I feel like 2025 is going to be my year; my year to get some projects done and out there, things I’ve been working on for months, and in some cases, years. My book is done and during the fall semester I received what I hope is my last round of peer review edits before I revise and resubmit the manuscript to my publisher, the University of Colorado Press/University of Wyoming Press. I also have a law review article I’m revising and shopping around and a few other smaller writing projects. And I have some ideas that I don’t even want to talk about yet, projects still in the garage. For the first time in a few months, I feel like I can pursue it all. 

Last semester I took on a couple of extra courses along with a busy travel schedule. I love teaching, and it’s something I don’t ever want to give up. This spring semester I will have a reduced course load, so that’s part of my optimism and why I feel ready to produce, but I don’t want to lose track of my students, and I have many that I stay in touch with long after graduation. Some of my former students are now attorneys, police officers, highway patrolmen, college professors, professional basketball players, federal agents – and I’m proud of them all. I also have many student athletes in classes, which brings me to the topic I want to write about: the college transfer portal. 

While discussing the college transfer portal may not be related to my chosen blog themes of criminal justice reform and endurance sports, I will discuss it in the context of two of my former criminal justice students. Both were defensive lineman on the University of Wyoming (UW) football team – Jaylen Pate and Gavin Meyer. Before I get into my thoughts on the portal, I should make it clear that both Jaylen and Gavin were excellent students, and they both graduated from UW before transferring. Their reasons for transferring may be different, but they both worked their asses off while they were here, and they embraced UW and the community. Jaylen transferred to Northwestern, and Gavin picked the University of Southern California (USC) – two of the top academic universities in America, both with rich football traditions, particularly USC. 

Both men took advantage of the controversial transfer portal, which opened in October of 2018, allowing college student athletes to transfer schools without having to sit out a year. Not everyone likes it. “College football is rapidly changing and maybe not for the better,” Dirk Koetter said after announcing his retirement on Facebook following Boise State’s elimination from the College Football Playoffs (CFP). Koetter, a long-time coach and offensive coordinator at Boise State said, “We are behind right now in the NIL game. Our best players are being offered between 2 and 10 times what we can offer.”

The rules around Name Image and Likeness (NIL) have permitted college players to be paid since 2021. Looking elsewhere, the NIL money situation and transfer portal seems to be working beautifully for Notre Dame at the moment. The headline I read following the Fighting Irish’s recent CFP win proclaimed: “Notre Dame, buoyed by transfers, knocks Georgia out of CFP.”^[1] Without question, the new landscape in college football is benefitting some teams at the expense of others. But is that inherently wrong? Is it really any different than the way things have always been?

Why would a college athlete ever come to UW in the first place? With Gavin, it was the allure of the Wild West. “I fell in love with the wilderness and I will surely miss the outdoors and mountains that you do not get many other places.” He would like to work as a game warden or perhaps private security along with possibly coaching someday. Gavin credited UW with preparing him “exceptionally well” for both grad school and football. He was “developed inside and outside the classroom by so many dedicated and impactful people.” Meyer won Academic All-Mountain West honors in 2021 and 2022, majoring in Criminal Justice with a minor in Sociology. Gavin is currently obtaining a certificate in Gerontology from USC. 

Meyer is also declaring for the NFL draft and beyond football, he wants to travel and, “see new places I haven’t been able to go while playing college football.” This past season, Gavin had a successful year for the Trojans, starting for them at defensive tackle and in this article, earning high praise for leading the USC D tackles in snaps and QB pressures:

https://usc.rivals.com/news/dt-gavin-meyer-s-warrior-mentality-is-legacy-he-is-proud-to-leave-at-usc

Like Meyer, Pate is “full speed ahead with preparing for pro day in March. I’ve put together solid film over the last few years.” This past season, Jaylen also had a fruitful year, including a game against Purdue where he had 3 tackles for a loss. This is a nice piece about Pate in the Daily Northwestern:

https://dailynorthwestern.com/2024/10/01/sports/football-northwesterns-jaylen-pate-finds-fuel-in-his-process-strives-for-consistency/

Citing long term health concerns, Pate was quick to note that, “quite frankly playing football for long professionally has never been in my plans. In the immediate, I’ll have to figure out whether I still plan to attend law school or not.” 

Pate fondly remembers the “simplicity and peacefulness” of Wyoming. “It was easy to get away from a lot of things and I really just learned how to enjoy my own time, thoughts, and peace.” Jaylen also found both the academic and athletic transition to Northwestern easier than he expected. “At first coming to Northwestern, I felt as if someone like me didn’t have the ability to attend and do well. Until I finally got here and realized that it’s the exact same work that everybody else is doing, it’s just that at ‘elite schools,’ they do a better job of collecting the most driven individuals and the top talent.” 

In Jaylen’s case, he had been accepted to the University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign) law school, but they did not offer him a football scholarship. Northwestern on the other hand, offered Pate a football scholarship but their law school waitlisted him. So, Jaylen went to Northwestern on a football scholarship and was accepted to the Northwestern Master’s of Public Policy and Administration program.

As prison education is near and dear to me, it was heartwarming to see that Pate also became involved in the Northwestern Prison Education Program, serving as the reentry chair. My colleague at UW, Tiger Robison, visited the prison ed. program at Northwestern with me, which is housed in their law school and pictured at the top. Pate still wants to work with an innocence project or equal justice initiative at some point. 

Chicago is also where Jaylen grew up, so the opportunity to return there to play in front of his friends and family was a significant factor in his decision to transfer to Northwestern. In both cases, Gavin and Jaylen transferred after they graduated from UW. 

I had the extreme good fortune of talking with both of these men during their processes of transferring. Full disclosure for those who don’t know me, but I grew up in Wyoming and have been a lifelong Wyoming football fan. My grandfather on my mother’s side was a professor here. My parents basically met on the UW campus, and I went to undergrad here. I love this place, but when I was 21 and looking at law schools, I wanted to get out of Wyoming. In hindsight, I probably should have stayed here in Laramie for law school. It’s a great school and it produces fantastic lawyers, which I can also attest to – since my entire legal career has been here. 

But when I was 21, I didn’t care about that. When Gavin and I talked about the process, he mentioned Cal Berkeley had contacted him. That was my dream for law school, although my LSAT was nowhere near high enough to get me in at Cal. But I went and toured the campus anyway, back in 1993 and it was stunning, completely awe-inspiring. Again, don’t get me wrong: our campus here at UW is beautiful in its own right. However, Cal Berkeley was something altogether different. So I tried to put myself in his shoes, especially knowing that he had graduated already and had given this university everything he had. It’s a big world out there, and I told him he’d be crazy not to transfer. 

My feelings about the transfer portal are complicated. Everything in life changes so quickly. I know that I have a different perspective as a college professor than I would have ten years ago, before I started teaching at UW. I am more sympathetic to the student athletes, at least the ones that I’ve worked with. I also know Gavin and Jaylen are both fine young men who gave UW everything they had while they were here, both on and off the field. The portal worked out beautifully for them and they earned it. They were great football players, great students, and excellent humans and – they will always be Wyoming Cowboys. Powder River and peace.   

^[1] https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/43266364/notre-dame-buoyed-transfers-knocks-georgia-cfp

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