Matt Hayes believes Dabo Swinney recently took a hard lesson.
From there, in his perspective, Clemson isn’t slipping in a wake of bad breaks and near losses — rather, it is slipping because it won’t make the transition to a collegiate football life that’s not the same. A truth that Hayes openly calls an “If you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’” era.
And in that framing, Swinney is not a whistleblower. He’s some old-timey idealist being passed over by programs ready to do anything to get something done. Hayes points to the numbers.
Since the NIL period began, Clemson has lost 20 games — more than it lost in the past decade while struggling against Alabama, Ohio State, and Georgia at the highest level of the game. A 2025 season that initially announced national championship aspirations ended in something of a quiet defeat, and one wrapped up with a bowl loss against Penn State that came out as more a series of fortuitous afterthoughts than a meaningful measurement.
To Hayes, it’s no accident. That’s regression.
And when Swinney laid out Clemson’s tampering allegations against Ole Miss, in public — phone calls and texts, timing and money — that day, Hayes noticed irony, not bravery. By calling out Ole Miss, Hayes contends, Clemson inadvertently laid itself bare.
Not because the accusations weren’t serious — but because they underscored how far behind Clemson is compared to the sport’s most aggressive operators.
“Clemson is not playing at the same, whatever-it-takes level when it comes to player procurement,” Hayes wrote.
That is the heart of his argument. One side pushes back on every line.
The other grumbles about the limits. The narrative is exacerbated by recruiting rankings. Clemson is currently outside the top 30 in transfer portal rankings, being behind rivals and conference peers. The Tigers’ high school class comes in at about No. 19 — behind South Carolina and well behind Miami, Florida State, and North Carolina. And at the same time, Clemson’s 2026 opener against LSU looms big — and the Tigers will be looking across the field at a roster assembled through cutthroat portal maneuvering and elite high school recruiting.
Ole Miss, the rival program Swinney had accused of tampering, has just continued to accumulate players in both ways. Hayes’ decision is devastating but also evident: Clemson’s decline from the national elite isn’t a matter of good luck. It’s about philosophy. But here, where the story becomes more complicated.
Because Hayes is not wrong about the sport.
College football became an arms race with fewer rules and fewer consequences. The gray areas are no longer gray — they’re openly exploited. Everyone knows it. Few want to say it. Dabo Swinney said it anyway.
And that matters.
ESPN insider Pete Thamel shared that Swinney’s move wasn’t ridiculed behind the scenes — it was applauded. ''
“People want rules,” Thamel said. “People want guardrails. But college athletics has always been about the rules being made and people finding a way around them.”
That’s the uncomfortable truth. The problem is not enforcement — it’s willingness.
Nobody wanted to follow the rules so nobody did. And no one changes unless someone forces the issue. Swinney forced the issue.
Was it risky? Absolutely.
Did it invite criticism? Of course.
But calling it ignorance misses the point.
This wasn’t Dabo being naïve. It was Dabo drawing a line. Clemson might not be winning the portal race. Perhaps it’s not fully exploiting every loophole. It can also be a cost of restraint that’s a battle, for one thing, against a competing market. But Swinney is not lost with the era he currently inhabits. He is questioning whether it’s sustainable — or even something worth going for. Matt Hayes has a point about some things, for a whole other question: college football tends to reward those who do not mind pushing the envelope a bit too much.
But he misses another that is wrong, I don’t think. This is not Clemson learning a hard lesson. This is Clemson choosing the lessons it’s willing to accept — and the ones it refuses to learn. And that choice will shape whatever happens next.