Jayden Daniels officially enters NCAA Transfer Portal

After rumors swirled, Arizona State quarterback Jayden Daniels entered the transfer portal Thursday afternoon, On3’s Matt Zenitz has learned.

Daniels told coaches about his plans to enter the portal on Thursday, according to Sun Devil Source, and people close to him have reportedly been in touch with other schools, including a Pac-12 program.

After Daniels made the decision, Arizona State players were heard using choice words about him while cleaning out his locker. Warning: The video contains explicit language.

“(Daniels) sucks anyways,” one player appeared to say.

He tied for first in the Pac-12 with a 65.4% completion percentage to help Arizona State to an 8-5 record in 2021. He also totaled for 2,381 yards and 10 touchdowns, but threw 10 interceptions in 13 games.

At ASU, Daniels completed 62.4% of his passes for 6,025 yards and 32 touchdowns in 29 games over three years.

Out of high school from the class of 2019, Daniels was a four-star recruit and the No. 8-ranked recruit from the state of California, according to the On3 Consensus, a complete and equally weighted industry-generated average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

It continues to be a turbulent offseason for Arizona State, which has seen multiple assistants leave the program due to an NCAA investigation. Both Sun Devils coordinators, including offensive coordinator Zak Hill, departed. Now, their quarterback is leaving, as well.

Click here for a full list of NCAA Transfer Portal rankings.

Transfer portal background information 

The NCAA Transfer Portal, which covers every NCAA sport at the Division I, II and III levels, is a private database with names of student-athletes who wish to transfer. It is not accessible to the public.

The process of entering the portal is done through a school’s compliance office. Once a player provides written notification of an intent to transfer, the office enters the player’s name in the database and everything is off and running. The compliance office has 48 hours to comply with the player’s request and that request cannot be refused.

Once a player’s name shows up in the portal, other schools can contact the player. Players can change their minds at any point and withdraw from the portal. However, once a player enters the portal, the current scholarship no longer has to be honored. In other words, if a player enters the portal but decides to stay, the school is not obligated to provide a scholarship anymore.

The database is a normal database, sortable by a variety of topics, including (of course) sport and name. A player’s individual entry includes basic details such as contact info, whether the player was on scholarship and whether the player is transferring as a graduate student.

A player can ask that a “do not contact” tag be placed on the report. In those instances, the players don’t want to be  contacted by schools unless they’ve initiated the communication.

The portal has been around since Oct. 15, 2018 and the new calendar cycle within the portal begins each August. For example, the 2021-22 cycle started Aug. 1. During the 2020-21 cycle, 2,626 FBS football players entered the transfer portal (including walk-ons). That comes after 1,681 entered during the 2019-20 cycle and 1,709 during the abbreviated 2018-19 cycle. In comparison, 1,833 Division I basketball players entered the portal during the 2020-21 cycle after totals of 1,020 in 2019-20 and 1,063 in 2018-19.