2023 Portal Discussion Thread

[Win4AU 4,055]

*As it stands today* I think Holden is Auburn’s starting Qb next season.  He’ll be a Junior with a full year of the offense under his belt.  Unless he is a generational talent it usually isn’t optimal to play a true freshman at Qb in the SEC and achieve success.  
 

Things that could change this:  Auburn signs a Qb starter with multiple years of eligibility, Auburn lands a can’t miss Qb transfer for 24, or Robbie gets his accuracy north of 40% completion(joke kind of….)

Edit to add by next year I mean 2024-2025 season.

Edited April 17, 2023 by Win4AU

[toddc 13,194]

 

[Gowebb11 9,492]

4 hours ago, ellitor said:

Or we could get a 1 and done 2 yers in a row if need be.

I hope we get away from that. I’m ready for AU to build our program on contender level sustainability, something we haven’t had since the 80s. I believe HF is suited to do that. 

[toddc 13,194]

Auburn offers ULM transfer OLB/edge Anthony Campbell

Jeffrey Lee

(Photo by Michael Wade/Icon Sportswire)

Auburn football on Monday extender an offer to Louisiana-Monroe transfer OLB/edge Anthony Campbell.

Campbell, who is from Bartow, Fla., announced the offer on Twitter.

Campbell entered the portal Monday morning and several schools were quick to offer. Purdue, West Virginia, Cal, North Texas and Auburn all offered within hours of him entering the portal.

Campbell played two seasons at ULM after transferring from Independence Community College. In 2022 at ULM, Campbell had 13 tackles, 7 solos and a sack.

He has two years of eligibility. 

Campbell is the third known transfer to receive an offer from Auburn. The Tigers also have offered two offensive lineman, Jaden Muskrat from Tulsa and Emmanuel Pregnon from Wyoming.

[AUwent 3,778]

7 hours ago, Zeek said:

We are really in a wait-and-see holding pattern right now. Just not a lot of information out there; additionally the portal isn't near as full as it has been at this point in previous seasons. SEC transfers are out of the discussion too considering they would have to sit a year and the staff wants instant-impact players.

 

Quarterback:

• We for sure are looking for a starting-caliber quarterback to become available. Allegedly, there was one from NCST we liked but some leaks and threats of tampering accusations may have killed that route. The names currently in the portal are not impressive.

Running Back:

• I don't think we'll pursue any RBs in the portal.

Wide Receiver:

• We would love to add three. A big outside threat, an inside speed-type, and an all-arounder for the other outside position.

Tight End:

• I don't think we are looking for another addition.

Offensive Tackle:

• Maybe if a depth piece arises but I don't think we see another tackle brought in for this group.

Interior Linemen:

• The staff would like 1-2 more interior offensive linemen. At least for depth, they would like to add some quality pieces. Jeremiah Wright and Tate are solid but injury-prone.

Edge/Jack:

• We would still like more talent here.

Defensive Line/End:

• I could see us taking 2-3 here if the right names appear.

Linebacker:

• Could see us taking one if the right name pops up.

Defensive Backs:

• Need depth at corner and ideally a better option at safety.

 

SMDH. Listen, meet recruiting goals come December and February and I can totally forgive things (currently average player rating 9th on On3, so looks like we're on track to do that). But not getting a QB through the portal is definitely a failure.

Edited April 17, 2023 by AUwent

[Gowebb11 9,492]

2 minutes ago, AUwent said:

SMDH. Listen, meet recruiting goals come December and February and I can totally forgive things. I am *not* calling for anyone's head. But no QB is definitely a failure.

No QB or no quality QB? I’m sure he can find another Grant Loy but that’s not going to help us. Freeze is recruiting as hard as any AU coach in my lifetime but he can’t force a QB to enter the portal or make them commit to us. 

[AUwent 3,778]

7 minutes ago, Gowebb11 said:

No QB or no quality QB? I’m sure he can find another Grant Loy but that’s not going to help us. Freeze is recruiting as hard as any AU coach in my lifetime but he can’t force a QB to enter the portal or make them commit to us. 

Just feels like we missed on a ton of QBs and well that's frustrating. Luckily, I'm not feeling like we need a big first season to sell recruits, which is exactly how I felt under Haskins.

Edited April 17, 2023 by AUwent

[augolf1716 21,476]

2 minutes ago, AUwent said:

Luckily, I'm not feeling like we need a big first season to sell recruits

Well now I feel better 

[JuscAUse! 1,516]

1 hour ago, AUwent said:

SMDH. Listen, meet recruiting goals come December and February and I can totally forgive things (currently average player rating 9th on On3, so looks like we're on track to do that). But not getting a QB through the portal is definitely a failure.

Ya think?

[yngwie1995 2,232]

1 hour ago, AUwent said:

Just feels like we missed on a ton of QBs and well that's frustrating. Luckily, I'm not feeling like we need a big first season to sell recruits, which is exactly how I felt under Haskins.

Yeah, that Haskins guy....

aka Mr Belding... he should steered AC Slater to Auburn that year. I'll never forgive him.

Edited April 18, 2023 by yngwie1995

[TeamZero77 1,790]

On 4/16/2023 at 9:39 PM, metafour said:

 

Most of the 1-year eligibility guys would have already transferred in the first window. Why would they wait till the spring to transfer if their intention was to transfer at all?

Nobody said that we were hunting for a 1 year eligibility guy in this second window. There are a few that may be out there, but it's not many.

The post-spring window at QB will be for guys who are in heated QB battles and lose (or appear to be trailing), or for a highly talented young backup at a top program who we think is better than everyone we currently have.

The delay here is that MOST schools either just played their spring game yesterday, or they haven't even played it yet. Our spring game actually occurred much earlier than most teams.  A QB isn't going to transfer out before they conclude the spring at their current school and find out where on the depth chart they sit.

This is all going to take lots of tampering, by the way. The kid from Texas who just showed out at their spring game (Maalik Murphy) is someone who would be an easy target, but it would require convincing him to leave. One of the roadblocks is that schools like Ohio State who have two hyped young guys competing will delay and stall the naming of their starter in the hope of keeping both guys there till the fall in an "open competition",  in which case it's now too late for whoever they plan to be the backup to leave and join  a new team.

Anyway, there is too much panic over nothing. Most teams are still not through spring. There are still several schools that have options that could/will become available. Finding a QB will require brokering interest before their guy is even  "in the portal".

I know that QB's with 1 year left would've been in the first portal instead of this portal. What I was talking about was a thread that we had on this board during the December portal. People were wondering why Devin Leary from NC State chose Kentucky over us and also why Sam Hartman from Wake Forest chose Notre Dame over us. I replied that players who have 1 year left are going to go where the O-Line and WR groups are really good because they're wanting to get to the NFL. Cam chose us over Miss. St. due to our O-Line being alot better. Russell Wilson chose Wisconsin over us because their O-Line was better. I said our O-Line is better but they still haven't gelled or played any snaps together and our transfers we got are players that played G-5 against lesser competition than SEC. And our WR group is average.

Thats where that came from.

Then, in that same thread during the first portal, I said that when our first game of the 2023 season gets here, TJ will still be on the roster and we wouldn't have a QB from the portal. I got trashed for saying that because Freeze, Montgomery and Austin are all QB whisperers and most everybody on this board thought transfer QB's would be lining up to come to Auburn and play for those 3 coaches. 

So that's the cliffsnotes version of that old thread from the December portal.

Edited April 18, 2023 by TeamZero77

[TeamZero77 1,790]

12 hours ago, metafour said:

Here is your actual timeline on Robby Ashford's career:

1) Was hyped 4-star QB at Hoover entering his SR year. Has a poor SR season and falls to 3-star as his final rating on most sites.
2) Was committed to Ole Miss prior to Kiffin being hired, ends up flipping to Oregon to be the 2nd QB in their class after the coaching change at Ole Miss (Kiffin didn't want him?)
3) Year 1 at Oregon: Plays baseball for ~20 games, quits to focus on football completely. ~#4 on their QB depth chart.
4) Year 2 at Oregon: Doesn't make much movement on their depth chart. Stuck at #3 or #4 on the depth chart. Opts to transfer.
5) Year 1 at Auburn: Loses fall camp battle to TJ Finley. Would have been #3 on the depth chart had Calzada not been injured.
6) Year 1 at Auburn: Pushed onto the field as the season collapses. Plays "hard", but not very well.
7) Year 1 at Auburn: Doesn't show much if any improvement game to game as the season progressed. In fact, after Harsin was fired they had to change the offense completely in order to work around his deficiencies. His completion percentage was actually WORSE in the 2nd half of the season.
8 ) Year 2 at Auburn: Shows some "improvement", but leaves Spring camp without being named the starter. Freeze and company are still searching for QB's in the Portal. Keep in mind, he has now been through 3-4 Spring Camp sessions and has not once been able to actually "win" the starting job. He is in year #4 of his NCAA career and is not even technically the starter here.

 

If you actually read the above timeline and think objectively, there is absolutely nothing in Ashford's resume to suggest that this is the makings of an actual worthwhile SEC starting QB.

Hope and prayer that he makes some sort of drastic improvement is all there is. But really, a QB who has been training for 3+ years already in college under multiple P5 coaching staffs is more or less developed by this point.
 

Have you heard anything about Robby Ashford dislocating a shoulder in 11th grade? Then the next year he had another pretty bad shoulder injury. We all know he played with a hurt shoulder most of last season. And a couple of weeks ago after a friday practice, Freeze said "Robby had his best day throwing the ball on monday. Then wednesday he told us coaches that his shoulder is bothering him again so he only threw a few passes. Then today (friday) his shoulder was hurting too bad so he didn't throw a single pass." 

An Auburn podcast was talking about all of Robby's shoulder injuries through the years and said that he has seemed injury prone in high school and college. His senior season at Hoover was 2019 and he played 6 games and missed 7 games because of the injury. 

[Mikey 16,779]

7 minutes ago, TeamZero77 said:

An Auburn podcast was talking about all of Robby's shoulder injuries through the years and said that he has seemed injury prone in high school and college. His senior season at Hoover was 2019 and he played 6 games and missed 7 games because of the injury. 

If he has chronic shoulder problems he and Auburn would be better off with him at slot receiver. The guy is going into his 4th year of college football. It might be time for him to adjust his goals.

[ellitor 33,141]

18 hours ago, NWALA Tiger said:

For continuity sake,  someone with 2 yrs would be better IMO.

Meh. Only if the staff sees him as similar or better talent wise.

[ellitor 33,141]

15 hours ago, Gowebb11 said:

I hope we get away from that. I’m ready for AU to build our program on contender level sustainability, something we haven’t had since the 80s. I believe HF is suited to do that. 

Long term yes. Short term you gotta do what you gotta do.

[ellitor 33,141]

14 hours ago, AUwent said:

But not getting a QB through the portal is definitely a failure.

@AUwent Can you please let the 2nd window close and our reporters and connected people say we aren't getting a transfer QB before jumping off a cliff? Thanks.

[ellitor 33,141]

13 hours ago, AUwent said:

Just feels like we missed on a ton of QBs and well that's frustrating

And you have been told countless times that's incorect.

[AUINSY 2,228]

10 hours ago, Mikey said:

If he has chronic shoulder problems he and Auburn would be better off with him at slot receiver. The guy is going into his 4th year of college football. It might be time for him to adjust his goals.

Yes to this. The dude’s very athletic and fast, he should turn his athleticism/speed into dollars any way he can. It doesn’t seem like it will be in the quarterback position. 

[NWALA Tiger 3,535]

I'm gonna predict that we won't sign QB this portal season. I'm not saying this to start an argument whether we should/shouldn't.  Unless TJ leaves then we make take a QB to add depth. RA will be your starter come Sept. Not saying it's good or bad but that's my prediction. And yes, Ellitor, I know the portal window is still open. Just making my prediction 

[toddc 13,194]

Auburn Daily Transfer Portal Tracker: Auburn offers transfer offensive lineman

Keep up to date with transfer portal departures, commitments, and prospects for Auburn football here.

Lance DaweApr 15, 2023 7:00 AM EDT

The final window of college football transfer portal action begins today.

The Auburn Tigers have pulled in an impressive haul thus far during Hugh Freeze's first season on the Plains, currently sitting at No. 3 nationally in 247Sports' transfer portal class rankings.

This is Auburn Daily's hub for all things happening through the spring portal window.

Here's all of Auburn's commitments through the portal during this spring window:

-

Here's a look at the departures in the spring window for Auburn football:

Jeffrey M'ba, DL

Bio: M'Ba had a short lived career with the Tigers, committing in December of 2021 to Bryan Harsin and his staff before essentially not playing the upcoming season. He struggled to crack the depth chart in his first season on the Plains after his time at Independence Community College, where he spent two seasons and collected 50 tackles and 15 TFL. Listed at 6-foot-6, 305 pounds, M'Ba appeared in nine total games last season with a PFF grade of 55.8 (albeit with a small sample size of only 82 snaps). Auburn credits him with 7 total tackles, one TFL, one sack, and one forced fumble.

Tar'varish Dawson, WR

Bio: Dawson record 30 receiving yards and 10 rushing yards during two seasons at Auburn. He leaves a crowded wide receiver room behind.

Here's all of Auburn's reported offers in the spring window:

Jaden Muskrat, OL, Tulsa

Bio: Muskrat tweeted that he has received an offer from Auburn. The obvious tie is that he spent time at Tulsa under now Auburn OC Philip Montgomery. He played 846 snaps at right tackle last season on the same line as Dillon Wade.

Here's all of Auburn's portal prospects in the spring window:

QB

Chance Nolan, Oregon State

Bio: Nolan is six feet two inch pro-style quarterback out of Menifee, California. He has been sitting in the portal since it opened originally in December of 2022. He has fifteen games as a starter under his belt, which is experience that would be welcomed on a lot of teams. He has thrown 270 completed passes over the last two years for over 3,000 yards. With that came 26 touchdowns to 18 interceptions and an average quarterback rating of around 140.

RB

None

WR

Blair Conwright, TCU

Bio: A former three-star wide receiver and a junior with the Horned Frogs, appeared in all 15 games for TCU in 2022. He caught five passes for 63 yards.

Over the course of his TCU career the 5-foot-10 Conwright caught 39 passes for 552 yards and three touchdowns with 257 of those yards coming in 2021.

Brenen Thompson, Texas

Bio: Thompson, a 5-foot-10, 165-pound freshman receiver from Spearman, Texas, appeared in nine games this season for the Longhorns. He only caught one pass for 32 yards vs Texas Tech. He's a former four-star and a top-75 prospect (top 130 on 247Sports' composite rankings).

TE

None

OL

Jaden Muskrat, Tulsa

Bio: Muskrat tweeted that he has received an offer from Auburn. The obvious tie is that he spent time at Tulsa under now Auburn OC Philip Montgomery. He played 846 snaps at right tackle last season on the same line as Dillon Wade. 

Caleb Etienne, Oklahoma State

Bio: A 6-foot-8, 310-pound behemoth offensive tackle, Etienne entered the transfer portal, on Friday afternoon. He started all 13 games for the Cowboys last season after transferring in from junior college.

DL

None

EDGE

Derrick Brown, Texas

Bio: A three-star prospect out of high school, Brown, At 6-foot-5 and 210 pounds, was ranked as the No. 83 recruit from the state of Texas and the No. 31 outside linebacker prospect in the country. He has elite speed for his size as well. The rumor is that this is not a playing time issue, he just wants to test the SEC waters.

LB

Jaheim Thomas, Cincinnati

Bio: Through three seasons with Cinci, Thomas collected 95 tackles, 7.0 tackles for loss, and 2.5 sacks. He appeared in all 13 games for Cincinnati in 2022 with a career-best 70 tackles on the season.

CB

None

S

Patrick McMorris, San Diego State

Bio: McMorris, a four-year player with the Aztecs, is coming off back-to-back first team All-Mountain West selections. Over his four seasons at SDSU, the 6-foot McMorris collected 162 tackles, 6.5 tackles for a loss, five interceptions, two fumble recoveries and deflected 20 passes.

 

[ken woolley 37]

Can we add someone from the portal after this portal season is over?  Once someone is in the portal isn’t he there even after this portal sign-up period is over?

[AuburnNTexas 7,215]

1 hour ago, NWALA Tiger said:

I'm gonna predict that we won't sign QB this portal season. I'm not saying this to start an argument whether we should/shouldn't.  Unless TJ leaves then we make take a QB to add depth. RA will be your starter come Sept. Not saying it's good or bad but that's my prediction. And yes, Ellitor, I know the portal window is still open. Just making my prediction 

I tend to agree with you.  I don't think it will be for lack of trying but the reason E gave for why we didn't get a QB in 1st group is due to average WR's and people not sure how good our O-Line will be as most came from smaller schools and have not played together. I think it will be a really solid O-line group but we have to be able to sell that a rebuilt and unproven O-line will protect a QB and that is a hard sell. Then on top of that we are competing for the few QB's people think might be good with other teams.  

So we really need at least one of our current QB's to improve enough to be a real game manager for this season. Whether that is a slight improvement on accuracy with RA and his legs or Geriner learning the system and winning with his arm. I don't think TJ will be here by fall camp.

😢

Edited April 18, 2023 by AuburnNTexas

[W.E.D 11,070]

15 hours ago, AUwent said:

Just feels like we missed on a ton of QBs and well that's frustrating.

I think it was more unfortunate than anything else.  Also, look where they landed.

1. McCall is bad at school & we got screwed.  He was our #1, would have been an elite pull.  I do wonder the lag between us getting his grades and focusing on him put us behind others.
2. Hartman went to Notre Dame.  The are objectively better than us in every way.  They are tailor made for a 1 year QB transfer
3. Leary.  Kentucky is producing a 1st round QB this year.  I'm not sure I buy the NIL excuse as we see we're desperate.  We'll see how he plays at Kentucky and if we were right or wrong on him not "being worth it".
4. Mordecai - Wisconsin with probably a more notable OC/HC than who we have.  he was on everyone's list from recruiting sites.  Some claim we didn't try, idk.  Maybe we were focused on McCall and got behind here.

Those were the home run guys.  Everyone else has risk of being average to hurt to some bad seasons.  I still will scream about Spencer Sanders (especially when he lit up the spring game) as being a huge mistake.  Everyone else, I think we'll have to see where we are after this window to judge if we should have taken someone ranked 6-15 to get average QB play.

We couldn't convince Duke/Tulane guys to jump.

We're a good school.  We have good coaches.  We did make our OL better...but that doesn't mean we were 100% going to get one of the top QBs when the competition was pretty strong.  We should have had one if he actually tried in school

Edited April 18, 2023 by W.E.D

[W.E.D 11,070]

1 hour ago, ken woolley said:

Can we add someone from the portal after this portal season is over?  Once someone is in the portal isn’t he there even after this portal sign-up period is over?

Yes.  4/15- 4/30 is to put their names in the portal.  They can commit anytime after that.

[W.E.D 11,070]

30 minutes ago, AuburnNTexas said:

why we didn't get a QB in 1st group is due to average WR's

I know we need more, but I don't think our WR group is a disaster.  Cam Brown is a #1 outside guy.  I think Koy Moore and Jar are good slot guys.  And if reports are true our TE will be a top receiving threat.  Omari Kelly looked decent as a TrFr last year.  King and Fair are wild cards.  not sure I heard much about Fair this spring