Notre Dame Fighting Irish news: Secrecy in the transfer portal

With many teams’ insiders reporting visits that transfers are taking, the beat on Notre Dame football has been unusually quiet. Besides the Sam Hartman noise, the Irish have been a somewhat mysterious and surprising team this offseason. While they’ve landed Spencer Shrader, Ben Krimm, Kaleb Smith, Sam Hartman, and Thomas Harper, all but one has been relatively out of the blue.

Thomas Harper was the latest to commit to the Fighting Irish, and people only knew of his visit to South Bend thanks to a tweet from Harper. He was on campus for a visit last week for a couple of days and committed shortly after his visit. The safety from Oklahoma State should play a significant role for the Irish next year as they’re set to lose safety Brandon Joseph.

I’ve seen some calling for more depth at the safety position and to target someone such as Jalen Catalon from Arkansas. However, I’ll trust coaches Freeman, O’Leary, and Mickens, who seem to have an excellent eye for secondary talent. Harper can play both the nickelback position and safety, which offers the Irish plenty of versatility. He also seems to have some great speed which has been missing from the veterans in the room lately.

We’ve used this example countless times, but Benajmin Morrison went from afterthought to All-American in short order. Jaden Mickey quietly had a fantastic ending to the season, and the Irish seem to have something with Xavier Watts and Ramon Henderson at safety as well. But, if there’s one area on the field Notre Dame football has gotten the most from their players, it would have to be the secondary.

We’ve heard Byron Vaughns was visiting the Notre Dame football program this past weekend but haven’t heard much else. So far, he has been the only guy directly connected to Notre Dame who hasn’t committed to the team or gone elsewhere.

The Irish would do well to add a few more players to the team this offseason, but not much has been made public as to what they’re doing. I don’t mind the secrecy even in the slightest. I hope they’re working as hard as everyone believes they are to add positive pieces to this team.