Recapping the Inside The League NFL Combine Seminar

Several NFL scouts and a bevvy of college personnel directors and general managers arrived at the Inside The League seminar at the NFL Combine, hosted by ITL founder Neil Stratton. The event featured two discussion panels consisting of 10 current personnel chiefs regarding the future of college football recruiting. Here are some news and tidbits from the event:

In the first panel which was exclusively full of general managers, there were literally five different definitions of what the college general manager role looks like. The common theme of all five was the duty of the general manager is to shape and manage the roster through recruiting – in both high school and the transfer portal – and develop an acquisition and retention plan.

Some general managers had skills geared more toward roster management while others were more on the player evaluation or scouting side, or managing the cap / finances of the roster in the new NIL era. One current GM who was not on the panel told me the status quo is “kind of a mess,” but still evolving.

All five general managers did not believe there should be any restrictions on the number of times players can enter the transfer portal, which was surprising to me.

All five college personnel directors do not believe there should be age limits on who can play college football, an issue that has arisen from players wanting to play after military service or mission trips.

One of the key questions was about the recent transition of NFL scouts to college teams (example: Clemson hired NFL veteran Kevin Kelly to their staff). All agreed they expect this to continue, although they noted that the skill sets of an NFL area scout and a college personnel role are different. Projecting high school players is much different than evaluating college players for the pros.

While the college personnel staffs are rapidly growing, most general managers still expect coaching staffs to be involved in the recruiting process. While coaches’ day-to-day recruiting grind will certainly slow down, they will still have to develop relationships with the players they will coach.