Oregon Ducks freshman defensive back enters the transfer portal

According to Matt Zennitz of On3, Oregon Ducks freshman defensive back Jaylin Davies has entered the transfer portal. Specifically playing cornerback, Davies came out of Mater Dei High School and was a member of the 2021 recruiting class.

Davies only appeared in two games during his time in Eugene, playing against Stony Brook and in the Alamo Bowl against the Oklahoma Sooners. He finished the season with three tackles, all in the bowl game.

Coming out of high school, Davies was a four-star prospect according to the On3 Consensus, a complete and equally weighted industry-generated average that utilizes all four major recruiting services. He ranked as the No. 15 cornerback in the country and the No. 14 player out of the state of California.

Before committing to Oregon, Davies dropped a top four list consisting of Arizona State, Ohio State, the Ducks, and USC. He will now go through the transfer portal process, hoping to find a new home for his redshirt freshman season.

NCAA transfer portal background information for Davies, Oregon Ducks

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.