Michigan State football: Aaron Brule shares interesting thoughts on recent transfers

Michigan State football lost quite a few players on Tuesday, and former linebacker Aaron Brule took to X to address this exodus.

April 30 marked the final open day of the transfer portal for college football. Like most of the country, Michigan State football was not exempt from last-minute transfers. In fact, the Spartans were hit pretty heavy, with three former starters and a rotational running back all hitting the portal.

In the wake of some of these transfers, along with the departures of both Simeon Barrow Jr. and Derrick Harmon, one former Michigan State football player decided to speak out. Aaron Brule, a standout defender from last season, took to X to voice his thoughts.

Somebody need to wrap the arms around these young bulls, your career ain’t worth transferring for some temporary bread 🤦🏽‍♂️. Think career first. This getting out of hand!

— Aaron Brule’ (@_AllOutAaron_) April 30, 2024

Context on the Michigan State football transfers

In case you did not see between both these recent transfers and the defensive tackle transfers, it appears that multiple players are hitting the portal to try to increase their pay. While some players, such as the walk-on or depth position players like running back Jaren Mangham, would transfer for playing time for obvious reasons, others want a higher purse for their play.

The four hitting the portal on Tuesday were the Mangham brothers and linemen Geno VanDeMark and Ethan Boyd.

This was a sentiment expressed in message boards, with unnamed players allegedly using the transfer portal as a bargaining piece. According to multiple accounts on X, for example, Harmon was already the highest-paid defensive tackle in the Big Ten before he hit the portal. Others, such as a few that hit the portal on Tuesday, were planning on using the portal as a leveraging chip to get a bigger payday. If that was the case, it appears the staff called their bluff, and players entered the portal.

I will defend Boyd here, as rumors are saying that he is thinking of leaving football entirely and had been passed up on the depth chart.

Aaron Brule continues to be an ambassador for the program

When reading over his words, my first thought was that it was a relief to see that even the players think the play-to-pay has gotten out of hand. It was not even until I read some comments under Brule’s post that I remembered something: Brule himself is a transfer.

Brule was a rotational linebacker at Mississippi State who showed enough promise to be in mock drafts as a Day 2 selection at one point. He elected to head north to the superior MSU, and put together a strong final season in 2023. Despite his season, where he led the team in sacks and was arguably the best linebacker (alongside Jordan Hall), he went undrafted last weekend. He settled for a minicamp invite with his hometown New Orleans Saints, and still took the time to speak on his program.

Honestly, if anyone has a reason to just avoid this topic or side with the players, it could be argued Brule does. His draft stock fell, the head coach he agreed to play for got fired in disgrace, and he saw the team go from 11-1 before he came to 4-8 in his final year. Brule could have avoided the topic or resented the Michigan State football program for how his final two years of eligibility played out. Instead, he took to X to tell his fellow defenders and former teammates (in vague terms without addressing anyone) that they would regret the short-term bag at the cost of loyalty and comradery.

I’m sure some of this came from pre-draft questions about his own transfer. He wants these players to think career-wise. Another post on X noted that using other jobs as leveraging chips in a world outside of football would not fly if it was used twice in four months. The linebacker knows exactly what he is talking about. He bleeds green and played with these players last season, but even he has seen enough.

The grass is not always greener on the other side

While some players (enter Keon Coleman) wound up with both the money and a better situation, that’s not always the case for Michigan State football transfers. Multiple players that have hit the portal from MSU in the past found themselves without a home to play college football after. The main example of this playing out is that of 2021 linebacker Quavaris Crouch, who went from an impact linebacker with multiple clutch tackles to being out of football entirely. Additionally, many players have ended up taking steps down. We even saw this last year with Justin White now playing football for Davenport in Division II and Bai Jobe’s best visit being Kansas after leaving the Spartans. While the step down for some players such as White and the like makes sense for playing time, I would use the case of Jobe and Crouch as a cautionary tale.

One last point before I leave is that this is not cause to panic.

Michigan State football was a 4-8 team last season and many of these players in the portal are in their final two seasons of eligibility. While losing the players might hurt the win total for next year, the player development from additional playing time could be massive in the long term. At the very worst, it might wind up being a situation where Jonathan Smith’s Spartans and former Spartans are in a mutually beneficial situation.