College Football

Caleb Williams to USC continues 'Oklahoma West' transformation

Updated Dec. 13, 2022 3:10 p.m. ET

By RJ Young
FOX Sports College Football Writer

After a month of speculation and rumor following quarterback Caleb Williams' decision to enter into the NCAA transfer portal, he announced Tuesday his decision to transfer to USC.

What’s shocking about Williams’ decision is not that he chose to transfer but that such an event was a far thought from almost every college football fan’s mind as recently as October 2021.

Williams announced his commitment to Oklahoma to great fanfare in July 2020. With fireworks going off behind him, lighting up the Washington, D.C., skyline, he donned an OU hat and threw the "horns down" finger sign in a live broadcast.

In now choosing to become a Trojan, Williams follows former Oklahoma coach Lincoln Riley to Los Angeles — along with former OU wide receiver Mario Williams and nearly half of the 2021 OU coaching staff.

The joke is the 2022 USC Trojans could also be known as "Oklahoma West." But the move also underscores a dominant trend in the sport: Loyalty is not to a program or school but to individuals.

With Riley choosing to leave Norman hours after the regular season ended, several important contributors and star players made the same decision.

Quarterback Spencer Rattler and tight end Austin Stogner transferred to South Carolina. Wide receiver Jadon Haselwood transferred to Arkansas, and players verbally committed to Oklahoma's one-time No. 1 overall 2023 recruiting class, including top quarterback Malachi Nelson, flipped their pledges to USC.

Meanwhile, Williams, who was one of the most highly coveted players to enter his name into the portal following the 2021 season, has become a Macbeth character in this still unfolding story of seized opportunity (USC) and perceived betrayal (OU) in what is becoming a quite entertaining feud between the Trojans and Sooners.

USC should strike fear into opponents in 2022, with Riley and Williams headlining an outstanding coaching staff and Trojans roster.

In addition to Williams, who relieved Rattler to lead OU to a comeback win against Texas last season and received Heisman consideration until the Sooners suffered a loss to eventual Big 12 champion Baylor, the Trojans return wide receiver and 2018 National Gatorade Player of the Year Jake Smith. Then there's the 2022 No. 5 player and No. 2 cornerback in the country (Domani Jackson), the No. 3 running back in the country (Raleek Brown) and former Oregon running back Travis Dye, who rushed for nearly 1,300 yards last season.

Already, USC’s games against Fresno State, at defending Pac-12 champion Utah and season finale against Notre Dame are must-see events in Riley’s first season. But there’s still more roster management to be figured out before the college football season kicks off in August, much of which was kicked off by Riley’s decision.

In fact, four quarterbacks who started multiple games in 2021 decided to transfer as a result of Riley being named USC coach.

After Rattler made his decision and Williams entered the portal, former USC quarterback Kedon Slovis entered the portal and has since transferred to Pittsburgh.

Another quarterback who started games at USC in 2021, 2020 National Gatorade Player of the Year Jaxson Dart, entered his name into the portal and has since transferred to Ole Miss.

After Dart left, yet another former USC starting quarterback, JT Daniels, entered the portal. As the starter at USC, Daniels tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee, and that injury sidelined him early in 2019. Slovis assumed the starting job, and Daniels transferred to Georgia in the spring of 2020.

Daniels started for the Dawgs in the 2020 Peach Bowl, but UGA quarterback Stetson Bennett earned the starting job in 2021 and led Georgia to the College Football Playoff National Championship. After Bennett announced he was returning to UGA for his final year of eligibility, Daniels began pursuit of his third transfer in three years.

Daniels was a five-star prospect in the 2017 class and a former National Gatorade Player of the Year himself. That means USC has signed three National Gatorade Players of the Year since 2018.

Talent has always found its way to USC, and Trojan athletic director Mike Bohn securing Riley has led many Trojan fans to believe they have the architect to build the program back to where it was when Pete Carroll roamed the sideline at the Coliseum.

Riley will have to do that in this age of rapid transfers and constant roster management. In April 2021, the NCAA lifted its requirement that first-time transfers must sit out for a year, making every first-time transfer football player immediately eligible to play if he is a student in good standing.

More players than ever have elected to try to find new places to play football, and many coaches are still grappling with how to keep their players out of the portal.

Players impatient to play, as well as those trying to extricate themselves from what they view as bad situations, would rather bet on themselves than trust their current coaches. Still other players are finding out that their scholarships won’t be renewed and are escorted to their school’s compliance office to initiate the transfer process.

While most coaches want to limit when players can enter the portal, players correctly point out that coaches can leave a program for another at any time, for any reason, and often the reason is financial.

The tension between management (coaches and administrators) and labor (players) in college football has never been so fractious.

All this while coaches, players and the NCAA at-large continue to grapple with Name, Image and Likeness legislation as elected officials at the state and federal levels look to develop their own remedies. The business of this sport — hiring, firing, transfers, signings, NIL — is becoming more visible and displays the uglier part of modern college football.

The second recruitment of Williams, in which he was reported to be entertaining not just USC but also Georgia, LSU, OU and even Wisconsin, is normal now. With National Signing Day on Wednesday, college football fans are getting used to the idea that players are likely to be recruited twice in their college football careers — once when entering college and again the day they enter the portal.

Loyalty, even on national championship teams, is not guaranteed for players or coaches. Loyalty in college football is commodified and monetized.

"The loyalty well held to fools does make Our faith mere folly," as Shakespeare wrote.

RJ Young is a national college football writer and analyst for FOX Sports and the host of the podcast "The No. 1 Ranked Show with RJ Young." Follow him on Twitter at @RJ_Young, and subscribe to "The RJ Young Show" on YouTube. He is not on a StepMill.