Shane Beamer calls for severe punishments for coaches who tamper: 'What the hell do we have rules for?'

Shane Beamer called for severe penalties for coaches who tamper with players not in the transfer portal. The South Carolina coach didn’t to want to appear “holier than thou,” but he said something must be done in this day and age of college athletics.

“What the penalty should be, that’s for other people to figure out, but I believe it should be severe,” Beamer said Wednesday. “I mean, if we have rules and we’re not going to enforce them, then what the hell do we have rules for? That’s kind of how I see it. And trust me … Am I sitting here, you know, from what is it, the expression in a glass house or whatever? I’m sure there’s a grey area that we’ve been in at some point and ticked off some school. We try and do things the right way.

“There’s a lot happening right now, just every kid in the portal, every kid in America, has an agent, and those agents are reaching out to schools. That’s happening. I mean, that’s happening during the season, and it’s not just this year. It’s been happening for multiple years where agents of players at other schools are reaching out to colleges about the players they represent.” 

Beamer noted that player agents are the root cause of the problem, but there’s not necessarily a lid to put back onto that bottle. Some players have those situations entirely out of their control.

“Sure there’s players on our team that have agents that their agents were reaching out to schools back during the season,” Beamer said. “That’s just the world we live in. So I’m not sitting here saying we’re holier than thou, we’ve never done anything wrong. I don’t think we have, but there’s certainly a grey area that’s hard to, you know, figure out what’s black and what’s white in so many ways, but I can honestly say, as a head football coach, I’ve never contacted a guy in the portal. Excuse me, ever contacted a guy that’s not in the portal, much less put in a text message, much less said asking what’s your buyout? You know?” 

Moving forward, as Beamer put it, if there’s no severe punishment, such as it being just a slap on the wrist, it’s going to continue. Heck, it could get worse when it comes to player movement in college football.

“And again, I know what’s reported. I don’t know what’s true, what’s not true,” Beamer said. “So I’m not sitting here claiming that I have all the facts, but I know what’s been reported. But I would say that myself and every coach in America is sitting around waiting to see what’s going to happen in regards to that situation, because if it’s proven that did happen, and then nothing happens, then you think it’s the wild wild west now, just wait what it’s going to turn into.”