Nick Saban might not like the transfer portal rules, but he’s mastered them
TYLER SISKEY WANTS to be clear: He doesn’t think Alabama coach Nick Saban is hypocritical when he says something is bad for college football and then goes out and does the exact thing he was complaining about. Siskey, who worked for Saban in his player personnel department from 2013 to ’14, knows his former boss to be a pragmatic man.
So when Saban raised a red flag about the unintended consequences of the transfer portal back in 2019, Siskey heard genuine concern for the state of the sport. Parity might be a myth in the modern NCAA, but it’s a myth Saban holds dear. And the portal, to Saban’s way of thinking, threatens the notion of competitive balance because it allows programs to poach players from struggling teams.
“So is that going to make the rich get richer?” Saban asked reporters during a news conference last year. “I don’t know.”
To Siskey and those connected to Alabama over the past decade, Saban’s question doubled as a warning — one he’d heard before.
“He’s telling you the truth about this not being a good thing,” Siskey said. “But he’s got the rules and he’s going to follow them.”
What’s more, Siskey added, Saban is adept at turning rules into an advantage.
“You know, he didn’t like spread offenses, either,” Siskey continued. “But you see what they’ve done.”
Saban once looked at the proliferation of spread offenses — with their quick tempo and offensive linemen running downfield — and asked, “Is this what we want football to be?” He was roundly mocked at the time. But then he went out and hired Lane Kiffin as offensive coordinator and told him to put his foot on the gas. Almost overnight, Alabama started producing some of the most dynamic offenses in college football.
“If that’s how the game’s going to be played,” Siskey said, “he’s going to play it.”
And he’s probably going to play it better than anyone. While Saban might dislike what the portal is doing to college football, that didn’t stop him from mastering it this past offseason, using it like NFL free agency but without a pesky salary cap. Forget taking unproven talent or drafting from the lower levels of football. He aimed higher.
When offensive tackle Evan Neal, running back Brian Robinson Jr., cornerback Josh Jobe and receivers John Metchie and Jameson Williams left via the NFL draft after last season, Alabama replaced them with proven Power 5 players. It signed offensive tackle Tyler Steen, who started 33 consecutive games at Vanderbilt; running back Jahmyr Gibbs, an All-ACC selection at three different positions at Georgia Tech; cornerback Eli Ricks, a former top-50 prospect and All-American at LSU; and wide receivers Jermaine Burton and Tyler Harrell, starters and high-level producers at Georgia and Louisville, respectively.
Siskey laughs at the absurdity of such a haul. Gibbs is playing his way into Heisman Trophy consideration after racking up 206 yards and two touchdowns against Arkansas last Saturday.
“Saban’s the best at what he does for a reason, right?” Siskey said.
A COLLEGE HEAD coach in the Southeast leans back in his chair and points to a cell phone sitting face up on his desk. Every day, he says, he gets calls on behalf of college players around the country — from former high school coaches, from trainers, from so-called mentors. He recounts the gist of every conversation: “Hey, So and So isn’t happy there.”
It’s the first month of the college football season, the transfer window is closed to non-graduates, but players are already shopping outside the portal for potential destinations. The coach says there are all these “underground connections” that lead to players’ next schools. “How tangled up that is, you go, ‘Whoa,'” he says.
Take Alabama. Steen went to the same high school in South Florida as safety Jordan Battle and outside linebacker Dallas Turner. Burton knew quarterback Bryce Young from California. Ricks played with Young at Mater Dei High School.
Gibbs, it turns out, was originally recruited by Alabama out of Dalton High School in Georgia. He was also offered a scholarship and recruited by North Carolina running backs coach Robert Gillespie, who joined the Alabama staff in 2021.
A Georgia Tech source said the staff was deflated when it learned that Gibbs — the team’s most talented player — was planning to leave. But they didn’t get the sense he was entering the portal for money via name, image and likeness opportunities. “The kid just wanted to win,” the source said.
But that same source said the transfer landscape is changing and growing more “out of control” with personnel departments keeping lists of potential transfer targets with geographical or personal connections to the team.
Less than two years ago, when the NCAA allowed players to transfer once with immediate eligibility and the portal exploded with activity, coaches were worried about what’s known in basketball as transferring up: players moving from Division II to Division I or from the Group of 5 to the Power 5. But blue bloods like Alabama are showing movement can happen at the highest levels, too.
Jordan Addison won the Biletnikoff Award at Pitt and entered the portal in May. He and Bryce Young worked out in California while he was in transfer limbo. Alabama even made overtures about bringing him to Tuscaloosa, sources said, but it never got far because he was intent on joining USC and its new coach Lincoln Riley.
Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi wasn’t happy with Riley for how the Addison saga unfolded. But Narduzzi was hardly alone in questioning the transfer process. Louisville coach Scott Satterfield suggested to 247Sports that Harrell was tampered with after he left for Alabama; Saban denied any wrongdoing.
A Power 5 assistant said the game has changed. “The whole goal of the postgame handshake,” he said, “is to start recruiting the other team.”
The paranoia is real, and quick commitments after a player enters the portal further fuel speculation.
On Jan. 10, Alabama lost to Georgia in the national championship game. Eight days later, Burton entered the portal. And four days after that, he announced he was joining Alabama.
In February, Saban addressed his use of the portal. He said that Burton “had some production this year” at Georgia.
Then he paused and shrugged.
Burton had 26 catches for 497 yards yards and 5 touchdowns.
“But [he] probably might have seen a better opportunity because we’re a little more wide open and throw the ball more with a good quarterback,” Saban added. “That may have been his intention.”
When Burton finally did speak to reporters this summer, he said he had moved on from Georgia and the championship.
“I honestly forgot about that game. I want to win with this team.”
LAST YEAR, MISSOURI coach Eliah Drinkwitz tried to peer into the future.
“We’re about two steps into a mile race,” he said of the transfer portal, “and I don’t think anyone knows the pace and I don’t think anyone knows the strategy and I don’t think anyone knows what the rules will be when this ends.”
Long story short: No one knows, or at least no one has settled on what’s the right thing to do.
The NCAA established windows of transfer activity in August, but that’s just a way of damming a river and pretending there’s not pressure building up on the other side. Because there most certainly is.
Strategies have varied wildly from one school to another. Georgia didn’t take a single transfer this offseason. Ole Miss took more than a dozen.
Siskey, who also spent time on staffs at Ole Miss and Arkansas State, expects Alabama to continue to be selective. “They don’t have to stretch for a guy in the portal,” he said, because Saban and his staff recruit high schools at such a high level; the Tide have finished in the top three of ESPN’s class rankings every year since 2008. Schools similarly flush with four- and five-star prospects — Ohio State, Clemson and the like — can instead use the portal as a supplement, filling gaps when a player leaves early for the NFL draft.
Leaning on the free agency analogy, Siskey said there are most often two motivating factors when it comes to players signing their next contracts: money and the ability to win a championship.
At Alabama, he said, there’s no need to sacrifice one for the other.
The Crimson Tide have won six national championships since 2009. No other team has won more than two during that time.
NIL, Saban said, is “not an issue for us.” He claimed players earned more than $3 million in name, image and likeness deals last season.
Siskey pointed to future earnings as another metric. This April, Saban claimed Alabama players have earned $1.7 billion in the NFL.
Steen got his degree from Vanderbilt and said he was looking for something new when he decided to transfer after last season.
And while adjusting to a new playbook, a new locker room and a new culture at Alabama isn’t easy, it appears to have been a successful transition. He has started every game at left tackle.
Steen said he has embraced the “different expectations” at his new home and how many people push him to reach his full potential.
“It’s different over here for sure.”
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Jesse Rogers
The last-place Washington Nationals fired president of baseball operations Mike Rizzo and manager Davey Martinez, the team announced Sunday.
Rizzo, 64, and Martinez, 60, won a World Series with the Nationals in 2019, but the team has floundered in recent years. This season, the Nationals are 37-53 and stuck at the bottom of the National League East after getting swept by the Boston Red Sox this weekend at home. Washington hasn’t finished higher than fourth in the division since winning the World Series.
“On behalf of our family and the Washington Nationals organization, I first and foremost want to thank Mike and Davey for their contributions to our franchise and our city,” principal owner Mark Lerner said in a statement. “Our family is eternally grateful for their years of dedication to the organization, including their roles in bringing a World Series trophy to Washington, D.C.
“While we are appreciative of their past successes, the on-field performance has not been where we or our fans expect it to be. This is a pivotal time for our club, and we believe a fresh approach and new energy is the best course of action for our team moving forward.”
Mike DeBartolo, the club’s senior vice president and assistant general manager, was named interim GM on Sunday night. DeBartolo will oversee all aspects of baseball operations, including the MLB draft. An announcement will be made on the interim manager Monday, a day before the club begins a series against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Rizzo has been the top decision-maker in Washington since 2013, and Martinez has been on board since 2018. Under Rizzo’s leadership, the team made the postseason four times: in 2014, 2016, 2017 and 2019. The latter season was Martinez’s lone playoff appearance.
“When our family assumed control of the team, nearly 20 years ago, Mike was the first hire we made,” Lerner said. “Over two decades, he was with us as we went from a fledging team in a new city to World Series champion. Mike helped make us who we are as an organization, and we’re so thankful to him for his hard work and dedication — not just on the field and in the front office, but in the community as well.”
The Nationals are in the midst of a rebuild that has moved slower than expected, though the team didn’t augment its young core much during the winter. Led by All-Stars James Wood and MacKenzie Gore, Washington has the second-youngest group of hitters in MLB and the sixth-youngest pitching staff.
The team lost 11 straight games in a forgettable stretch last month. And during a 2-10 run in June, Washington averaged just 2.5 runs. Since June 1, the Nationals have scored one run or been shut out seven times. In Sunday’s 6-4 loss to Boston, they left 15 runners on base.
There was industry speculation over the winter that the Nationals would spend money on free agents for the first time in several years, but that never materialized. Instead, the team made minor moves, signing free agents Josh Bell and Michael Soroka, trading for first baseman Nathaniel Lowe and re-signing closer Kyle Finnegan. Now, the hope is a new management team, both on and off the field, can help change the franchise’s fortunes.
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David Schoenfield
The rosters for the 2025 MLB All-Star Game will feature 19 first-timers — and one legend — as the pitchers and reserves were announced Sunday for the July 15 contest at Truist Park in Atlanta.
Los Angeles Dodgers left-hander Clayton Kershaw, a three-time Cy Young Award winner who made his first All-Star team in 2011, was named to his 11th National League roster as a special commissioner’s selection.
Kershaw, who became only the fourth left-hander to amass 3,000 career strikeouts, is 4-0 with a 3.43 ERA in nine starts after beginning the season on the injured list. He joins Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrera as a legend choice, after the pair of sluggers were selected in 2022.
Kershaw said he didn’t want to discuss the selection Sunday.
Among the first-time All-Stars announced Sunday: Dodgers teammate Yoshinobu Yamamoto; Washington Nationals outfielder James Wood and left-hander MacKenzie Gore; Houston Astros ace Hunter Brown and shortstop Jeremy Pena; and Chicago Cubs 34-year-old left-hander Matthew Boyd.
“It’ll just be cool being around some of the best players in the game,” Wood said.
First-time All-Stars previously elected to start by the fans include Seattle Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh, Athletics shortstop Jacob Wilson, Baltimore Orioles designated hitter Ryan O’Hearn and Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong.
Overall, the 19 first-time All-Stars is a drop from the 32 first-time selections on the initial rosters in 2024.
Kershaw would be the sentimental choice to start for the National League, although Pittsburgh Pirates ace Paul Skenes, who leads NL pitchers in ERA and WAR, might be in line to start his second straight contest. Philadelphia Phillies right-hander Zack Wheeler, a three-time All-Star, is 9-3 with a 2.17 ERA after Sunday’s complete-game victory and also would be a strong candidate to start.
“I think it would be stupid to say no to that. It’s a pretty cool opportunity,” Skenes said about the possibility of being asked to start by Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “I didn’t make plans over the All-Star break or anything. So, yeah, I’m super stoked.”
Kershaw has made one All-Star start in his career, in 2022 at Dodger Stadium.
Among standout players not selected were New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto, who signed a $765 million contract as a free agent in the offseason, and Dodgers shortstop Mookie Betts, who had made eight consecutive All-Star rosters since 2016.
Soto got off to a slow start but was the National League Player of the Month in June and entered Sunday ranked sixth in the NL in WAR among position players while ranking second in OBP, eighth in OPS and third in runs scored.
The players vote for the reserves at each position and selected Wood, Corbin Carroll of the Arizona Diamondbacks and Fernando Tatis Jr. of the San Diego Padres as the backup outfielders. Kyle Stowers also made it as a backup outfielder as the representative for the Miami Marlins.
Unless Soto later is added as an injury replacement, he’ll miss his first All-Star Game since his first full season in 2019.
The Dodgers lead all teams with five representatives: Kershaw, Yamamoto and starters Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman and Will Smith. The AL-leading Detroit Tigers (57-34) and Mariners have four each.
Tigers ace Tarik Skubal will join AL starters Riley Greene, Gleyber Torres and Javier Baez, while Raleigh, the AL’s starting catcher, will be joined by Seattle teammates Bryan Woo, Andres Munoz and Julio Rodriguez.
Earning his fifth career selection but first since 2021 is Texas Rangers righty Jacob deGrom, who is finally healthy after making only nine starts in his first two seasons with the Rangers and is 9-2 with a 2.13 ERA. He has never started an All-Star Game, although Skubal or Brown would be the favorite to start for the AL.
The hometown Braves will have three All-Stars in Acuna, pitcher Chris Sale (his ninth selection, tied with Freeman for the second most behind Kershaw) and first baseman Matt Olson. The San Francisco Giants had three pitchers selected: Logan Webb, Robbie Ray and reliever Randy Rodriguez.
The slumping New York Yankees ended up with three All-Stars: Aaron Judge, Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Max Fried. The Mets also earned three All-Star selections: Francisco Lindor, Pete Alonso and Edwin Diaz.
“Red carpet, that’s my thing,” Chisholm said. “I do have a ‘fit in mind.”
Rosters are expanded from 26 to 32 for the All-Star Game. They include starters elected by fans, 17 players (five starting pitchers, three relievers and a backup for each position) chosen in a player vote and six players (four pitchers and two position players) selected by league officials. Every club must be represented.
Acuna, Wood and Raleigh are the three All-Stars who have so far committed to participating in the Home Run Derby.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Jorge Castillo
NEW YORK — The New York Yankees were seemingly in deep trouble Sunday when Juan Soto cracked a pitch to left field in the seventh inning.
The New York Mets, down two runs, were cooking up a rally with no outs. Francisco Lindor stood at first base, Pete Alonso loomed on deck, and Brandon Nimmo was in the hole. This was the heart of the Mets’ potent lineup. Given the Yankees’ recent woes, fumbling their two-run lead and suffering a Subway Series sweep at the hands of their neighbors — and a seventh straight loss — seemed almost fated.
Then Cody Bellinger charged Soto’s sinking 105 mph line drive, made a shoestring catch and fired a strike to first base for an improbable double play to secure a skid-snapping 6-4 win — and perhaps rescue the Yankees from another dreadful outcome.
“Considering the context of this week and everything,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said, “that’s probably our play of the year so far.”
Soto’s line drive off Mark Leiter Jr. had a 10% catch probability, according to Statcast, but Bellinger, a plus defender at multiple positions who started at first base Saturday, was just able to snatch it before it touched the grass. Certain that he caught it clean, he made an 89.9 mph toss that reached first baseman Paul Goldschmidt on a line, over Lindor, who didn’t slide into the bag.
“I saw it in the air and had a really good beat on it,” said Bellinger, who went 2-for-3 with a double and a walk at the plate.
The Mets challenged the catch, but the call stood.
“That was incredible,” said Yankees right fielder Aaron Judge, who swatted his 33rd home run of the season in the fifth inning. “I’ve never seen something like that on the field.”
For the past week, a stretch Boone described as “terrible” for his ballclub, poor defense has been an issue for the Yankees. Physical errors. Mental lapses. Near disasters. The sloppiness helped sink a depleted pitching staff, more than offsetting the offense’s strong production.
That combination produced the team’s second six-game losing streak in three weeks and a three-game deficit in the American League East standings behind the first-place Toronto Blue Jays.
The surging Blue Jays won again Sunday to extend their winning streak to seven games and keep their division lead at three games, but Bellinger’s glove and arm ensured it didn’t grow to four.
“That was an unbelievable play,” Goldschmidt said. “Amazing catch and absolute cannon to me at first. To make that play was a game-changing play and potentially game-winning play for us today. And we needed it.”
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