College basketball’s 'lawless, cesspool' transfer portal must be fixed

On Thursday, we got wind of the latest batch of transfer portal news in what has become a never-ending cycle.

Memphis star and All-American guard PJ Haggerty entered the portal. Auburn big man Dain Dainja — who has to apply for a waiver for an extra year of eligibility in a process that's unpredictable to begin with — was reportedly going to enter, but that rumor was quickly squashed after he posted on social media saying that he was "not going anywhere."

One of the best mid-major players in the country, Mid-American Conference Player of the Year and former Akron star Nate Johnson joined the 2,000-plus names in the portal as well. Combine that chaos with the April 22 deadline to enter the portal — you can expect some at-the-buzzer drama with what the going rate is for even decent talent right now — and the state of college basketball this offseason is utter chaos. An absolute mess.

Players shouldn't be blamed at all. If you could maximize your value and cash in at this age, wouldn't you try to get every dollar you could? That's smart business.

But this is not pro sports where there are structured contracts across the board that get honored by both parties. Auburn standout Chad Baker-Mazara entered the portal on Thursday, yet he had signed a contract with the Tigers that said he would owe back a percentage of the money given to him for a deal that included his return for the 2025-26 season — the last of his NCAA career. This is a kid who has already been to three different schools, including San Diego State and JUCO Northwest Florida State College. Coming back to Auburn for a third year and making seven figures while cementing himself as a Tigers great is certainly a nice route, but in this marketplace, dollar amounts are constantly rising. Baker-Mazara wants more money, but what about that contract?

If Auburn fights him on it, is it really worth the potential harm the school could do to a player? Couldn't that hurt Auburn in recruiting, or is there something to be said about proving a point with a 25-year-old and getting him and his people to honor the contract?

These are all questions that I'm sure are being pondered right now for a program that just reached the sport's biggest stage and should be feeling about as good as anybody, shy of national champion Florida, right now. Instead, Auburn is in the same fight that everybody is in — bidding wars that continue to rise.

We've gone from Nijel Pack leaving Kansas State for Miami (Fla.) on a deal worth $800,000 for two years to multiple programs having budgets that reach into the eight-figure mark.

"This is an absolute cesspool," said one high-major coach, who has solid NIL money. "It's birthed by the far-too-long original sin of NCAA greed. The adults in the room gave NIL with no guidelines. No guidance. No rules. Imagine the NBA with annual unrestricted free agency, and no salary cap. And now imagine asking a team full of players earning six figures to go to class."

[MORE: Ranking the best players available in the college basketball transfer portal]

As the NCAA looks to complete a settlement that will force the association to pay $2.8 billion in back damages to athletes who played sports from 2016 to 2024 and were not entitled to the same rights that current athletes have in the NIL space, conferences and schools are hopeful that the ability to directly pay athletes with an annual budget starting at roughly $20 million will get passed by Judge Claudia Wilken. While roster-cap limits are being discussed right now by both sets of representatives — with Wilken wanting to gradually shift to the cap of 105 football players and 15 basketball players, among a variety of limits to make walk-ons and others happy for now instead of opening a new can of worms — things are still tracking for a July 1 implementation of this new policy. Wilken has even already granted preliminary approval of the settlement.

While a budget of $20 million or so will mainly be dedicated to football and any outside money would have to go through a separate "approval process," let's not act like under-the-table funding for players — something that used to happen — wouldn't continue. So, even with this settlement, there are still loopholes.

"This is a Grade-A f------ goat rodeo," said another mid-major coach with some of the best funding in his league. "I need to pray the rosary to get through the offseason."

"It's terrible to watch because — as a guy who played four years at my school and was a part of championships — the team pride on the men's side is dead," a former player and national champion told me.

"It's lawless," one assistant at one of the best programs in America told FOX Sports. "I am all for players getting paid, but we need a governing body, a players association, salary cap, rules and formal and enforceable contracts (on both sides). And we need the portal — a.k.a. free agency — starting at the conclusion of the season, just like it does in pro sports."

That may be the thing that sums up the dysfunction of this sport right now more than anything. The transfer portal formally opens the day following the conclusion of the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament.

Why? Why is the offseason starting while the season is still going on? This year, we saw players on tournament teams that were heading to the Sweet 16 — minor ones, but still! — enter the portal while their current program was marching on in the Big Dance.

We don't talk about roster management and what's next for a program nationally during any other postseason in sports, because we instead focus on who's left for a Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the World Series and so on. But while the best period is happening in college sports, social media is filled with announcements from players thanking their fan base, saying they're a Bulldog or Wildcat for life and that, after much thought and deliberation, they're moving on.

Can't that wait? There's a lot that has to be answered, but the portal opening during the season — albeit with just 16 teams left — is pure stupidity. It's also not healthy for anybody employed in the sport. Dead period? Forget it.

"I see a lot of people saying the market for men's and women's college basketball players is broken, but the only thing they point to is that the players are getting paid a lot," sports lawyer Mit Winter said. "That doesn't mean the market is broken. It just means the current market values are high."

So, what would it take for collective bargaining? For some of this chaos to be dialed down? For players to have an offer of $600,000, agree in principle, then get the bid for $1.1 million from a more desperate place and the open-season chaos just continue? I'm not blaming a player for seeking the value, but the structure of that is like the rainbow pinwheel of death on a Mac laptop. It's a hamster wheel structurally.

"There would obviously have to be pretty big concessions from the school and conference sides, ones that are financial but others that provide benefits and protection," Winter told FOX Sports last year when asked about the potential of collective bargaining, which would still be a long way from actualizing unless conversations really shift. "There would have to be pretty big trade-offs to get athletes to agree to limit their freedom of movement, but professionals do it all the time, so I don't think it's something that would not happen, but it would have to be the right deal for athletes to agree to that."

[MORE: College basketball is in a state of chaos, but it's not beyond fixing]

One high-major head coach who's not in the top-half of his league in terms of budget shared this with FOX Sports on the condition of anonymity: "It's challenging, but it's still an amazing sport. I hate when coaches complain because we chose this life, but there are obvious changes that need to happen to grow our game and increase its popularity outside of March Madness. Hopefully the NCAA, conferences and the powers that be can move swiftly to improve the overall product from NIL to some rule changes (less video review, quarters, etc.) that I believe would help."

For those saying college basketball is dying, the national championship game between a pair of non-blue bloods (Florida and Houston) delivered 18.1 million viewers and peaked at 21.1 million viewers, capping the sport's most-watched Final Four weekend since 2017. The tournament as a whole was up 3% in viewership from a year ago even with Cinderellas not being a theme this time around. We have seen some big-time returns in college hoops, with Purdue guard Braden Smith coming back for his senior season in West Lafayette being the headliner right now, as he's a lead national player of the year candidate.

This sport has fought through the one-and-done rule, the period where one could go straight from high school to the pros, the G League trying to take players from the college ranks and much more.

College basketball will never be the same, and a pathway to regulation has to happen, but for that to occur, the current leadership has to acknowledge the fact that the student-athlete model is gone.

These are employees, with the caveat to still make "college" part of the contract: you do go to class. That degree isn't so bad either, but there has to be a middle ground at some point for everybody involved, and it starts with accepting the reality that what's happening isn't productive for anybody and that the current "system" truly isn't one.

John Fanta is a national college basketball broadcaster and writer for FOX Sports. He covers the sport in a variety of capacities, from calling games on FS1 to serving as lead host on the BIG EAST Digital Network to providing commentary on The Field of 68 Media Network. Follow him at @John_Fanta.

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