(Editor’s note: Claire Ginder is a true junior infielder at Texas State. After spending her freshman season at Furman, Ginder entered the transfer portal in 2021 and ultimately transferred to Texas State. In this player blog, she shares – quite candidly – her thoughts on the transfer portal both from personal experience and as someone observing the continuous movement through the portal.)
by Claire Ginder
Exclusive to Extra Inning Softball
Transferring has always been around, but with recent waivers and free transfer opportunities, it has become more widely recognized as the “transfer portal” throughout the softball community. Everyone is going to have their own opinions about it, but it’s important to watch what language is used when talking about transfers. All over social media you can find posts that transfers are selfish, lazy, soft, uncommitted, and everything in between.
What people on the outside fail to realize is how much really goes into the decision to transfer.
I transferred after my freshman season. Looking from the outside in, there should have been no reason for me to leave. I was a starter, I played basically every game, at the top of the batting order, and was on the All-Freshman team in my conference. What no one else could see is how much that season destroyed me as a player and a person. Any confidence I had in my abilities was gone. At the time, I did not feel the same love for the game that I had prior; the last thing I wanted to do was step back onto the field every day.
Because of this, I made the decision to transfer and it was truly the best decision I could have possibly made for myself. I love the game again and I am even more passionate about it than I used to be. I will never take that for granted again. I am happy, confident, and completely bought into the program, my school, and my life here.
I was first drawn to Texas State by the tradition of winning that the program had. I wanted to experience what it felt like to be on the winning side of the game. But I knew that there had to be so much more than that before making my decision. Originally, I wanted to stay much closer to home but my visit to the school changed my mind. Not only were there great athletic facilities – facilities that I had yet to have in my college career – but I saw an athletic department and a university that supported their athletes. I found a school that felt like a home away from home and I found coaches that I knew not only wanted to win, but supported their players and wanted to see them succeed as well.
All these things combined (along with a few other aspects) gave me the confidence to transfer and still love the life I have here at Texas State.
This is just a fraction of my story, and you do not know the stories of other athletes transferring. I have seen too many players quit the game that they loved because of the situations they thought they were stuck in. Most of us only get four years of college athletics; there is no reason to stay in a place that will not allow us to thrive and that will not prepare you for the next stage of your life.
We preach protecting our athletes both physically and mentally, so why do we scrutinize decisions that they make for themselves to be happy? Being a collegiate athlete is a job, simple as that. There is a lot of pressure and expectations that come with that; we should be in a program and at a school that we can be completely bought in to.
College athletics is more than just the sport; you learn valuable skills to help you achieve success after college as well. We do not scrutinize people for changing jobs or choosing a better opportunity for themselves, so why do we do it to athletes?
The transfer portal is not a perfect system, but then again, nothing really is. It gives players the ability to make decisions for themselves. Do not vilify athletes for finally finding their right fit. Stop telling players to ”just suck it up and deal with it’ because there is so much more that goes into these decisions that we do not know about.
We have lost too many athletes to act like that’s all there is to it.
