... between bringing in slightly more "ready now" talent versus letting younger guys earn their stripes while starting. There's always the old way of doing things and the new way, and the more active transfer portal of the past couple of years suggests to me that the new wave is already emerging. Like the emergence (and rapidly, now a necessity) of affiliated RTCs if you want to recruit top talent (kudos to Robie for being ahead of that curve), more regular use of the transfer portal is a reality that the best teams will use to their advantage. If you have a team with podium ambitions and maybe you have two weight divisions where your projected starters are good, but not top 15, more and more coaches are going to fill those spots with a transfer candidate if the guy is there and can step in and probably (rather than just hopefully) give you points in March.

Most teams - except perhaps the top 3 or 4 - have always operated on the premise that they can work in a guy or two who may not be quite ready for primetime, and they're still going to win almost all their duals, and the top 7 or 8 guys will carry them in the conference championships and tournament. But as more and more teams fill those few weak slots with transfers, that will quickly become the norm for the best teams.