GLENN GUILBEAU, Tiger Rag Editor
According to NCAA rules, players can enter the Transfer Portal, take a look around, then return to the same school. Former LSU quarterback Myles Brennan did that.
Players can also play for their original team while in the portal taking a look-see, such as in LSU’s College World Series opener on Saturday against Arkansas (6 p.m., ESPN).
LSU COACH JAY JOHNSON MULTI-TASKING WHILE IN NCAA POSTSEASON
Off LSU’s 2025 roster, seven deep backups have entered the portal, including some very talented and highly ranked players. Some are in Omaha with the team, but they will not be dressing out. Or at least, the plan is not to dress them out.
And if some decide they don’t like the offers they receive from other programs and try to return to LSU, coach Jay Johnson said that is likely not going to happen. There are exceptions, but do not expect one.
“They decided they didn’t feel like they could play here,” Johnson said this week. “And that’s OK. Everybody makes decisions for their own reasons. There wasn’t one of them that I said needed to leave, I can tell you that. We’re going to play the best player all the time.”
JAKE BROWN LEADING STRONG LOUISIANA CONTINGENT TO OMAHA
The seven to enter the portal were junior catcher Blaise Priester, junior right-handed pitcher Chandler Dorsey, redshirt sophomore outfielder Mic Paul, redshirt freshman right-handed pitcher Dylan Thompson, freshman infielder David Hogg II, freshman first baseman Ryan Costello and freshman infielder Mike Ryan.
Johnson was asked by Tiger Rag if any of the above players decided to ask back, could they come back?
“Yeah,” he said half-heartedly as that is true, according to NCAA rules. “That’s a very unique circumstance, though. My line with that is we’re not going to negotiate with terrorists, so to speak. But there has been one exception to that in my time here. And the player ended up moving along anyway. It’s one of those things – you cannot play for me and not be all bought into what’s happening here. And if you’re doing that, it’s like the Navy Seals.”
The Navy Seals is short for the U.S. Navy’s Sea, Air and Land (SEAL) special forces with its Team One formally founded in 1962 at the Naval Amphibious Coronado Base in San Diego, where Johnson was an assistant coach from 2006-13.
“Like, if somebody thinks about quitting the Navy Seals, they’re eventually going to quit,” Johnson said. “That’s kind of how I look at it.”
Johnson couldn’t conceive playing a player while he is in the portal.
“That wouldn’t work,” Johnson said.
But Mic Paul, for example, is traveling with the team while in the portal, but he is not on the 27-man roster for the College World Series.
“The dude’s everything right about our program and college baseball,” Johnson said. “I made the personal decision that if this is what he felt like was best and wanted to stay with us through this, I’m OK with that. And his teammates are OK with that.”
Johnson is taking 32 players in all to Omaha with five not in a playing role.
Paul signed with LSU for the 2023 season as the No. 1 outfielder in Utah out of Olympus High in Salt Lake City. He hit .111 (1-for-9) in 12 games before missing all of 2024 with an injury and was red-shirted. He hit .250 this season (2-for-8) in 25 games.
“There is a funny story from 2023,” Johnson said of the season his Tigers won the national championship with some players making the trip who had decided to enter the portal and not return the next season.
“Those other guys, they snuck down into the cages and and threw their uniform on and went out in the dogpile when we won,” Johnson said. “They got dressed out for the dogpile.”
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