NIL's Mercenary March of College Football Athletes

This isn't isolated to mid-tier teams like Iowa State. Even former powerhouses are reeling from portal raids. USC, under Lincoln Riley, hemorrhaged 15 players after a disappointing 2025 season, including backups and starters seeking better NIL opportunities elsewhere. The Trojans' losses exacerbate roster instability in a program once synonymous with West Coast dominance. Similarly, Florida State shed 25 athletes, UNC lost 15, and over 10 programs nationwide saw 20 or more departures, highlighting how NIL bidding wars amplify turnover at underperforming or underfunded schools. These exits often follow coaching changes or subpar seasons, with athletes prioritizing financial incentives over rebuilding efforts.

The fallout extends beyond regular-season rosters, contributing to a palpable lack of interest in the multitude of bowl games not tied to the College Football Playoff (CFP). With the transfer portal overlapping bowl season and NIL deals luring players away, non-playoff bowls have become exhibitions of depleted teams, rife with opt-outs and makeshift lineups. Players, now professionalized through NIL earnings, increasingly skip these games to avoid injury risks ahead of the NFL draft or to chase better opportunities via the portal, rendering many matchups unwatchable and irrelevant. This year alone, several 5-7 teams declined bowl invitations outright, including Iowa State and Notre Dame that also had a 10-2 winning record in 2025, signaling diminished prestige, while opt-outs have turned storied bowls into shadow versions of themselves. Viewership for non-playoff bowls remains robust in aggregate—Disney's 33 such games averaged 2.7 million viewers last season, up from prior years—but fan sentiment and expert analysis point to growing apathy, with complaints that NIL and the portal have "demolished bowl season" by eroding competitive integrity. As one observer noted, these games hold "no interest" for teams anymore, fueling calls for reforms like paying players to participate or shifting the portal window post-bowls.

As the 2025 calendar winds down, the NCAA's revamped transfer portal is poised to swing open on January 2, 2026, ushering in a condensed 15-day frenzy that closes on January 16, 2026, for most football programs. This single-window structure, a shift from previous dual periods to curb ongoing tampering and streamline chaos, includes extensions: Players from teams in the College Football Playoff national championship (set for January 19, 2026) get an extra five days from January 20-24, while coaching changes trigger separate 15-day windows starting five days after a new hire. Amid NIL's financial allure, this upcoming portal period could accelerate roster volatility, with programs like Iowa State still reeling from pre-window announcements and others bracing for bidding wars.

Yet, in Texas—the epicenter of NIL spending—some programs thrive amid the chaos, leveraging deep-pocketed boosters to build fortresses against portal losses. The University of Texas (UT) boasts the nation's top football NIL budget at $35-40 million for 2025, enabling net gains like edge rusher Colin Simmons from LSU and wideout Isaiah Bond from Alabama while minimizing outflows. Texas A&M follows closely with $51.4 million in total NIL revenue (football-dominant), adding 12 transfers like quarterback Marcel Reed despite some exits tied to NIL dissatisfaction. Texas Tech, spending nearly $30 million, turned the portal into a weapon with 15 additions, including quarterback Brendan Sorsby on a rumored $4 million deal, fueling a playoff push. SMU, raising $65 million for all sports via its Mustang Club, focused on retention bonuses to limit departures to just five, adding talents like edge Braden Carter and earning ACC buzz.

Contrast this with in-state rivals Baylor, TCU, and the University of Houston, where modest NIL resources expose vulnerabilities. Baylor ramped up to $15 million in NIL spending, adding 24 transfers to flip its roster, but still suffered heavy losses post-2025, prompting coach Dave Aranda to fight for key retentions like four critical players amid portal risks. TCU, also allocating around $15 million to football under Big 12 revenue sharing, balanced gains (e.g., experienced quarterbacks) with lumps from departures, reflecting the portal's double-edged sword in a new era of $20.5 million caps. Houston, with unspecified but lower NIL figures, bolstered its roster with 15 transfers and 30 overall additions, yet faces ongoing portal needs after a 4-8 season, lacking the financial firepower to consistently outbid elites.

This Texas divide underscores NIL's inequality: Wealthy programs like UT and A&M buy stability and stars, while others like Baylor and TCU scramble to plug holes, often becoming feeder systems. As the transfer portal window in 2026 looms, college football's soul hangs in the balance and talk of reform is already in the air.

This isn't isolated to mid-tier teams like Iowa State. Even former powerhouses are reeling from portal raids. USC, under Lincoln Riley, hemorrhaged 15 players after a disappointing 2025 season, including backups and starters seeking better NIL opportunities elsewhere. The Trojans' losses exacerbate roster instability in a program once synonymous with West Coast dominance. Similarly, Florida State shed 25 athletes, UNC lost 15, and over 10 programs nationwide saw 20 or more departures, highlighting how NIL bidding wars amplify turnover at underperforming or underfunded schools. These exits often follow coaching changes or subpar seasons, with athletes prioritizing financial incentives over rebuilding efforts.

The fallout extends beyond regular-season rosters, contributing to a palpable lack of interest in the multitude of bowl games not tied to the College Football Playoff (CFP). With the transfer portal overlapping bowl season and NIL deals luring players away, non-playoff bowls have become exhibitions of depleted teams, rife with opt-outs and makeshift lineups. Players, now professionalized through NIL earnings, increasingly skip these games to avoid injury risks ahead of the NFL draft or to chase better opportunities via the portal, rendering many matchups unwatchable and irrelevant. This year alone, several 5-7 teams declined bowl invitations outright, including Iowa State and Notre Dame that also had a 10-2 winning record in 2025, signaling diminished prestige, while opt-outs have turned storied bowls into shadow versions of themselves. Viewership for non-playoff bowls remains robust in aggregate—Disney's 33 such games averaged 2.7 million viewers last season, up from prior years—but fan sentiment and expert analysis point to growing apathy, with complaints that NIL and the portal have "demolished bowl season" by eroding competitive integrity. As one observer noted, these games hold "no interest" for teams anymore, fueling calls for reforms like paying players to participate or shifting the portal window post-bowls.

As the 2025 calendar winds down, the NCAA's revamped transfer portal is poised to swing open on January 2, 2026, ushering in a condensed 15-day frenzy that closes on January 16, 2026, for most football programs. This single-window structure, a shift from previous dual periods to curb ongoing tampering and streamline chaos, includes extensions: Players from teams in the College Football Playoff national championship (set for January 19, 2026) get an extra five days from January 20-24, while coaching changes trigger separate 15-day windows starting five days after a new hire. Amid NIL's financial allure, this upcoming portal period could accelerate roster volatility, with programs like Iowa State still reeling from pre-window announcements and others bracing for bidding wars.

Yet, in Texas—the epicenter of NIL spending—some programs thrive amid the chaos, leveraging deep-pocketed boosters to build fortresses against portal losses. The University of Texas (UT) boasts the nation's top football NIL budget at $35-40 million for 2025, enabling net gains like edge rusher Colin Simmons from LSU and wideout Isaiah Bond from Alabama while minimizing outflows. Texas A&M follows closely with $51.4 million in total NIL revenue (football-dominant), adding 12 transfers like quarterback Marcel Reed despite some exits tied to NIL dissatisfaction. Texas Tech, spending nearly $30 million, turned the portal into a weapon with 15 additions, including quarterback Brendan Sorsby on a rumored $4 million deal, fueling a playoff push. SMU, raising $65 million for all sports via its Mustang Club, focused on retention bonuses to limit departures to just five, adding talents like edge Braden Carter and earning ACC buzz.

Contrast this with in-state rivals Baylor, TCU, and the University of Houston, where modest NIL resources expose vulnerabilities. Baylor ramped up to $15 million in NIL spending, adding 24 transfers to flip its roster, but still suffered heavy losses post-2025, prompting coach Dave Aranda to fight for key retentions like four critical players amid portal risks. TCU, also allocating around $15 million to football under Big 12 revenue sharing, balanced gains (e.g., experienced quarterbacks) with lumps from departures, reflecting the portal's double-edged sword in a new era of $20.5 million caps. Houston, with unspecified but lower NIL figures, bolstered its roster with 15 transfers and 30 overall additions, yet faces ongoing portal needs after a 4-8 season, lacking the financial firepower to consistently outbid elites.

This Texas divide underscores NIL's inequality: Wealthy programs like UT and A&M buy stability and stars, while others like Baylor and TCU scramble to plug holes, often becoming feeder systems. As the transfer portal window in 2026 looms, college football's soul hangs in the balance and talk of reform is already in the air.