Transfer portal is coming to the high school level

Alabama just sent its left tackle to the NFL? The Crimson Tide will hit the transfer portal and pick up a player who excelled at a different school and is ready to take a step up in competition.

Some say it’s ruining the college game as the haves continue to further out-pace the have-nots.

It’s sort of a sordid part of sports and you’re now starting to see it at the high school level, especially in football.

It was a big issue in the Southern Section of the CIF — players develop for a couple years at one school before jumping to the powerhouse team to finish off their high school career.

But now that mentality is finding its way north. Jeff Scheller, San Mateo head football coach and athletic director, knows of two players from Peninsula Athletic League football teams that transferred from public schools to private schools.

I’m sure he’s not alone in hearing about these kind of moves.

“We’ve never had to deal with that stuff. … (But) you’re seeing it more,” Scheller said. “If we start seeing a trend of kids leaving public schools for privates, I might be done.”

It used to be the other way around. There are countless stories of Peninsula players starting their high school career at a private school and transferring to a local public school. There are also countless incidents of athletes eschewing their local public school to take their talents to private schools for their high school athletic careers.

“(Transferring) public school to public school is one thing. A family moves or whatever,” Scheller said, or it is an inter-district transfer between two schools in the same district, like San Mateo and Aragon, for instance.

Scheller said he encountered another emerging trend for the first time — the “reclassifying” athlete. It is a way to give athletes an extra year of prep time before beginning their high school athletic clock, so they are 18, 19 years old, playing against 16- and 17-year-olds during their senior year.

Students can either simply repeat a grade or do home-schooling for a year and enter high school a year older.

Scheller said he received an email from the parent of a prospective San Mateo High School student, who was excited about seeing their son play football at San Mateo.

Then the kid doesn’t show up during the summer, fall camp starts and Scheller learns that the student will reclassify and enroll at private high school next year as a freshman.

And in this case, Scheller doesn’t mind.

“I’m OK with that. I’d honestly rather not have him. We’re not going to give him what he wants,” Scheller said. “The ones that bug me are the ones that are here, get the time in and then it’s on to another level.”

What bothers Scheller the most is the fact that it further gets away from what the point of high school athletics is — it’s an extension of the classroom, not a business.

“Education-based athletics — I believe in that,” Scheller said.

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Scheller was talking to The Sports Lounge from his new digs in San Mateo’s brand-new gymnasium, which the school took control of last week.

“I just finished up a chalk session,” Scheller said, whose football team officially moved in Monday.

“It was awkward, but it was great,” Scheller said. “The locker room before, had no coaches’ space. We’re usually in a classroom setting if we’re doing chalk, but now we can do it in the locker room.”

It becomes the third gym facility on the San Mateo campus. The main gym is shared by both the San Mateo Union High School District and the city of San Mateo. The other gym is really more of a practice facility with very limited seating space for events.

This new facility give the school first priority for use, as well as new, spacious locker rooms for athletes.

Scheller said a ribbon-cutting ceremony is schedule for the Bearcats’ football opener Aug. 29 against Los Altos.

Nathan Mollat has been covering high school sports in San Mateo County for the San Mateo Daily Journal since 2001. He can be reached by email: nathan@smdailyjournal.com.