Auburn's Hugh Freeze uncomfortable with 'bidding wars' for top players in transfer portal

There used to be a time — not that long ago, in fact — when college coaches would spend years getting to know prospective recruits. They would watch up-and-comers play sometimes as soon as their sophomore seasons in high school, all the while planting seeds and getting "in" with said recruit's family.

It was a process that oftentimes led to extreme loyalty between recruit and school. If you committed somewhere as a junior in high school, there was a very real possibility that you'd be connected to that school for the rest of your life.

That's no longer the case in the NIL and transfer portal era, though. Even once a recruit is committed to a school, the coaching staff has to worry that a rival school can steal from their depth chart at any time. Whether that's the promise of more playing time or more money via NIL deals, a recruit can sign as a freshman at school A in February and be somewhere completely different by December of the same year.

It's not how it used to be, and specific to NIL deals and schools basically trying to outbid each other with different NIL packages, Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze doesn't seem to be a huge fan.

The transfer portal has basically become free agency for college athletes, where like in the NFL, the highest bidder wins.

“I just don’t feel comfortable with some of the bidding wars for some of the top guys in the portal,” Freeze recently said on the "McElroy and Cubelic In The Morning" show (h/t On3). “Not that we’re not very fair. It’s just I want to build the whole roster and try to do it with guys that fit, somewhat, your culture.”

Freeze wants players who want to play at Auburn because it's Auburn, not because the Tigers simply promised more money than Alabama. That's not to say the Tigers don't care about NIL, but there still has to be something "old school" about a commitment in order for it to make sense for Freeze.

Essentially, it still has to be for the love of the game.

“That’s what I’ve always done. I recruit, we have a relationship. I know him, I know his family. You hope that those relationships really cause a kid to develop with you through the process of all that comes with college football now," Freeze explained.

“I think our collective is very fair. But, if that is the only purpose in a kid’s decision, I feel uncomfortable about that, going that route,” said Freeze.

It's old school, but it apparently still works. At the time of this writing, Auburn's 2025 class is ranked No. 10 in the nation.