Florida Football: Are Gators becoming ‘Transfer Portal U’ under Dan Mullen?

After yet another player entered the NCAA Transfer Portal, it looks as if Florida football is earning the distinction of ‘Transfer Portal U’ under Dan Mullen.

The NCAA Transfer Portal has become a growing trend in college football these days. A few years ago, we’d hear about transfers and it’d be no big deal, but now that the portal has emerged, it seems like free agency is coming to the college scene.

Florida football knows all too well what the transfer portal has done to the sport. In fact, Dan Mullen and the Gators have been a breeding ground for players who’ve entered the portal this offseason.

In his second year as Florida head coach, Mullen has lost a handful of players to the transfer portal, including star freshmen Jalon Jones (word is that this was mutual) and Chris Steele. The latter was the top-ranked recruit in Florida’s 2019 recruiting class and he was vying for prominent playing time at cornerback, even spending time with the ones this spring.

Steele is now at Oregon and Jones chose Jackson State, making Mullen’s 2019 class look a little less elite. While that class has been losing some luster with transfers, the Gators as a team have been losing players left and right to the portal.

In fact, Kylan Johnson decided to transfer to Pitt this week and is eligible immediately and on Wednesday, Ryshad Jackson decided to enter the portal. That’s four prominent names that have left Florida just this spring, raising the question, “Are the Gators becoming ‘Transfer Portal U’?”

It’s a valid question, but this is something that’s going to become a trend all over college football with how easy it is to transfer now.

All the top teams will have their fair share of transfers and Florida is just going through its rough patch right now, adjusting to a new coaching staff and some of the upperclassmen aren’t getting the playing time they expected. It’s normal though the Steele-Jones drama was a different situation altogether.

Can we start calling Florida ‘Transfer Portal U’? Sure, it’s a good troll, but it’s not going to last and we’ll soon see other top programs go through rough stretches of losing 4-5 recruits in a short period of time. Florida will get over this soon enough.