Miami Football: Jarren Williams will be highly sought-after in transfer portal

Entering the transfer portal on Thursday afternoon, Miami football’s Jarren Williams will be one of the hottest commodities on the market.

Manny Diaz took a huge risk this week. The second-year head coach decided to host D’Eriq King for a visit to try and court the talented Houston-transfer knowing full well he could lose a quarterback, or two, to the NCAA transfer portal.

The fallout came sooner than expected as just days after King decided to commit to the Hurricanes, Miami lost Jarren Williams to the portal.

The former four-star recruit was once committed to Kentucky during his recruiting process and picked the Hurricanes in the end. He almost transferred during his true freshman season, but Brevin Jordan talked him out of it and he ended up winning the starting quarterback job for Miami in 2019 but inconsistencies forced him to split time with N’Kosi Perry.

Standing 6-2 and weighing about 210 pounds, Williams is a former top-100 recruit from the 2018 class who was supposed to be ‘the next guy’ for Miami. That clearly didn’t happen.

But that doesn’t mean it can’t happen for someone else. He has a strong arm and has a year of starting experience under his belt, so there will be teams lining up for his services. He passed for 2,187 yards and 19 touchdowns with seven picks and a 61 percent completion rate in 2019, showing that he can be a more than adequate starting quarterback in the Power Five.

If you’re a team that will be looking for a quarterback either this season or next (depending on a potential waiver for immediate eligibility), you have to give Williams a look.

Diaz took a risk on a guy who could help now and he ended up losing the potential quarterback of the future, but it could pay major dividends in 2020. Who will start when King leaves? That quarterback may not be on the roster yet.