Former Mississippi State, Michigan State guard Rocket Watts enters transfer portal

Mississippi State guard Rocket Watts has entered the NCAA Transfer Portal, according to On3’s Matt Zenitz. A former Michigan State player, Watts previously transferred to Starkville last offseason.

Because this is the second transfer for Watts in as many years, he will need a waiver from the NCAA to play at a Division I school in 2022-23.

Watts was an on and off member of the starting lineup his first two college seasons with Michigan State, and was named to the Big Ten All-Freshman Team following the 2019-20 season. He finished his career with the Spartans averaging 8.4 points and 2.2 assists across 22.5 minutes per game.

The 6-foot-2 guard saw his production take a dip in 2021-22 with the Bulldogs, as he appeared in only 19 games for an average of 13.1 minutes. Mississippi State finished the season 18-16, falling to Virginia in the first round of the NIT.

A four-star prospect coming out of high school, Watts ranked as the No. 5 point guard and No. 27 overall player in the 2019 class according to On3 Consensus. He chose to attend Michigan State over offers from Connecticut, Florida State, Oregon and many others.

Transfer portal background information for Rocket Watts 

The NCAA Transfer Portal, which covers every NCAA sport at the Division I, II and III levels, is a private database with names of student-athletes who wish to transfer. It is not accessible to the public.

The process of entering the portal is done through a school’s compliance office. Once a player provides written notification of an intent to transfer, the office enters the player’s name in the database and everything is off and running. The compliance office has 48 hours to comply with the player’s request and that request cannot be refused.

Once a player’s name shows up in the portal, other schools can contact the player. Players can change their minds at any point and withdraw from the portal. However, once a player enters the portal, the current scholarship no longer has to be honored. In other words, if a player enters the portal but decides to stay, the school is not obligated to provide a scholarship anymore.

The database is a normal database, sortable by a variety of topics, including (of course) sport and name. A player’s individual entry includes basic details such as contact info, whether the player was on scholarship and whether the player is transferring as a graduate student.

A player can ask that a “do not contact” tag be placed on the report. In those instances, the players don’t want to be  contacted by schools unless they’ve initiated the communication.

The portal has been around since Oct. 15, 2018 and the new calendar cycle within the portal begins each August. For example, the 2021-22 cycle started Aug. 1. During the 2020-21 cycle, 2,626 FBS football players entered the transfer portal (including walk-ons). That comes after 1,681 entered during the 2019-20 cycle and 1,709 during the abbreviated 2018-19 cycle. In comparison, 1,833 Division I basketball players entered the portal during the 2020-21 cycle after totals of 1,020 in 2019-20 and 1,063 in 2018-19.