***Official portal tracker thread***

This will be interesting to watch how PSU develops over time. In his press conference, to summarize, Campbell essentially stated that he had to start NIL himself, do more with less, and expressed gratitude to Kraft for providing great financial resources. He emphasizes the importance of culture, focusing on rebuilding PSU's culture, developing young men, encouraging good grades, and players putting the team first. He also said looks at portal players that make sense for his system, but they must fit into the team and system.

PSU say they are fully committed to this plan, but once they see Campbell sticking to it, they might be surprised—as if to say, "Wait, you actually meant that?" They might expect him to pay to bring in a five-star running back or similar talent, and they don't fit his requirements. It seems like Campbell is similar to someone who is with a beautiful, willing woman but isn't quite sure how to handle it, so he ends up spending time with his old friends while she sits dumbfounded. Instead of immediately scouting talent from the portal, he is securing our recruits for a year or two until he gets his feet on the ground.

With that in mind, he clearly understands he must perform immediately, so he is going to do what he needs to do, which is why he is recruiting and bringing in as much of our ISU team as possible for the first year, then build the talent with the increased financial resources at the payers and our expense. He’s not the man of character that I thought.
 
Those guys will be under dogs to ever play at PSU. Matt will have to recruit 4 stars starting next year or the fan base will go nuts.
On the contrary, some may get bumps just because PSU > ISU in the recruiting world.
Think Kase Evans will be a good QB, though, & actually produce much better than his "ranking"

Cignetti brought JMU players to Indiana, so there will be no difference here. Will just need to let everything play out & trust Rogers & Co. retaining anyone worth it plus getting capable, talented players here.
 
On the contrary, some may get bumps just because PSU > ISU in the recruiting world.
Think Kase Evans will be a good QB, though, & actually produce much better than his "ranking"

Cignetti brought JMU players to Indiana, so there will be no difference here. Will just need to let everything play out & trust Rogers & Co. retaining anyone worth it plus getting capable, talented players here.
HS recruiting is a crap shoot. I would be shocked if Evans ever plays at PSU. I thought his film looked good, but he was a last minute add to our class because we didn't get the guys we really wanted. Cignetti brought JMU players with him from his highly competitive team. Guys that were know commodities because he understood that he need to win right away and that he couldn't wait on HS kids to develop. Plus he added from other P4 schools. Similarly, I see Matt trying to get our best players (starters) to follow him. Then he will add from other schools too. He has the money to do so.
 
HS recruiting is a crap shoot. I would be shocked if Evans ever plays at PSU. I thought his film looked good, but he was a last minute add to our class because we didn't get the guys we really wanted. Cignetti brought JMU players with him from his highly competitive team. Guys that were know commodities because he understood that he need to win right away and that he couldn't wait on HS kids to develop. Plus he added from other P4 schools. Similarly, I see Matt trying to get our best players (starters) to follow him. Then he will add from other schools too. He has the money to do so.
Evans may be different in a complete backup for us. He was committee to Gundy u til he was let go and then flipped to us. While we did lose our guys, Evans was pretty much off the board also.
 
Might get hammered for this take. IMO, CMCs job at Ped St isn’t to take good players and grow them. That won’t cut it when the expectation is a Natty. His job will be dependent on recruiting 4 and 5 stars and getting them to buy in to his culture speak and beat the likes of Bama, ND, Michigan and Ohio St. I love our kids, but the ones that should be playing there aren’t here.

I disagree with the belief that their expectation is a national title. They put up with the a-hole that is James Franklin for 11 seasons. It included two sub-.500 seasons right in the middle. If he wasn’t such a giant prick he would still be the coach today.
 
Don't disagree with your statement. Penn State will recover from their anomaly recruiting cycle faster than Iowa State will. This one event will be more painful and difficult for ISU to dig out from.

If it was hard to raise NIL money before, it will be even more so now.
If Jimmy Rogers had to rely 100% on HS recruits I'd be concerned Iowa State is in for a couple years of mediocrity.

But ISU has $13M to spend on its existing roster & portal guys, so the Clones success in 2026 is about Jimmy Rogers and his personnel guys spending wisely. So paying $3M on a QB or other elite player is probably out of the question.

If he can convince 50-60% of ISU's 1st/2nd/3rd teams to stick in Ames & attack the portal hard we should be competitive in 2026.

And remember, ISU isn't going to be alone in getting gutted among Big12 programs. I'd bet most Big12 programs are going to have 25+ players enter the portal. At a minimum to establish their value.
 
Evans may be different in a complete backup for us. He was committee to Gundy u til he was let go and then flipped to us. While we did lose our guys, Evans was pretty much off the board also.
Did you look at his other offers when he was a commit to Gundy? No P4
 
FIFY.

Need two "goods" in there, Emperor.
No worries,

The Emperor does say Good twice, later in that scene.

But not before the quote I wrote.

Actually the better quote that applies is the first interaction, when Luke Skywalker is watching the battle: I’ll paraphrase for Iowa State context.

The Emperor says “Your fleet is lost. And your friends at Iowa State will not survive. There is no escape, my young Cyclone Fanatic. The Football Program will die. As will your hope.”

Luke looks down at his keyboard.

The Emperor says “ Gooooood. I can feel your anger. I am defenseless. Take your keyboard and strike me down with all of your Hatred. And your journey toward the Dark Side will be complete.”
 
Didn’t he really want to play for Gundy though? If so, a light 3 star may not become a high 3 if they say their hard desire to play for one coach.
Evans has had a crazy recruiting year that is for sure. I doubt anyone including him thought he would be at a school like PSU. Gundy getting fired opened lots of doors.

IMG_2398.jpeg
 
So we had three high school guys. How is that similar to how things work today with the portal?
Based on how things were when he came from Toledo and he brought the recruits he could/wanted and tried to bring more, along with the fact that he brought most of the coaches it seemed fairly obvious to me, that he would take what he wanted when he left. The current environment allows him to take current players and offer the players and recruits money from deeper pockets on top of it. He would leave the cupboards bare in Ames if he felt thats what he needed to do to win at PSU.
 

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