Dabo Swinney is under fire for not using the transfer portal. But the Tigers' issues are more complex than that.
SEC Now analyst Jordan Rodgers praises the Bulldogs' powerful defense and their physicality that allows them to remain a force to be reckoned with in the trenches. Clemsonand saw a team that, according to him, matched Georgia physically and lost, in large part, due to a handful of unforced errors and an inability to capture any"momentum."
Swinney believes in building a program, and that means more than winning games. And on that front, he's been exceptional. And as one Power 4 coach said of Swinney's portal position,"You can still win a championship without the portal. The margin for error is just much smaller, and your flaws get much harder to hide."
Swinney drew blowback in the spring for his latest attempt to rationalize his portal aversion with rhetorical gamesmanship by suggesting that everyone is a transfer from somewhere, and he'd just prefer to focus on guys transferring from high school to Clemson. Wesco played 12 snaps against Georgia. Moore played five. They combined for two catches for 12 yards, all in the fourth quarter after the game was out of hand.
So, boil that all down into an elevator pitch to transfers: You must be elite. You're going to have to win a job against players here that Swinney already adores. There will be no NIL handouts without proven production. To be at Clemson is a privilege.David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire And herein lies the paradox for Clemson. Swinney sees the potential in this team every year. He recruited these guys, he knows them, he's seen flashes of success and believes that, given the right mixture of time and circumstance, they'll put up numbers like Lawrence or
Swinney points often at the close losses -- and, following the Georgia game, even the blowouts -- and notes the handful of plays that might've set Clemson on a different course. But in the Lawrence era, most games didn't come down to a handful of critical plays. Clemson was at the narrow end of the bell curve, one of those elite teams that was simply better than everyone else.
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