One of the top rated and highly sought-after players in the 247Sports transfer portal will be checking out Michigan.
Penn graduate transfer defensive tackle Joey Slackman has confirmed with The Michigan Insider that he will be taking a visit to Ann Arbor this weekend.
“I am visiting this coming weekend,” Slackman told The Michigan Insider. “They’re one of the best and I’m looking into them closely. Excited to speak with the staff further.”
The 6-foot-4, 300-pound Slackman holds over 20 scholarship offers since entering the transfer portal last month including picking up a scholarship from the Wolverines in late November.
The former Ivy League standout is rated a four-star prospect in the 247Sports Transfer Portal Ranking as he sits as the No. 22 overall prospect and No. 3 defensive lineman.
Slackman, who hails from Commack, New York on Long Island, initially enrolled at Penn in 2019 to wrestle, he opted to return to football after a freshman year injury and after Ivy League sports canceled all 2020-21 athletics. He played in nine games along the defensive line in 2021, recording 16 tackles and 3.5 tackles for loss, then truly blossomed as an upperclassman. Over the 2022 and 2023 seasons, Slackman recorded 99 tackles, 21.5 tackles for loss, and 8.5 sacks in 19 games.
He was also credited for 49 quarterback pressures in that time and 44 run stops, per Pro Football Focus. In 2022, he had the 12th-highest grade among FCS defensive tackles per PFF, and was the No. 1 graded tackle this season.
Entering the NCAA’s Transfer Portal does not mean a player is going elsewhere, of course, as players are free to withdraw from the portal if they choose. That said, the next few weeks are expected to see hundreds and even thousands of players transfer elsewhere in the FBS. This is the first cycle with transfer portal windows, which stretch from Dec. 5 to January 18 for the FBS with another period from April 15-30. No longer can players enter the portal whenever they please, though there are always exceptions to the rules. Graduate transfers and players whose head coaches have left the program are not subjected to these guidelines, which is why athletes have already started entering the portal.
Schools are also no longer limited to signing just 25 initial counters per cycle. This means programs can aggressively rework their rosters to sign up to their 85-scholarship limit. Many across the country believe that this will lead to players being run off rosters. The NCAA also passed a rule that schools are required to keep transfer athletes on scholarship through the completion of their eligibility clock or until they complete their undergraduate degree. This means there’s more risk than ever in taking an undergraduate transfer, because they’re stuck on the roster no matter what.