It’s way different than NFL free agency. In the NFL they sign contracts with terms that both player and team negotiate and have to honor, with certain guarantees. This is quite literally not regulated in any way and boosters, fans or companies can pay whoever they want, whatever they want. No ones supposed to be talking to anyone until they actually enter the portal, but if someone from Iowa (just using them as an example, don’t kill me) wants to get someone from let’s say Virginia. Some rich Iowa fan in the hallway outside NCAA’s can run in to that kids old high school coach or their parent or uncle and say “I have on pretty good authority if your kid enters the portal, we can find a way to get him $50k a year. And if we can’t, he can just pull his name out of the portal no harm done” and it works. Sometimes. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk