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How SMU scouts are preparing for college football’s unpredictable transfer portal

Alex Brown and his Elite Eight have 45 days to find gems in a portal that’s expected to be filled by thousands of players.

UNIVERSITY PARK — For the first time, the transfer portal — the landscape often referred to as college football’s “Wild, Wild West” — has some barriers.

Starting Monday, the portal will open for 45 days, giving FBS players their only chance to enter. FCS players were given that ability a week prior. Graduate transfers can enter the portal at any time.

Like any new development in college football, there are bound to be repercussions — both foretold and unforeseen.

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“I don’t think anybody has any idea,” SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee said with a chuckle when asked what he expects Monday.

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But teams like SMU can be prepared. That’s where director of scouting Alex Brown comes in. If the transfer portal is a gold mine, then consider Brown and his team the prospectors, searching for gems inside a portal that’s expected to be filled by thousands of players.

SMU director of scouting Alex Brown.
SMU director of scouting Alex Brown.(Courtesy: SMU)

This offseason is a pivotal one for Lashlee and the Mustangs. The transfer portal is the college equivalent to NFL free agency. For a team like SMU — a Group of Five program that believes it’s uniquely positioned to acquire Power Five bouncebacks — it’s an opportunity it can’t afford to miss, either by ill-preparation or poor decisions.

The latter remains to be seen, but the groundwork to avoid the former was laid a long time ago on the Hilltop.

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“If you are not already working on it to a degree, then you’re behind,” SMU offensive coordinator Casey Woods said.

Before Brown got into college athletics, he worked at Optimum Scouting, a football scouting consulting company. There, he was in charge of scouting everything from the Southeastern Conference to the Southland Conference to every Division III and NAIA school in Texas.

With so much ground to cover, he needed a system. So he developed a database to track players. In his previous roles as a recruiting staff member at Houston and a director of recruiting at Rice, he didn’t rely heavily on his Optimum Scouting experiences, but in his latest role — as director of scouting and miner of the transfer portal — he had to, especially with the NCAA moving to transfer portal windows for the first time. Before this cycle, the portal was constantly open.

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“That was a big adjustment this summer,” Brown said regarding database creation and a shift back to his scouting days. “We really did a ton of work from the spring through the summer to get us ready for fall, and I don’t think it can happen overnight. Like, I think it’s something you have to have the manpower for.”

At SMU, Brown has it. He half-jokingly referred to his team of assistants as the “Elite Eight” as both a reflection of their quantity and their quality. They assist Brown in making up all aspects of his transfer portal databases: from plugging in numbers to watching film to creating data-driven models.

The database is where the preparation for the opening of the transfer portal has to begin, and Brown says he couldn’t do half the work without his team.

“I think it’s important to start with the big picture in mind and then get granular as you get into it,” Brown said of the strategy behind preparing for the transfer portal opening. “Don’t lose the forest for the trees early on, because then you can adapt as you see things actually working for you.”

SMU director of scouting Alex Brown (back middle left) seen here with his "Elight Eight"...
SMU director of scouting Alex Brown (back middle left) seen here with his "Elight Eight" after SMU's 34-31 win over Memphis on Nov. 27, 2022. Back L-R: (Madison Levy, Grant Hizer, Brown, Dillon Toole, Matthew Suero, Matt Gaynor, Brad Jones) Front L-R (Bryan Filker, Jeremiah Wait)(Courtesy: Alex Brown)

And the adaptation never stops. Brown said being on top of the transfer portal is a race that’s never finished. It’s alive and constantly changing. Therefore, it has a pulse. Brown and his team have to have a feel for the pulse at all times, especially at this point.

“You’re always on your phone,” Brown said, “and I told my wife just let me get to signing day and it’ll slow down.”

Because right now — and for the next month or so with the transfer portal and high school’s early signing period starting on Dec. 21 — is when the preparation turns into decision-making. Brown, knowing what Lashlee and the position coaches are looking for, has to be quick with his scouting evaluations.

Akin to the NFL draft or free agency, Brown and his assistants have sorted potential transfer portal entrants, along with the FCS and graduate transfers already inside, into different tiers. Without getting into specifics, there are players they would take without a doubt, players they’re comfortable taking, players they would take if other circumstances fell a certain way, and players they don’t see as a fit at SMU.

For simplicity’s sake, it all comes back to one question: Why is that player leaving his school and why would he make SMU better?

Brown has to answer that question the moment a player enters the portal. Come Monday, when the portal opens, that question will pertain to hundreds of potential players.

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“As it happens in real time, day to day. Time is critical and you have to be quick to it,” Lashlee said. “Because, while there’s a month until school starts, there’s only about a two-to-three-week cycle that they can visit your campus. And during that time, you’re also going to be preparing for a bowl game. So there’s a lot going on.”

The work has already turned up a notch. SMU has already made offers to at least a handful of players who entered the portal as graduate transfers or played at the FCS level last year. In Brown’s database, those players were ranked in the higher tiers of whom they would consider taking. While Brown was being interviewed for this story, he had a knock on the door. News made it to Brown’s office that one of those players was expressing interest in transferring to SMU.

Monday, however, should be a whole different ballgame. SMU’s position coaches — key to SMU’s transfer recruiting efforts — will be prepared to travel from Dallas and visit players in the portal whom the Mustangs highly covet.

What exactly happens in the coming weeks, in terms of how the transfer portal plays out, remains to be seen. But because SMU was proactive, the Mustangs believe they can be reactive, as well.

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“We’re going to be in position to go and attack those guys, if that’s the case,” Brown said of players entering the portal. “And you have to be out in front of it and be the first one to see these dudes, especially in this contact period. We’re all going after the same guys.”

On Twitter: @JoeJHoyt

Key dates

Here are a look at some important dates regarding college player acquisition. Note: the 45-day transfer portal window is a time for players to enter. Once in, the players can sign and enroll with schools well after it closes. The window is the only chance nongraduate players have to enter.

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Transfer portal open: Dec. 5

Transfer portal closes: Jan. 18

NCAA contact period: Dec. 2-18

NCAA dead period: Dec. 19-Jan. 3

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Transfers allowed to visit schools during NCAA quiet period: Jan. 4-8

Early national signing period: Dec. 21-23

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