Crim: Mizzou continues swimming around in transfer portal in search for quarterback

Quarterback remains an unsettled position at Missouri.

Coach Eli Drinkwitz continues to be in the market for a veteran transfer as he prepares for his third season in Columbia with hopes of improving on his 11-12 overall record there. Various media outlets reported he hosted former Southern Miss and Mississippi State quarterback Jack Abraham for a visit over the weekend.

The 6-foot Abraham is the fourth known transfer quarterback Missouri has hosted for an on-campus visit. The other three — Arizona State’s Jayden Daniels (he picked LSU), Georgia’s JT Daniels (West Virginia) and Baylor’s Gerry Bohanon (USF) — opted to go elsewhere.

This would be Abraham’s seventh season in college because of two redshirts and a COVID year. He redshirted his first year at Louisiana Tech in 2016, then spent one year at Northwest Mississippi Community College, three years at Southern Miss and one at Mississippi State. He did not play last season because of an injury and will turn 25 in October.

“We’re going to continue to add competition to this quarterback battle, because we need it more to win in this league,” Drinkwitz told the Columbia Missourian prior to the Tigers’ spring game in March.

Connor Bazelak was the co-Freshman of the Year in the SEC in 2020 but struggled with injuries and inconsistent play last season before ultimately falling out of favor — he did not appear in the Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl — and transferring to Indiana. In SEC play, the Tigers averaged 22.6 points per game and topped 30 points only twice last season, resulting in a 3-5 league finish.

(To be fair, the defense was horrid the first two-thirds of the season, getting torched for 35 points by Kentucky, 41 by Boston College and 62 by Tennessee in what were considered three winnable early games that ended in losses. A 43-6 drubbing at Georgia was not as bad as expected.)

Redshirt sophomore Brady Cook and redshirt freshman Tyler Macon return but have little combined experience. True freshman Sam Horn, a four-star recruit from Georgia, could also be in the mix if he doesn’t opt for professional baseball. He has been rated the No. 71 prospect in next month’s Major League Baseball Draft.

Drinkwitz, considered an offensive guru, will need someone to get the ball to Luther Burden, the electric wide receiver from East St. Louis High School. Burden, the top-ranked receiver nationally in the 2022 recruiting class, caught 71 passes for 1,174 yards and 20 touchdowns in leading East St. Louis to the Illinois Class 6A championship game. He also scored on eight of his 21 punt returns.

All transfers must be enrolled in school by June 1.

Mizzou opens the season with non-conference games against Louisiana Tech, Kansas State and Abilene Christian before facing Auburn, Georgia and Florida in successive weeks to open SEC play.

Mizzou went 12-2 in 2013 and 11-3 in 2014, reaching the SEC championship game both seasons, but has posted a 41-44 record in the seven seasons since, finishing with a winning record just twice.

Speaking of the transfer portal …

According to Scott Dochterman of The Athletic, longtime Iowa athletics director Gary Barta is advocating for NCAA institutions to bring back one year of ineligibility for athletic transfers as a way to curb what he calls “the wild, wild west” confluence of name, image and likeness with the transfer portal.

“If we can’t totally control name, image and likeness, then let’s go back and put a one year … if you transfer, you can transfer, you don’t have to lose your scholarship,” Barta said on the school-produced Fight For Iowa Podcast, according to The Athletic. “But you must sit out a year because we can control that, and that, I think, would slow down the name, image and likeness deals.

“A booster isn’t going to offer a student-athlete a big sum of money if they know if they come to their university, they have to sit out a year. But at the same time, once the student is there, they can put together a name, image and likeness package that they benefit from.”

Dochterman reported Barta was among several Big Ten, Big 12 and ACC officials meeting in Scottsdale, Ariz., recently searching for ways to cut down on the rampant tampering officials see throughout football and men’s basketball with NIL and open transfers.

Dochterman wrote that Barta’s proposal comes concurrently with the NCAA releasing guidelines reminding schools that boosters cannot offer money, jobs or other perks to incoming recruits. 

“Allowing movement of student-athletes will continue and allowing student-athletes to benefit from their name, image and likeness will continue,” Barta told The Athletic. “But we’ve got to get it with some rules. Right now, it’s free agency without rules.”

How crazy has name, image and likeness gotten?

An unnamed high school college football player in the class of 2023 has signed a deal that could pay him up to $8 million, The Athletic reported in March. The contract reportedly will pay $350,000 right away, with escalating payments that will total $2 million per year.

It is the largest NIL deal signed by a non-professional athlete, The Athletic reported, citing two unnamed experts.