Florida Gators pitcher Clete Hartzog will enter the transfer portal
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Florida Gators right-handed pitcher Clete Hartzog will enter the transfer, Gators Online has learned. Hartzog will have one more year of eligibility after pitching for Florida in 2023.
Hartzog was a three-time letter winner in baseball as a two-way player under head coach Jon Hudson at Mosley High School. He went to junior college at Wallace Community College-Dothan after high school. He competed there from 2021-22 and was named the 2022 ACCC South Division Pitcher of the Year. Hartzog struck out 10.5 batters per nine innings including an 11.9 K/9 in 2022.
Hartzog enrolled at Florida in the fall and quickly earned a role. The JUCO product was positing himself for a role as the Gators’ closer. When the team returned for spring practice before the season, Hartzog didn’t match his performance from the fall.
He pitched his first game for the Gators against Jacksonville, striking out all three batters he faced. Hartzog recorded his first 11 outs via strikeout but would only make seven appearances and log 6.1 innings of work. Hartzog is draft eligible and could sign with a team following the 2023 MLB Draft.
Backround on the transfer portal and Clete Hartzog
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.
