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Carson Beck is in the transfer portal and suitors are lining up significant chunks of capital to bring the former Georgia quarterback to their respective campuses.
Reports surfaced on Thursday that, rather than try his luck in the 2025 NFL Draft, Beck was entering the transfer portal and leaving Athens after 5 seasons with the Bulldogs. Immediately, he was linked to Miami by ESPN’s Pete Thamel. On3’s Pete Nakos followed up with a report that Ohio State and Texas Tech were also teams to watch in his transfer recruitment.
Whoever lands the quarterback will be spending upwards of $2 million to do so, according to Thamel.
“I would think that Carson Beck, over $2 million — just my general estimate — would be about the market he has,” Thamel said Thursday on the Pat McAfee Show. “And it’s just exponentially bigger than it was a year ago.”
Beck finished the 2024 season with 3,485 passing yards, 28 touchdowns, and 12 picks while completing 64.7% of his passes. For his career, Beck has 7,912 yards and 58 touchdowns against 20 interceptions. He also has 5 rushing scores.
He went 24-3 as a starter with the Bulldogs, leading them to an Orange Bowl beatdown of Florida State in 2023 and an SEC Championship Game appearance this season.
But Beck was knocked out of the SEC title game against Texas with what was later revealed to be an injury to the UCL in his throwing arm. He had successful surgery on his elbow last month and is expected to begin throwing again in the spring.
While the injury may have impacted his ability to work out for NFL clubs, it probably won’t be a limiting factor in the transfer portal. Beck immediately becomes the top-ranked transfer to enter the portal this cycle, per 247Sports.
The market has already seen players like John Mateer (Wazzu to Oklahoma), Fernando Mendoza (Cal to Indiana), and Miller Moss (USC to Louisville) change zip codes but no one to date has hit the transfer market with Beck’s pedigree.
It’s worth mentioning here that Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers was reportedly offered $6 million just to eschew the NFL Draft and enter the transfer portal. With Beck actually in the transfer portal, perhaps a team has to overpay to get him to town.
“An average power conference starter is in the $700,000 to $1 million range at this point,” Thamel said on McAfee’s show. “Your high, high-end guys, I’ve heard numbers eclipsing $3 million this year in this market. We’re at a confluence in the market path where the places that had large NIL stashes, now basically these guys can double-dip. You can unload all the NIL money you have because you have rev-share money coming. … Right now, it’s almost like the market is flooded and guys are getting overpaid.”
Derek Peterson does a bit of everything, not unlike Taysom Hill. He has covered Oklahoma, Nebraska, the Pac-12, and now delivers CFB-wide content.
