This is part three of a four-part series examining the effects of the transfer portal from a non-FBS perspective. The first two parts are available at the following links: Part One and Part Two.

“The grass is always greener on the other side, but you still have to mow it,” one FCS head coach said.

“Everybody has greatness in them, and you need to make sure you are betting on yourself a little,” the coach continued. “Everyone wants to play Division I football, and guys in FCS are looking to play in FBS. But the reality is that if you don’t find a school where you match their skill set, then you may be out of college football.”

His warning applies to every undergraduate athlete competing with athletics aid at a non-FBS institution. As discussed in part one of this series, statistics provided by the NCAA show that 58.3 percent of undergraduate athletes receiving athletics aid to play football at an FCS or Division II university who entered the portal remain on active status. The NCAA defines active status as athletes who may still be exploring their options, transferred to a non-NCAA school (such as NAIA or NJCAA), or left the sport.

“When you get into the transfer portal, you’re essentially on your own,” another FCS head coach said. “You’re not the kid from San Antonio MacArthur. You’re the guy who was just at whatever university, and now you’re in the portal, but who is he?”

“We’ve had ten or fewer guys leave us,” one FCS head coach said. “We had one player four years ago who went to South Carolina and was a seventh-round pick of the Cowboys last year and made their squad. However, most of the guys who’ve left have been rotation guys or don’t play much at all. There haven’t been many success stories.”

Every coach agrees that the lack of success stories from players entering the portal should be discussed more and that players or people close to them must honestly evaluate their skill set before choosing to enter.

“If a kid is good enough to move up, then move up. But you need a realistic view of what you can and can’t do athletically to play on the next level. You have to be an elite to a great football player at our level to have a chance to play at the next level,” one DII head coach said. “To be good at the Division II level, you need kids that are borderline guys who can play at Stephen F. Austin. Someone needs to have those hard conversations with players because those kids in FBS are special.”

One FCS head coach had a somewhat similar view.

“Sometimes being recruited is more important to the kid. They’ve been recruited hard in high school and get addicted to that attention,” the coach said. “All of a sudden, you find yourself at the bottom of the depth chart and have a long road of hard work to become a starter. It’s easier and more enjoyable to enter the portal and be recruited again.

“Then they make another post about being blessed and honored, and it’s “God’s plan.” You know what? It’s not God’s plan. It’s your plan and your decision to go into the portal. They don’t understand the cold, hard fact that your chance of graduating plummets when you enter the portal. Everybody thinks they’re “that guy” when they’re not. There needs to be more stories about how it’s not a positive thing that young people aren’t getting their education.”

Statistics showing the likelihood of a player transferring to a higher NCAA Division and receiving playing time are nonexistent. However, one coach placed the chance a starter at Group of Five Tulsa would start after transferring to FBS Texas Tech at “30 percent.”

Another coach noted that the difference in what a player makes in Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) contracts at Group of Five schools isn’t much more than what they make in FCS.

“There isn’t a big difference in NIL money between FCS and Group of Five schools. You might make a couple hundred dollars more at G5,” He said. “It’s not that way at the Power 5 level, where it’s more like pro ball where you can make six figures.”

Another factor in a player's success in transferring to a new school is their position, with offensive and defensive linemen being the most desired by teams at every level.

“You can look in the portal the day before school starts, and there are 25 wide receivers, 80 running backs, and 100 defensive backs,” one head coach said. “There are so many of those positions out there.”

One Division II head coach said that unless a player is in a high-demand position, they should be an “all-conference” level player before considering entering the portal.

While players must properly evaluate their talent before entering the portal, coaches are also worried about the number of fake offers a player immediately receives after entering.

“Let’s say a guy in the portal is offered a scholarship. They need to know the details of it, like what the expiration date is, when I need to make a decision, and whether it is a commitable scholarship.”

Are you telling me that teams are offering scholarships to athletes that aren’t “committable”?

“A young man will get in the portal, and six (colleges) will throw an offer at him, and none of them are commitable. They’re just trying to get in the fight. You have to look for who brings them in for an official visit. Those are usually the serious schools,” another head coach said. “We’ll be looking at a guy in the portal, and his social media will show that he has seven offers. Once we can get him to campus and signed, I’ll ask them how many other firm offers they had besides (our offer). Usually, only one or two of those seven offers were serious.”

Why are teams giving fake offers to athletes?

“They do this to scare people off a guy. We look, and he has seven offers; two of them are from mid-majors, and it makes you believe you can’t get into that hot of a fight and move on to the next guy,” one FCS head coach said. “We’ve learned to hang around and watch it for a few weeks because a good portion of those initial offers aren’t legitimate, and it’s just bad business.”

Another FCS head coach said his staff has learned to wait out the illegitimate offers.

“One thing we’ve learned over the years is if you find a guy you like and he’s going to fit your program, then dive in and offer,” he said. “Let it play out because there’s a chance the others will fall away.”

Despite the relatively new transfer portal, athletes transferred before it was invented. The difference is that a player had to sit out a season if they moved to a school in the same division or higher.

“There’s always been a transfer portal, but the rules have changed to allow athletes to play immediately,” one Division II head coach said. “Those rules are in there to protect the student-athlete because some are 17, 18, and 19 years old, and they’re making Twitter decisions instead of educated decisions.”

In part four, we’ll examine how coaches can manage their roster today and possibly limit some of the “Twitter” decisions in the transfer portal era.