2026 ND Portal Targets

Rudy89

Rudy89

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rtrn2glory said:
This portal season is proof that it's best to just be playing these next two weeks. Prolly should use that strategy in the future
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A corrupt committee & their network business partner can’t have a boner for a team on the outs of their era of dominance & a hate boner for us unfortunately.
 
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IrishInOntario

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calvegas04 said:
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Lol, ridiculous troll take.

ND has had 15 players transfer out, but they also over signed in recruiting, taking a 29 man class in anticipation of "forcing" guys out by cutting their compensation down to extremely low levels. Cut throat, but it's what they felt they had to do to retain the top players and most of the key depth on their roster, while making room for studs in the 2026 class.

Think of who have transfered... how many of these 15 guys were likely to ever play meaningfully at ND with the way that Freeman recruits and the Portal can be used to augment talent...

QB: Anthony Rezac... No
RB: Gi'Bran Payne... No
WR: KK Smith... Maybe
WR: Scrap Richardson... No
DE: Josh Burnham... Yes
DE: Preston Zinter... No
DT: Armel Mukam... Maybe
LB: Bodie Kahoun... No
LB: Anthony Sacca... Maybe
S: Jadon Blair... Maybe
S: Ben Minich... No
S: Taebro Bennie-Powell... No
CB: Chance Tucker... No
CB: Cree Thomas... Maybe
CB: Karson Hobbs... No

I've got it as 1 "yes", 5 "maybe", and 9 "no".

We're only at 15, we can probably expect a few more. A tight end maybe? We have wayyyy too many offensive linemen, you have to think 2-3 of those guys are going to announce as well. 17-18 transfers maybe?

The truth is that ND needs some of these guys to transfer, because each one that does opens up practice reps for the higher upside guys and more importantly, the increments of $25,000-$50,000 that most of these guys were going to get in Rev Share can now be recycled to help pay signing bonuses for incoming recruits and can be used to augment the portal budget.

Welcome to pro sports, with hybrid college oriented recruiting model!
 
SDIrishFan

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NDPhilly said:
We have 29 signees for 2026, including ~22 4+ stars. 29 x 4 = 116 scholarships, so they are recruiting for attrition accordingly.
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True, but half those kids won’t be part of the team in two years with the current environment.
 
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IrishInOntario

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SDIrishFan said:
True, but half those kids won’t be part of the team in two years with the current environment.
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That's actually the plan. People that follow college ball and recruiting in general hate it, because they enjoy the attachment to the players and watching them sign with the program and grow inside it...

Here is the dirty truth though, directly from the mouth of a college football coach and former recruiting coordinator (I'm talking about myself). It's the same at all levels of college and pro football. We're not infallible (and don't even try to be) as recruiters and talent evaluators. We miss on guys all the time, then we get "stuck" with trying to develop a kid that we know has very little shot of helping the program win.

Under this model, you'll lose / "force out" a couple guys each year that you would have preferred to keep, but you also get rid of most of your "dead playing weight", enabling to you to open more roster spots, and bring in more talent... Rinse, repeat and recycle the kids through.
 
Irish#1

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stpeteirish said:
Pitt’s kicker went into the portal today.Wasn’t the first rumor that we had a deal with a kicker on an east coast team that we played?
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When did they move Pittsburgh to the east coast?
 
Dale

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A lot of these 3 star transfer outs with the 85 scholarship limit going away are basically a combination of lottery tickets (Scrap Richardson) + good program guys (Zinter) that function as pseudo walk ons to fill out your practices.

Cree Thomas is probably the only bummer if reports of Blair likely being a bit of a bust are correct.
 
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IrishInOntario

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Dale said:
A lot of these 3 star transfer outs with the 85 scholarship limit going away are basically a combination of lottery tickets (Scrap Richardson) + good program guys (Zinter) that function as pseudo walk ons to fill out your practices.
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Yep. Look at the 2025 class for example. 20/24 kids in that class are still on the roster as of today, including 6 of the top 7. The only top 200 guy they've had transfer is JaDon Blair and he got passed up as a freshman by Ethan Long, who was ranked below him.

ND is overwhelmingly keeping it's most talented guys and is cycling through the guys thay weren't likely to ever seriously play at ND. Certainly not on a team looking to compete for championships.
 
IrishSpartan

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seeing us so under the limit now, could this be just creating space for future recruiting?
 
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IrishInOntario

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IrishSpartan said:
seeing us so under the limit now, could this be just creating space for future recruiting?
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I actually think thay you'll see programs like ND actually stay well below the roster limit in the future (with the exception of maybe adding walk ons), and instead focus on quality. You can pay your front line guys more and your depth players more to stick around, when there are less guys to pay overall.

There is obviously a balance to strike here, but don't be surprised if ND and others schools that attract top talent take this route. You don't need to be 20 OL and 16 WR deep when you get the best guys and everyone on your roster can play.
 
NDpendent

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CanadalovesND said:
I'm very relieved that PutUp is not around. Could you imagine the crap he would have spewed.

His ban has been by far the most needed transfer.
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Did he ever end up hooking up with Dingle. Always seemed like he was interested in PIIHB
 
ACamp1900

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The only thing that really sticks with me and has me legit on panic mode is DT,… wtf is going on there? I don’t need to see 10 commits but it seems like something is lacking with response to that position. Couple that with how close it came this year and how close it can again next IF they can improve the d line and yeah,… all the other talk, excuses, spending philosophy bs is just that until they lock in and get some tackles,… that’s just where I’m at. I can usually ignore all this circus but damn, the stakes are much higher than usual here
 
Irishnuke

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IrishSpartan

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irishff1014 said:
I still think it hilarious that not a single reporter knows what is going on.
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Not going to lie Driskell current rant on ND PR is 100% correct. Whoever is in charge of sports marketing and social media needs to get canned. It’s obviously someone who does not understand the current climate and fanbase. The whole announcement or leak of the new staff today could not have come at a worse time. Makes the program look incompetent.
 
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