Mel Tucker seeks difference-makers in latest batch of Michigan State football transfers

EAST LANSING — Another preseason camp for Michigan State football, another batch of new names and faces to learn.

Not just for the fans, but for their coaches and teammates, too.

In head coach Mel Tucker’s four seasons, the Spartans have become a blueprint on how to rebuild a roster in the era of the transfer portal and immediate eligibility. Some additions have worked, some haven’t, and one was 2021 Doak Walker winner Kenneth Walker III — the ultimate unicorn for programs hoping to win big in the casino of portal prospects.

The draw for the players?

“Coach Mel Tucker,” said defensive end Tuminse Adeleye, a former four-star recruit who arrived in January from Texas A&M. “Thank you, coach Mel Tucker, for the opportunity to come to Michigan State — to have the opportunity to help an underdog school, come in and win at a high level.”

If only it was that easy, to try and speak it into existence.

MSU added Adeleye and 17 other transfers — two of which come from the junior college ranks — for 2023 after going 5-7 and missing a bowl in 2022. Last year’s team featured 10 portal additions, after Tucker got instant impact in 2021 with 17 transfers — including Walker, who in addition to winning the Doak Walker as the nation’s best running back, was named the Walter Camp national player of the year. Walker’s group helped take the Spartans from a 2-5 debut for Tucker in 2020 into an 11-win, top-10 finish in 2021.

In all, the Spartans have welcomed 47 players from the portal since Tucker’s first season in 2020, making his program — like many others around college football — a revolving door of players coming and going at a higher rate than ever before. All of those transactions are a play to make teams better in the short term and give athletes a chance to boost their futures.

“It's kind of like the NFL. Your roster nowadays can be different every year,” said senior wide receiver Tre Mosley — a homegrown product in his fifth season as a Spartan — late last month at Lucas Oil Stadium, home of the Indianapolis Colts. “You got to take it for what it is — guys are gonna come in, guys are gonna leave. That's the day and age we're in now with college sports in general.

“But it’s just being able to coexist and still make guys feel a part of a team and a family. Because at the end of the day, we are a family still. No matter if you're here for one year, if you're a transfer, if you might transfer later down the line — you never know. But that's one thing I really take pride in, is making sure that everyone on the team feels like they're a part of the team.”

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Transfer-heavy roster

The move to MSU has worked out well individually for some transfers.

That includes Walker, of course, who turned pro after his one season as a Spartan and became a second-round pick of the Seattle Seahawks in the 2022 NFL draft. Cornerback Ameer Speed transferred from Georgia for his final season last fall, then was drafted in the sixth round by the New England Patriots in April 2023. Safety Kendell Brooks (Arizona Cardinals) and linebacker Ben VanSumeren (Philadelphia Eagles), both of whom arrived at MSU before the 2021 season, latched on with NFL squads as free agents this spring after the draft.

Tucker has tried to blend one-year stopgaps with longer-term projects, and 30 transfers from the 2020-22 cycles remain on the roster. Some, such as running back Jalen Berger (Wisconsin) and linebacker Jacoby Windmon (UNLV), are returning starters going into this fall. Others, such as tight end Maliq Carr (Purdue) and defensive end Khris Bogle (Florida), could emerge from camp with pivotal roles. Still others, such as linebacker Aaron Brule (Mississippi State) and defensive back Chester Kimbrough (Florida), remain critical to the Spartans’ improved depth.

Including this year’s batch, 48 of the 117 players currently on MSU’s most recent preseason camp roster — 41% —have, at one time or another over the past three years, arrived via transfer.

“It depends on what our needs are,” Tucker said last month. “I haven't told the coaching staff that we need this percentage of high school guys, this percentage transfers. We're in a win-now culture, OK? And so we have to do what we have to do every year to build a team, put the best team out there we can, fill the needs that we can. We have to we have to be able to do that and build a winning culture along the way. It's a challenge.”

Players also are beginning to use the portal themselves as leverage — whether that means getting more playing time or making more money from name, image and likeness (NIL). Some have used the threat of a transfer to extract bigger paydays from their school’s NIL collective or sponsors, even though coaches and universities are supposed to have no input in players receiving deals.

Yet to hear Tucker break down the combination from his vantage point, it sounds miles from the college game he returned to in 2015 and closer to the NFL version he left after a decade of assistant jobs.

Because it is.

“Obviously, you have a finite amount of (NIL) money. And so, how do you put values on players?” said the 51-year-old Tucker, who played at Wisconsin before coaching in the NFL from 2005-14. “And then as you go into the portal, sometimes it takes a little bit more to get someone out of the portal than it does out of high school. Sometimes. It just depends on who that player is and what your needs are and how many guys are out there on the market available at that position. So it is very similar to the NFL, but there's a lot less rules, a lot less regulation and a lot less parity. There's no salary cap. …

“It's very treacherous out there. I mean, it's a different ballgame. It's not the same job that I took February 12, 2020 — it's totally different.”

Filling the gaps

Tucker and his staff went into this cycle targeting five key areas of need: two each on offense and defense, plus the kicking game.

To help bolster a stagnant run game, MSU brought in a pair of veteran running backs: sixth-year senior Jaren Mangham (South Florida/Colorado) and third-year junior Nathan Carter (Connecticut). Along with adding Berger a year ago. Tucker has brought in two transfer running backs each year since 2021.

Along with Mangham and Carter, adding bigger and more experienced tight ends to aid edge blocking also became a priority. Enter a big trio — Ademola Faleye (FCS-level Norfolk State), Jaylan Franklin (Wisconsin) and Tyneil Hopper (Boise State). Franklin and Hopper are sixth-year seniors with expiring eligibility, while Faleye is a junior with potentially three more years to play. Carr also has three years, thanks to his COVID waiver for 2020, his true freshman year in which he took a redshirt before transferring to MSU.

On defense, beefing up the defensive line — both in size and numbers — was a necessity based upon attrition after last season. That group is highlighted by Adeleye, a third-year sophomore who was a top-100 recruit out of high school.

Asked how the defensive end depth at MSU compares to the Texas A&M program he left, Adeleye said the number of potential contributors is comparable. And the talent?

“That’s a loaded question,” the 6-foot-4, 290-pound native of Katy, Texas, said. “I think it’s, 'Do guys capitalize off their opportunities when they go on the field?' That’s the ultimate. We can display things in practice and it doesn’t translate onto the field on Saturdays. I believe we have guys that are gonna be able to translate it over to the other field on Saturdays.”

Joining Adeleye are three experienced defensive tackles: Dre Butler (Liberty/Auburn), Jarrett Jackson (Florida State) and Jalen Sami (Colorado). All three are in their final year of collegiate eligibility.

Sami experienced several coaching changes in his first five college seasons and bridges the gap between Tucker’s past and present. The sixth-year senior played for Tucker at Colorado in 2019, his first season as a head coach. That was after arriving in 2018 to play for Mike MacIntyre. And staying to play three seasons for Karl Dorrell, then leaving after spending the spring with new Buffaloes coach Deion Sanders.

“Throughout that experience, I've also been through nine position coaches,” Sami said. “This is my fifth head coach, but technically the fourth because I've had Tuck before. Just that experience alone, learning from every coach, I wanted to make sure I felt that connection. … And I already knew what coach Tuck was about.”

With multiple second- and third-year Tucker recruits fighting to emerge with major roles in the secondary, the Spartans added three defensive back transfers to balance the experience. Cornerback Semar Melvin (Wisconsin) enrolled in January, followed by the arrivals of safety Armorion Smith (Cincinnati) and cornerback Terry Roberts (Miami-Florida/Iowa) in the summer. Smith has three years of eligibility left, Melvin two and Roberts just this fall.

MSU’s special teams suffered the graduation loss of All-American punter Bryce Baringer and the departures of kickers Jack Stone (transferred to TCU) and Ben Patton, who no longer is on the roster after transferring to MSU during preseason camp last fall. Tucker and his staff brought in kicker Jonathan Kim from North Carolina and punter Michael O’Shaughnessy from Ohio State to compete for the jobs.

“I just love the culture that he’s built, honestly, and the players that he brought in,” said Mangham, who also played for Tucker at Colorado. “He's very key on what he wants and what he doesn't want, what the standard is — and everyone has to obey that standard. If you can't obey that standard, you got to check yourself.

“I just feel that he's done a great job with that, bringing the team together.”

The question, though, is this: Will this group jell quickly, helping the Spartans succeed like they did in 2021, or will MSU regress, as it did in 2022?

Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan State football seeks difference-makers in latest transfers