"I'm less concerned with transfer portal": When Brian Kelly made his feelings known about players leaving LSU

Brian Kelly voiced his concerns about college football’s shifting landscape in a May 2023 interview with WAFB’s Jacques Doucet, focusing on the transfer portal and the growing influence of name, image and likeness deals.

Kelly said he understands players transferring for more playing time but sees a problem when money is the main motivator.

“If I'm leaving the transfer portal because somebody's giving me a boatload of money, that's a problem, and those are the things that we've got to fix,” he said.

When asked about LSU’s losses in the portal, Kelly mentioned Walker Howard and Jack Nash. Their departures surprised him because they had shown a strong commitment to the program.

“Their circumstances were much more about playing time than they were NIL and not loving LSU,” he said.

While Kelly didn’t say LSU lost key players due to NIL, his comments reflect a broader concern.

“I'm less concerned with the transfer portal,” Kelly said (24:08). “I'm more concerned with inducements within the transfer portal. If the transfer portal is just about, ‘I want to transfer and go somewhere else because I'm not playing,’ those are easy to navigate."

It seems the coach saw the transfer portal as manageable when it was about playing time but warned that financial inducements could disrupt team dynamics.

Brian Kelly didn’t see LSU as a title contender in 2023

Many Tigers fans in 2023 believed their team had a shot at the national championship, but Brian Kelly thought otherwise. In June, he told SEC columnist Blake Toppmeyer that LSU needed more time.

“We need another year of recruiting,” Kelly said, according to Death Valley Voice, "one more really good year on both sides of the ball, I think, puts us in a position where, I think, year three, the consistency piece, the depth of our program, the messaging, all the things we do on a day-to-day basis, puts us in a position to compete for a championship."

That year, LSU finished the season with a 10-3 record under Kelly, going 6-2 in SEC play. The second-year coach led Tigers quarterback Jayden Daniels to a Heisman Trophy. The team also earned a ReliaQuest Bowl win over Wisconsin.