Penn State's James Franklin Talks Transfer Portal, Roster Retention

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Like many college football coaches, Penn State’s James Franklin understands and accepts the need for NIL and the Transfer Portal. He just prefers a different form of the game, in which relationships are “transformational” rather than “transactional.” The impact of that, Franklin said, is changing college football.

Penn State recently completed spring drills with a roster ready to change. The Nittany Lions closed practice with 97-99 scholarship players, depending on the outsiders counting. That includes the remaining players arriving this summer from the 2024 recruiting class.

So Penn State’s staff and roster have some decisions to make to reach the NCAA’s mandated 85-scholarship limit. Franklin has said he’s unconcerned and that his program’s internal math is different, meaning he’s comfortable Penn State will get there. However, Franklin still said he expects an “interesting” few weeks as the NCAA Transfer Portal is open until the end of April.

“There’s a lot of a lot of reasons why that’s interesting,” Franklin said after the Blue-White Game. “For me, that’s what these meetings [with players] are going to be about: the individual meetings with our position coaches, the meetings with me. We’ve had some conversations with some guys already. But at the end of the day, you never really know until it happens. I think we got pretty good relationships where guys, for the most part, have been very  transparent and honest with us and we do the same thing with them.

“One of the things that I think is really important is I’m still a big believer in transformational relationships, and college football being transformational. I’m worried that college football is becomingmore and more transactional. That has to be in both directions.”

Penn State has lost two players, both receivers, so far in the portal. KeAndre Lambert-Smith, who led the Nittany Lions in catches in 2023, and Malick Meiga, a receiver and special teams captain, entered the portal. The Lions could lose more but also have been pretty strong in roster retention.

“That’s something that I’ve talked to our guys all the time about,” Franklin said. “To be honest with you, 99 percent of the time, what’s good for the individual is good for the team, and vice versa. So that’s the good thing that I feel good about as head coach. I can have theseconversations and be honest, because the reality is, more times than not, maybe not in the short term, maybe not at the time that they want it to be in their schedule in their mind, more times than not it is.”