While college football deals with the frenzy of significant player movement in the transfer portal, former Kansas State head coach Chris Klieman is happy to watch the chaos from afar now.
Klieman, 58, surprisingly announced his retirement after the Wildcats’ season, ending a seven-year tenure in Manhattan. Yet it wasn’t Kansas State’s 6-6 season that compelled him to step down and cede to new head coach Collin Klein. The veteran coach who won four FBS championships at North Dakota State said the stress of dealing with the transfer portal forced his decision.
“I’d die if I kept doing this job, I’d die,” Klieman told the Manhattan Mercury’s Ned Seaton. “If I kept doing this job, I was gonna have a heart attack, or I was gonna have a stroke.”
“My blood pressure was through the roof,” he added. “The stress and anxiety, not of winning and losing — my legacy is going to be fine on winning and losing.”
Despite the stress that the transfer portal process caused him, Klieman does not begrudge players for being able to maximize their financial value. Yet having to re-recruit his players each season and deal with agents immediately wanting NIL compensation figures felt far too different for him than typical recruiting in college football.
“I don’t blame any of these kids,” Klieman said. “It’s not their fault, but you get done playing Colorado, and come Monday, man, there’s 20 (players’ agents) that want to know a number, or they’re ready to go into the (transfer) portal.”
“That’s all I’m going to do the whole month of December and January, is work with whatever 80 of our kids to see if we can keep them,” he added. “And if not, go work with 580 kids to fill the 30 spots we’re going to need, and that’s all December and January. That’s not recruiting.”
As Klieman put it, the offseason is now about making deals and putting compensation packages together. But for now, that’s college football reality and he no longer wanted to work with it during the seven years remaining on his contract.
He added that a return to coaching was possible if the rules changed. However, he’s not interested in being part of that process.
No, no way,” Klieman said. “Everything that we have put out there to try to get it fixed gets shot down.”
Taking over for legendary coach Bill Snyder, Klieman compiled a 54-34 record in seven seasons at Kansas State. That includes one Big 12 championship in 2022 and a 3-2 mark in bowl games.
