Is Minnesota Baseball’s Transfer Portal Class the Best in the Big Ten?

The Minnesota Gophers were in desperate need of improvement to their baseball program following the 2025 season. First-year head coach Ty McDevitt recorded quite the disappointment of a first season with the Gophers. The team saw a drastic decline in performance toward the end of their season, losing six of their final nine in-conference matchups. The losses didn’t end there, though. In the off-season, the Gophers then lost three key athletes to the monster that is the transfer portal. McDevitt made sure not to let his first season define him as a Big Ten coach and made some portal moves of his own. Now that the portal is closed and the academic year is starting, it appears that the eleven athlete transfer portal class selected by McDevitt may just be the best in the Big Ten. 

Four of the 11 players picked up by McDevitt and the Gophers’ coaching staff come from outside Division 1 play. This is becoming more and more common amongst D1 programs. The landscape of college sports has changed with NIL and the transfer portal. Overall, this was a smart move for the Gophers because taking players outside the D1 rank is not only cheaper, but also is an easy way to quench the need for developing talent that will expand their team. 

Two standout players coming from programs with a D1 ranking are Isaac Morton, who entered the portal from Texas A&M, and Michael Lippe, who entered the portal from Louisville. Morton will bring the Gophers some much-needed improvement in their pitching staff. He played both his freshman and sophomore seasons with the Aggies. In his freshman year, the Aggies cruised their way to Omaha, nearly winning it all. In 2024, Morton recorded a 2.87 ERA across 10 games played and struck out ten batters. The six-foot-three Minnesota native is sure to be an asset to the Gophers’ bullpen in the coming seasons.

Lippe also has experience with a team that has made an appearance in the College World Series recently. An offensive weapon, Lippe will head to Minnesota as a rising senior. In his junior season with the Cardinals at Louisville, he played 41 games and finished the season with a batting average of .212. Coming from a conference as competitive in baseball as the ACC is, Lippe will have no problem adjusting to the Big Ten pitchers and batters that he’ll face in the 2026 season with the Gophers.