We all know that the world of college athletics has completely changed with the introduction of NIL and that players are searching to make as much money as possible while in college, but even some moves continue to baffle fans. Yesterday, in what felt completely out of the blue, senior receiver Trebor Pena announced that he would be entering the transfer portal, just a few weeks after being announced as a captain for the 2025 season by head coach Fran Brown. Today, Coach Brown spoke on ESPN Radio Syracuse about the shocking news.
“First off I love the kid, that’s my guy that we recruited to play for me at Temple,” Brown said about Pena. “We paid him enough, he was going to get paid more… There was some numbers that was asked of me that I didn’t think we’d be able to do.”
Hearing that from Coach Brown confirms what every SU fan was definitely thinking, that this was an NIL issue. Despite putting up nearly 1,000 yards last season as McCord’s top guy and probably slating in as the top wideout for this season, Pena decides to go after a bigger payday instead. You can call him a traitor, you could even burn his T-shirt (which was absolutely ridiculous by the way,) but this is just the new normal in college athletics. Loyalty continues to be pushed to the side for financial interest, which when you see what some of these players are receiving, can you really blame them?
In his interview with ESPN Syracuse, Brown also mentioned that he told Pena to hit the portal after hearing some of the offers being made. Who will be the one to serve up those figures to Pena is still yet to be seen, but don’t be surprised if this becomes the norm as the summer continues to progress.
“Man, my son might enter the portal,” Brown joked with ESPN. “These kids see these other guys doing it, why wouldn’t they do it … we might get close to ten more guys put themselves in [the portal.]”
