Dabo Swinney is a great coach. People (trolls) saying he isn’t are just uneducated and those claiming he can’t win big without a great quarterback might as well say Bill Belichick sucks as well. But as good as Dabo is, he needs to wake up and adjust.
Swinney added Garrett Riley as his Offensive Coordinator this off-season, and I still think that’s a good move. And it was a departure of sorts from the “we are family” style Dabo exudes, as he loves to promote from within. Going outside the family to land Riley will help in the long run, and Swinney seems more willing to recruit from the outside for his staff. That’s good news.
What Swinney is unwilling to do is hit the transfer portal. And that’s just dumb and stubborn. College football now has a feel of free agency as the NFL does, and any NFL coach who refuses to play the free agent market should and would be fired. Swinney shouldn’t be fired, of course, but he has to get his head out of his butt in this respect. The old “our lockerroom is our portal” is antiquated and naive, as Clemson has lost key players to the portal but gained none. And I kinda mean none. So even when they lost to portal-savvy teams like Alabama, Ohio State, and LSU in the college football playoff, Dabo still doubled down on high school development. And it’s not the reason they lost to Duke, but it’s starting to cause more parity. Essentially, Clemson is coming back to the ACC pack as other teams improve with transfers. He’s being left behind. And it needs to stop.
Clemson has a great roster. But they sure look like they could have used an elite WR from the portal or perhaps a QB to push Cade Klubnik a tad harder. No offense to Paul Tyson and all, but he’s not it. Some will object and tell me that guys like Devin Leary and Sam Hartman would have never transferred to Clemson because Klubnik was there, and maybe they’re right. But look at Ole Miss. Walker Howard and Spencer Sanders came in and made Jaxon Dart a better QB. Competition does that, and with DJ Uiagalelei gone, Klubnik was not pushed. But the real issue is at WR. While playoff contenders like Georgia, USC, Texas, and others added key WR help, Clemson did nothing. And their WR room looks quite pedestrian. Relying on transfers can be iffy, but adding a few key ones here and there is something Swinney could have done. And it wouldn’t have been hard.
There is a debate as to how Swinney feels about and approaches NIL, but the general consensus is he’s against pay-for-play based on many things he’s said. So factor that in with the misuse of the portal, and you have a team ready to be passed by many others. A debate on whether the playoff window for Swinney and Clemson has closed is for another article. But it’s hard to find anyone to argue that Swinney needs to step into 2023 college football, and he needs to do it sooner rather than later.
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