The transfer portal and NIL has completely remade college athletics in almost no time at all. But while SportsCenter anchor Scott Van Pelt is happy that players are finally getting more compensation, he still has an issue with how it’s all operating in an ungoverned way.
While there are some voices saying that the portal and NIL are killing March Madness and harming college athletics, the numbers show that it couldn’t be further from the truth. We literally just witnessed the most watched NCAA Tournament opening weekend in decades and college football is more popular than it has ever been.
But the NCAA is seeing these sports succeed in spite of itself. Look no further than the nonsensical reality that the college basketball transfer portal is open in the middle of the NCAA Tournament.
Everyone agrees that makes absolutely no sense, but on Tuesday night’s SportsCenter live from the TGL final, Scott Van Pelt went a step further talking about the portal itself and how every college player is a free agent every year in building off Tom Izzo’s press conference rant when he was asked about it following Michigan State advancing to the Sweet 16.
The portal opening while the tourney is still going makes zero sense. pic.twitter.com/QQChzZ9nzT
— Stanford Steve (@StanfordSteve82) March 26, 2025
“Any time this is brought up people stop listening to what I’m saying, and they say ‘you’re anti player making any money.’ No, no, I’m not,” Van Pelt said. “I am anti every single player on every single team being a free agent every single year. It does not exist anywhere in professional sports, but it does in big time college football and college basketball, sports which are fueled by unrivaled passion. And now boosters who can legally funnel that passion directly to players has created an arms race without a governor of any kind.”
“And the number of players who enter the portal, it’s a huge number, but it’s almost inconsequential. Because in a sense everyone is. Because they can be. And they’re going to be in the portal again next March. How does that make any sense to anybody” Van Pelt asked.
One of the reasons why Scott Van Pelt’s work is so appreciated is because he’s able to find some common sense middle ground in complicated topics that are easily drowned out by sides rushing to the extremes. If you would ask most sports fans, they would probably be in agreement that players deserve to be better compensated but that there is an uncomfortable amount of movement in the transfer portal. This graphic went viral on social media showing that where Sweet 16 team players started their college basketball careers is unrecognizable compared to who they play for now.
Where every Sweet 16 Team’s Starting-5 began playing college basketball.
(Try to figure out which teams are which) pic.twitter.com/MPomf1dyuT— NCAA Buzzer Beaters & Game Winners (@NCAABuzzerBters) March 25, 2025
Of course there should be freedom of movement for players as there are for coaches and everyone else. We don’t need to return to the dark ages of college sports. But the transfer portal is truly the wild west right now and pretty much everyone is a free agent every year.
If the NCAA can’t even get the basics of scheduling to make sense, there’s little hope for figuring out such transformational issues like revenue sharing or an actual governable system for paying players and allowing players to freely transfer within reason. Surely there is a better way forward, but seeing it come to fruition anytime soon seems like wishful thinking.
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