The Arkansas Razorbacks have had more than 20 scholarship players announce plans to transfer as of Thursday, but head coach Sam Pittman said he expects to have a huge pool of money to spend in the transfer portal moving forward to make up for the losses.
While plenty of those portal entrants were likely encouraged to move on, a good bit have been starters that maybe were not expected. Names such as offensive linemen Patrick Kutas and Joshua Braun, tight end Luke Hasz, linebacker Brad Spence, receiver Isaiah Sategna, safety TJ Metcalf and more all started in the 2024 regular season.
Despite losing household names around the state — if that's still a thing in the transfer portal era — Pittman spoke with confidence Thursday about being able to rebuild, especially given that state of the program's Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) funding.
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"We wouldn’t have had financially — and we’ve got money — but we wouldn’t have had financially the money left to go out and get what we might consider big-time difference makers had we just said ‘yes, yes, yes, yes' (to those who decided to transfer for financial reasons)," Pittman said. "And if we’d said that to every one of them, as much money as we have, we would have ran out.
"Listen, let’s go back. Is it very frustrating? Absolutely. And I get that it’s frustrating. But what we decided to do was save a huge pool of money to go into the portal. And that’s what we decided."
That huge pool of money should be encouraging to Arkansas fans, who have grown accustomed to announcements for Razorbacks hitting the portal what feels like every 30 minutes. Pittman was very specific that the Hogs have money to spend.
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"Our donors have been very good financially to us," Pittman said. "Revenue sharing coming up here in July, we have money. And so we’re not losing these kids because we don’t have money. We’re losing them because what our value is compared to what maybe they can get elsewhere has been, at times, substantially different. We were a 6-6 football team and we’ve got money, and so we need to use it wisely.
"We have 29 visits already set up coming out of the portal. What’s hard, I think probably on the fan base is that we know more about who’s in the portal than probably anybody does, the availability of us getting them. And so, basically is comes down to those two things. If we weren’t able to match what the number was out there nationally for somebody, then we were saying ‘Hey, we believe that we can go get somebody as good or somebody, two somebody’s for that amount of money.’”
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Of those 29 visits from transfer portal players, Pittman said 15 will come over the next five days. He also jokingly added that the number of total visitors could've gone up to 32 by the time he was speaking.
"Everything is negative now because guys are leaving, leaving, leaving," Pittman said. "I think in a few days, I think everybody will feel a little bit better about it because of the guys that we’re bringing in."
To his credit, Pittman has had a mass exodus of scholarship players to the portal in each of the past two offseasons as well. While the 2023 season didn't go as planned (4-8 record), he and his staff put together a squad that improved to 6-6 this regular season.
According to Pittman, they had to decide between paying a whole lot of players or paying a fewer number of players more money. He said paying a fewer number more money is "kind of where we went in that."
"We probably have more what the state would say known guys this year than what we’ve had in the past go in the portal," Pittman said. "They probably in the past didn’t go in the portal because we said, ‘We’re going to match whatever it is to keep them.’ Financially, it’s hard to get to better than .500 if you continue to pay a whole large pool of monies and you kind of… What we’re thinking to kind of cut that down and go out and get what we would consider huge difference makers. Now we’re going to have to get roster count, we’re going to have to do that as well. But yeah, I think in a nutshell that’s what we’re going to do."
Asked about a message to fans during this time, Pittman said they aren't stupid and they realize guys such as Luke Hasz walking out the door means something.
"Hell, it meant something to us too," Pittman said. "It meant something to him too, it was very difficult for him and his family. But, the decisions have to be about the team. It can’t be about just the individual, it has to be about the team.
"All I would say is, all I would ask is that they be patient to see over the next week and a half, whom — if I can not bite off more than I can chew. See if we get out of the portal what I think we can get. If we do, I think they’ll be very excited about that."
Arkansas will play Texas Tech in the Liberty Bowl in Memphis on Dec. 27 at 6 p.m. CT on ESPN.
