UW Couch Sales & Purchases (Portal Tracker)
Comments
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Every player that enters into the portal is doing so for their own reason and it isn't the same for everybody
The Butler story is well known with his daughter … if he made a decision that he wanted to be closer to his family that is one that can and should be respected. Life happens.
Henning is a player that 10-20 years ago goes into the offseason as part of an open competition at C and likely has a great shot at winning that competition. In today's world you don't need to have the risk of competition and you can just go somewhere else where you walk in as a starter. Your judgment on whether that's a good or bad thing in the bigger picture.
RVB is a guy that ideally you'd like to see at UW to see his progression but it's hard to view this as a surprise given that the last 2 flips we had at the end of the cycle were WRs so something had to be known somewhere and I doubt that this was a surprise. While I thought he had a solid true freshman year I'm not 100% sure that he's not a bit of an overlap with Roebuck and if you're looking at those players playing similar spots it is clear who you should prioritize.
Mohammad let's wait to see where he lands before making any big judgments. This idea that he's starting at UW next year is a bit of a question to me … best case scenario he was probably going to be a 1A or 1B with Bonner with a good chance that Bonner took the job over the back half of the year. What's the number that Mohammad was looking for? Does it fit with his planned usage? I'll never blame a RB looking to get paid given their shorter career spans compared to other positions. One thing I haven't seen mentioned … if Mohammad was to enter the portal after the Wisconsin, what would the response by the fanbase been? I don't think anybody would have lost any sleep over it.
In today's world of college football, if you don't have unlimited NIL sources to pay everybody then you need to be smart at who you are and who you are not paying. You pay your stars and impact players that influence the outcome of games. You don't pay top dollar for guys that you can conceivably replace with another player. I don't see anybody that has entered the portal for UW (to date) that I'd consider to be irreplaceable for 2026.
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At least regarding UW and outside of a perfect storm like DeBoer leaving, the majority of Husky recruits spend / will spend 4 or 5 seasons on Montlake and most of the transfers who come in won't transfer to another school.
Outside of a few guys who left / are leaving for bigger bags, most of the players who have portaled left for more playing time at a lesser school.
Also, it is a rare for a local / WA guy who is a starter to leave going forward. G. Hatchett left after DeBoer left and then came back. Landon Hatchett has stayed, so has Boston (could have left), Jacob Lane, etc etc.
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The only way I could kind of see it is those power SEC schools seemed to at least used to love those big straight line backs to run behind dominant OLs where they don't need some dynamic RB.
More likely to me is:
- Knowing agents they love to throw out lofty shit based on a fragment of interest and it's in their interest to get a kid in the portal because that fuels more money. So, "jump in the portal," Georgia is interested, then instead they just leverage UW against some school like Arizona to get the most money as possible out of the situation.
- Growing up I remember some kids that got recruiting letters from big schools like Michigan State or USC and then they went around telling everyone they were going to those schools when really not even half a tire was kicked by those programs.
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Since I am curious, I have been looking around. There have been a few people posting in various places claiming that Mohammed wanted to transfer out last spring (discussed here) but there would've been financial penalties given he signed a 2-year NIL deal out of HS (that had crossed my mind). So he finished out the season before entering the portal, like any pro player would who had 1 year left on his deal yet wanted to move on. If that is all accurate, then it remains to be seen if his issue was primarily with UW /Seattle itself, the scheme, the coaching staff, an agent in his ear, or some combo but it does suggest this isn't just a case of UW not being willing to increase its bag offer.
Regardless, RB is one of (if not the) easiest positions to fill in the portal or with good internal options. The top 4 RBs (Washington, Bonner, Carr, and McMahon) could definitely get to 30+ touches per game amongst them. Bonner could be up to 200 lbs by next September.
