Outside of the service academies, the Clemson Tigers were the only program in FBS college football not to bring in a single player through the transfer portal, which is a pretty controversial decision in modern college football. And Dabo Swinney defended that decision this week.
During a recent appearance on ACC PM, Dabo Swinney offered his reaction to Clemson not taking a single player in the transfer portal, explaining that they like the players they currently have and that “every player is technically a transfer” since they get them from college.
“It wasn’t really necessarily like an intentional thing,” Swinney said on ACC PM according to On3. “There’s a couple of guys we looked at but you know, they gotta love you too … And honestly, every player is technically a transfer. You know, we just signed a whole class of guys that transferred from high school. So we like our guys, we like our starters. We look at every position and we say, okay, coach you’re getting to get you know, two corners. You want a transfer? No, sir. I like my guys. Here’s the guys in recruiting and you know, so there’s a lot that goes into it.”
Swinney has seemed to actively avoid using the transfer portal throughout his time as the head coach of the Tigers. We’ll have to see how it works out for him and the Tigers.
