Michigan State Football: No need to worry about recent recruiting misses

The 2023 recruiting class for Michigan State football is off to a great start, but it’s hit a bit of a wall, and that’s OK — for now.

A month ago, Michigan State football was in its hottest recruiting stretch in over five years.

Mel Tucker had landed a handful of four-star recruits in the month of June to kick off official visit season and the Spartans rose all the way to the top-10 range in the 2023 recruiting class.

Everything was trending in the right direction for Michigan State but the class hit a wall when July rolled around even though the Spartans did pick up commitments from Cole Dellinger and Bai Jobe. The class rose to nine four-star commits and 12 pledges overall, but after a string of tough misses such as Payton Kirkland, Caleb Presley, Elliot Washington, Jayden Wayne, and most recently Chase Bisontis, fans are beginning to question the reason.

Some are worried, but most realize it’s just the name of the game.

And that’s exactly what everyone needs to realize: it’s going to be OK.

Tucker has picked up the most four-star commitments in a single class in years and he’s on the verge of landing 10-plus and yet some fans who are two years removed from a 2-5 season and three removed from a second straight seven-win season are worried about the recruiting losses.

Michigan State signed the No. 25 recruiting class in 2022 and currently has a top-25 class for 2023 and that’s an unprecedented amount of recruiting success this early in a coaching tenure — especially after mediocre seasons and a sudden, unexpected retirement by a legendary head coach.

The class currently sits at No. 25 nationally and has 12 commitments and there are still some top targets left on the board, but fans are worried about losing Bisontis, Kirkland, Wayne, Enow Etta, Washington, and Presley. Don’t be worried.

Why? The transfer portal exists.

Michigan State swung for the fences after its first good season under Tucker and came in second and third place for some big names in the recruiting class but another solid campaign should help them win those battles. Plus, landing one more hefty transfer class is only going to help expedite the process as the Spartans should add another 8-10 impact transfers next season and turn that into a 9-10 win year.

In the early years of building a program (which Tucker is still in), utilizing the portal to land double-digit players is fine, but in the coming classes, Tucker will have to land more of these Plan A guys and cut the portal additions down to 4-5. Everything is still well on track.

The transfer portal exists and Tucker is not afraid to use it. He’s going to make up for these recruiting losses one way or another and MSU will be just fine.