College football is more chaotic than ever. Don’t believe me? Well, 2023 five-star quarterback Nico Iamaleava just transferred away from Tennessee in the spring portal window over an NIL dispute and now six of the top eight quarterbacks in that class for 247Sports Composite rankings, have transferred at least once. That’s chaos, and yet James Franklin, for the most part, manages to keep Penn State out of it.
The Nittany Lions grabbed a five-star quarterback in the class before, and Drew Allar never threatened to enter the portal or held the program hostage for a raise. Instead, he’s heading into his third year as the program’s starter in 2025 with national championship expectations and Penn State has had about as quiet an offseason as possible.
Nittany Lions limit spring transfer portal damage
The spring transfer portal window officially opened on Wednesday and just two Penn State players entered their names. The departures of Ta’Mere Robinson and Jon Mitchell come on the heels of veteran offensive guard JB Nelson, who presumably lost the starting right guard job to rising sophomore Cooper Cousins, entering the portal as a grad transfer earlier this week.
In all three cases, it is safe to assume that the players lost their respective positional battles, or recognized they were putting up a losing effort against stiff competition and are seeking starting spots elsewhere. While it’s never great to lose depth, and Mitchell’s departure particularly stings as a young cornerback who projected as a future starter, maybe as soon as next season, none of the three impact the Nittany Lion’s chances of winning it all in January.
Franklin has plenty of critics and those portions of the fanbase that chant “fire Franklin” after another Ohio State loss, have good reasons to be frustrated. In his 11 seasons, Franklin has never truly gotten over the hump. He’s beaten the Buckeyes just once, the same season he won his only Big Ten Title in 2016, and his long College Football Playoff victories came over SMU and Boise State in the first year of a flawed 12-team expansion that awarded the Mountain West Champions the No. 3 seed in the bracket.
Still, it's time like the first day of the spring transfer portal window, or national signing day when it's comforting to have Franklin at the helm. His program is still built on development and loyalty which prevents major departures and keeps chaos at bay. Instead of heading to the auction for the sport’s top earners, he leverages his NIL resources to keep his best players, like Allar, running backs Nicholas Singleton and Kaytron Allen, and star defensive end Dani Dennis-Sutton from entering the NFL Draft.
It may not earn major headlines, and Penn State may never sign an $8 million quarterback as Iamaleava was when he first left Southern California for Knoxville out of high school, but with so much turnover everywhere else, stability might be Franklin’s superpower.
Expectations are sky-high heading into the 2025 season, and if the head coach doesn’t deliver, it could legitimately be time to move on. Still, with much of Penn State’s roster, including a former five-star quarterback, heading into their fourth year in Happy Valley with another chance to win the national title, it’s a good time to be thankful for James Franklin.