Michigan State and Coach Jonathan Smith are in the beginning stages of rebuilding a once proud football program. Like in his previous coaching position, Coach Smith has been tasked with turning around a disappointing football team on the field. After a difficult start to his first offseason at the helm, he has gradually begun making the changes he hopes to see in his football program.
Coach Smith and his coaching staff lost many players to the transfer portal early in the offseason. However, after a few weeks, the Spartans recovered well in the long run. Coach Smith and Michigan State signed many players in the transfer portal, filling most of the voids left by the departures earlier in the offseason.
Michigan State used the transfer portal to add nearly as many players as they had lost to the portal. Coach Smith and his coaching staff added so many talented players from the transfer portal that their transfer portal class ranks near the top ten in college football.
Coach Smith and the Spartans took what was once a detriment to their roster and turned the transfer portal into the valuable tool it can be for many teams, especially those rebuilding like Michigan State. The transfer portal allows a team like Michigan State not to need as many years under their first-year head coach to turn around their program.
Even with all of the additions, the national outlook on the Spartans is still less than optimistic heading into next season. The Spartans' new head coach and a roster with many new players were not enough to convince the experts of Michigan State’s chances for success this upcoming season.
ESPN recently released its Football Power Index for every college football team.
According to ESPN, “the Football Power Index (FPI) is a measure of team strength that is meant to be the best predictor of a team's performance going forward for the rest of the season. FPI represents how many points above or below average a team is. Projected results are based on 20,000 simulations of the rest of the season using FPI, results to date, and the remaining schedule. Ratings and projections update daily.”
ESPN gave the Spartans an FPI rank of 68th, which was the second-worst in the Big Ten.
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EZEKIEL TREZEVANT
Ezekiel is a former Sports Editor from the Western Herald and former Atlanta Falcons beat writer.
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