

We are Temu Joneses. We don't have any more money than other programs.

Or it's simply they don't see the value in paying more for a player than they should. They could be flat wrong...they could be right.

This does not mean they're poor...just that they're not going to throw starting money at backups. right or wrong.

4 minutes ago, Hookem2147 said:

IT

Here’s where we’re at with agents:

One DT that Texas has had “some” interest in is asking for $900K. He’s a mid-rotation sort of guy. He has one offer for $600K and one for $500K. Wants $900K.

One guy at Texas agreed to one amount, then turned around and asked for a bigger number to which Texas reluctantly agreed, then he asked for almost 4X the original number he agreed to. He is free to walk. (This isn’t about Bo Barnes).

This is just where agents and/or players are. From Texas’ vantage there are thousands of options in the portal. Texas will negotiate with terrorists but only to a certain point. And they will happily spend for stars, starters, and immediate depth.

What a shitshow. Going to be interesting to see how many guys like this get left standing when the music stops on January 16, and how many of these “agents” are blacklisted by teams for this kind of behavior.

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10 minutes ago, victory88 said:

Goosby, a 3 star, is going to be a top 15 pick next year.

Cam Williams, a 3 star, was drafted after 1 year of starting.

Texas has had the most draft picks at OL in any time in our history in a short period of time and will have more and you want to run off the coach? Which OL coach has had more OL drafted in the last 5 years across college football? I bet the list will be very short.

Fine, let's review the OL that Flood/Sark have had drafted.

2024 - Christian Jones, OT, drafted in the fifth round. COVID super-senior Flood inherited from Herman.

2025 - Kelvin Banks, OT, drafted in round #1. Five-star, recruited by Flood and lived up to the billing (and then some).

2025 - Cam Williams, OT, drafted in round #6. Three-star, recruited by Flood, very up-and-down season in 2024 and probably bolted earlier than he should have.

2025 - Hayden Connor, OG, drafted in round #6. Another senior Flood inherited from Herman.

Flood has yet to actually develop one of his IOL recruits into an NFL drafted-player and that's a massive fucking problem. DJ Campbell is going to be his first this year, and despite being a consensus five-star blue-chip prospect, he's going to fall to the end of the draft. Flood's record of scouting and developing IOL has been massively disappointing and there's no way around it. He's run off our entire IOL haul from the 2024 class (Cruz and Kibble). He refused to play Neto, a four-star from the 2022 class, and turned the LG spot into an absolute clusterfuck by throwing in a mismash of Stroh (massive bust from the 2023 class) and Brooks (true freshman) before finally having to rely on Hutson and Robertson. Now they're all gone except for Brooks, and we have to desperately hope a very mediocre Robertson returns.

Yes, I want to 'run off' Flood. Any sane fan would. He's mismanaged the IOL to a horrific degree this year, and set the entire position group up for failure long-term.

Edited by satyanash

1 hour ago, Drew said:

Portal Pirate...really?

Might be a spelling error? "The Port Hole Pirate" seems to make a bit more sense.

10 minutes ago, ClubWhatever said:

In your scenario, how would this play out with a real GM?

Having set financial considerations for players by position and pedigree, clearly it’s all speculation and maybe they did that. If his motivation was matching Atkinson’s agreement, then that would be how to mitigate that issue better.

IT seems to be saying we wanted to give him a pay cut though, so it sounds like we didn’t care to keep him around.

4 minutes ago, Hookem2147 said:

Charlie Williams (IT Mod who reported the Barnes transfer)

Bringing clarity to the Elijah BO Barnes situation:

Barnes intends to enter the portal. I'm told Texas tried to renegotiate the original HS deal based on 2026 expectations. Barnes was open to renegotiating, but the revised number from Texas was too big of a pay cut for his side. They didn’t see eye to eye and couldn’t align. This was a business decision.

Lol this is crazy but not surprising based off how incompetent this staff is when it comes to negotiations

2 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

If you’re looking for guys that are okay being 3rd string and developing, you’re going to need to evaluate well at the HS level and add a few in every class. Goes don’t go into the portal to sit the bench somewhere.

Even the unheralded HS recruit ready to be developed is fraught with peril. Kibble just leveraged his time being “developed” at Texas into a payday at Baylor that was larger than his offer to stay.

You’re wishcasting with that starting 5. At this time, there’s no reason to assume Texas lands Brunner or Sprague.

Understood and I get that evaluating at the high school level each year is the preferred route for the developmental types. I guess I thought with the +25 or so scholarship limit increase that a school like Texas would contemplate adding in a few low risk (BC their NIL is low) high reward types (if you scout/recruit well) to fill those spots. I know we got a chunk of those with our high school recruiting this year and get that they are the most likely scenario for developing players.

1 minute ago, Drew said:

This does not mean they're poor...just that they're not going to throw starting money at backups. right or wrong.

The problem is we have to pay money for backups. So we have a known backup and what he can do and just cut him loose. Now we're going to have to pay someone unknown except on tape to play backup for the same price that we were willing to pay our own backup. Backups are spares which other programs are ok loosing. We just cast our dude aside to pick up a spare from another dude.

This shit is just stupid.

A paycut makes it in imply that they didn't see him getting meaningful playing time in 2026. Now, how do they know that at this point of the offseason and with the room depleted?

They better close on their targets

Should we refer to Clark as 4x from now on?

7 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

The constant self-loathing from our fanbase gets really old. What you’re inadvertently implying is that Texas might be the only school losing some guys that they’d like to keep and that is as far from reality as anything could be. It doesn’t always have to be “man, Texas sucks and everyone else is doing better” but that seems to a default position on this thread lately. It’s boring and tiring.

My take on this general point is less that this is only happening to us and more that it shouldn't be happening to us because we're Texas. We are better than other schools and shouldn't have to deal with the same bullshit. In other words, Texas is exceptional.

That's probably overstating my point a bit, but it does seem like we should be able to retain guys like Barnes while looking to fill out the position room.

6 minutes ago, Hookem2147 said:

IT

Here’s where we’re at with agents:

One DT that Texas has had “some” interest in is asking for $900K. He’s a mid-rotation sort of guy. He has one offer for $600K and one for $500K. Wants $900K.

One guy at Texas agreed to one amount, then turned around and asked for a bigger number to which Texas reluctantly agreed, then he asked for almost 4X the original number he agreed to. He is free to walk. (This isn’t about Bo Barnes).

This is just where agents and/or players are.
From Texas’ vantage there are thousands of options in the portal. Texas will negotiate with terrorists but only to a certain point. And they will happily spend for stars, starters, and immediate depth.

Anyone who does this can get fucked. But if there are "thousands of options in the portal," why have we only pulled a single one on offense? I get that there are another 10 days until the portal closes, but at some point this shit starts to feel like musical chairs. The song is ending and seats are filling up.

4 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

We are Temu Joneses. We don't have any more money than other programs.

C'mon now. You know this isn't true. Don't be a prisoner of the moment.

Perhaps Barnes is a casualty of a new DC for whatever reason? Either way, I'm interested to see if Muschamp is about to make a splash in the portal. The Rutgers CB seems like a very good start.

1 hour ago, The Dog said:

He did mention that there are four teams still playing, and I'd have to think that Ole Miss would be ripe for poaching with the situation there still in flux.

Why is Ole Miss in flux?

Pete Nakos just said the following on his livestream, re: Texas -

  • Trending to land Raleek Brown.

  • In the mix for Sprague.

  • Competing for Jaden Woods (Sumrall/ doing everything to get him back to Gainsville. Some other guy added later that Sumrall and other staff members went to Kansas and met w/ Woods in person. He thought the fact that Woods went to Texas and didn't commit, and is now meeting with Florida staff, is a big development.)

  • Sources in Austin - Longhorns definitely have confidence re: Coleman. (Coleman is expected at TT today; Bama expects him later this week. USC is out, having landed the NC State kid.) Coleman expected to decide in the next 7 days.

Edited by Getafix

1 minute ago, Atticus said:

Having set financial considerations for players by position and pedigree

This sounds good until the agent Uncle gets to the negotiating table with you.

The market is what the dumbest competitor is willing to pay or what the uncle demands his client gets. There are no set parameters in this sport right now.

1 minute ago, BlackCat said:

Perhaps Barnes is a casualty of a new DC for whatever reason? Either way, I'm interested to see if Muschamp is about to make a splash in the portal. The Rutgers CB seems like a very good start.

Just have to see where things settle. Bo Barnes is a great prospect but none of us know how good he is, and there are guys we could pay with a lot more skins on the wall. I think the portal is just going to wreck quality depth for teams like Texas that have blue chips on the 2 deep.

26 minutes ago, satyanash said:

OK at this point it’s getting fucking ridiculous. We had no linebackers for the citrus bowl so this dude is obviously played into a starter next year. What the fuck is the story here?

12 minutes ago, Hookem2147 said:

Charlie Williams (IT Mod who reported the Barnes transfer)

Bringing clarity to the Elijah BO Barnes situation:

Barnes intends to enter the portal. I'm told Texas tried to renegotiate the original HS deal based on 2026 expectations. Barnes was open to renegotiating, but the revised number from Texas was too big of a pay cut for his side. They didn’t see eye to eye and couldn’t align. This was a business decision.

So we offered him a pay cut? Or is that meant to say that the pay increase offered wasn't large enough.

3 minutes ago, deech said:

Should we refer to Clark as 4x from now on?

haha. They should let him walk.

2 minutes ago, Park Gothic said:

C'mon now. You know this isn't true. Don't be a prisoner of the moment.

Show me where we outspent for someone who everyone wanted? We aren't willing to do what it takes to land our main targets but don't have enough money to retain our backups and have to shopping for backups on the cheap.

okay fuck this i'm 15 pages behind and it's impossible to keep up with actual news

one thing is clear - the reorganization of college football is not going to be driven by the playoff structure

a day of reckoning is coming

will it be 64 that make it? 70? 96? 128?

not to steal mdmost's thunder and apologies if someone has posted this already but this shit is borked

The Hunt for Red October (1990) - Fred Thompson as Admiral Painter - IMDb

1 hour ago, Hiphopopotamos said:

Bobby/Gerry mentioned yesterday that generally Texas isn’t looking for Portal guys from lower levels because they want guys ready to step in and play right away (why they also avoid players who have been injured). Trey Moore was an exception but a good example of a player that took more than half a season to adjust to the new level of competition.

Actually stupid when you look across the country at portal players from lower divisions excelling

this is really making me appreciate Arch and how he is handling an everything (all his national NIL contracts obviously help)

how fucked are we when he is gone and need to pay market rate for a starting qb?

Edited by FORTY NINE TO ZERO

1 hour ago, Hiphopopotamos said:

Bobby/Gerry mentioned yesterday that generally Texas isn’t looking for Portal guys from lower levels because they want guys ready to step in and play right away (why they also avoid players who have been injured). Trey Moore was an exception but a good example of a player that took more than half a season to adjust to the new level of competition.

this is beyond stupid and extremely lazy, wreaks of zero scout abilities

1 hour ago, Newy25 said:

We currently have nine scholarship linemen including Robertson. Typically we are carrying 13-15 scholarship linemen. That means we need to retain Robertson plus land both guys we have an offer to plus sign two more players to get to 13.

Maybe in the portal era you can argue it’s more like a pro system and you carry less players at the position but 11 seems like a very low number for a pipeline of player development.

Also means we’re going to roll with dog shit Robertson as our center.

Maybe we should have kept a few of the OL guys that left around for depth? Or is their strategy really to run with one backup at every OL position next year with two being freshman? I don’t claim to know shit but if their plan is to enter next season with 10-11 OL that seems like a bad idea.

7 minutes ago, Dbeasy said:

Why is Ole Miss in flux?

I'm assuming Golding hasn't identified the offensive staff to replace the people Lane is stealing, and even if he has there will be players who would rather play elsewhere if they don't like who he's bringing in.

Just now, JohnnyTapia said:

Lol this is crazy but not surprising based off how incompetent this staff is when it comes to negotiations

I know our embarrassing 10 win season has most of you thinking about drinking bleach right now, but if that breakdown is correct how is it a sign of incompetent negotiating to you?

Seems like a player the staff likes ok, but don’t have a lot of confidence that he would help them win next season and they aren’t going to throw big money at guys with long-term development curves. That’s just how things work now, it’s a year to year proposition and his 2026 production can be replicated at a lower number.

22 minutes ago, BurntEyes said:

Is the system broken or is Texas' system broken? I'm not being a smart ass nor sarcastic. Are these types of issues common at all the top universities. Is there negative press about Bo I don't know? I recall him being well regarded coming out of HS and don't recall issues since. So why is he shopping and why is that a system problem and not a Texas problem?

Honestly, it certainly seems like the latter. While there are a lot of stupid aspects of the current college football landscape (portal dates, lack of true rule enforcement, etc.), the current landscape should benefit Texas. It does not appear that our personnel department (and certain members of the coaching staff) know how to take advantage of, let alone operate well, in this environment (as of this cycle, at least).

1 minute ago, Hook1997 said:

Maybe we should have kept a few of the OL guys that left around for depth? Or is their strategy really to run with one backup at every OL position next year with two being freshman? I don’t claim to know shit but if their plan is to enter next season with 10-11 OL that seems like a bad idea.

Texas should drop their nuts on Kansas and get Stroh back.

17 minutes ago, Hookem2147 said:

Charlie Williams (IT Mod who reported the Barnes transfer)

Bringing clarity to the Elijah BO Barnes situation:

Barnes intends to enter the portal. I'm told Texas tried to renegotiate the original HS deal based on 2026 expectations. Barnes was open to renegotiating, but the revised number from Texas was too big of a pay cut for his side. They didn’t see eye to eye and couldn’t align. This was a business decision.

They offered him a pay cut? And expected him to stay?!

My thoughts on whoever backed and presented that brilliant idea (Sark? Boom? Nansen? Harris?)

peter capaldi GIF

Edited by NoName

Just now, crash_davis said:

Show me where we outspent for someone who everyone wanted? We aren't willing to do what it takes to land our main targets but don't have enough money to retain our backups and have to shopping for backups on the cheap.

1) It happens all the time for HS recruits. Every cycle. Take your pick of any blue chips here: https://www.on3.com/college/texas-longhorns/football/2025/commits/. We outspent all competitors for these guys.

2) We haven't done it in the portal this cycle yet. There is still plenty of time. Cam Coleman is a very obvious example. Last cycle we pulled Kanu from OSU who they definitely wanted to keep, Watson who was a freshman AA and had other big suitors, and Endries who was a coveted TE.

I'm sympathetic with your frustrations, but your problem is with the coaches' strategy, not our checkbook.

4 minutes ago, Gene Parmesan said:

So we offered him a pay cut? Or is that meant to say that the pay increase offered wasn't large enough.

I read it as pay cut. To me it kind of feels like Muschamp watched some tape and decided that he wasn't a guy we have to have next year.

4 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

okay fuck this i'm 15 pages behind and it's impossible to keep up with actual news

Tip for whenever this happens: just scroll quickly looking for posts with orange borders. You won't miss anything important.

2 minutes ago, FORTY NINE TO ZERO said:

how fucked are we when he is gone and need to pay market rate for a starting qb?

Pretty fucked (as is everyone). QBs are the ultimate chaos. The money involved is like 2-3x any other position.

Just now, Constant said:

Texas should drop their nuts on Kansas and get Stroh back.

Fuck it, I could use some good news.

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