The Matt Campbell era will bring about significant change to Penn State football. One of the most significant adjustments will be regarding how the team manages its roster and NIL fund.

Campbell hired Derek Hoodjer to serve as the team’s general manager. He previously served as the Assistant Athletics Director for Football Player Personnel at Iowa State, his alma mater.

Hoodjer’s career began while he was a student in Ames, where he volunteered for the football program. He eventually branched out, taking on roles in defense, special teams, recruiting, and various operations.

When Campbell became a Cyclone in the fall of 2015, he made sure to keep Hoodjer on staff, where they continued to build a relationship for the ensuing decade.

“I’ve been really fortunate to be around a lot of really good people who believed in me and helped me along the way,” Hoodjer said.

Being a general manager in college football is a quickly evolving job. NIL and revenue sharing continue to play a prominent role in the sport, as does the transfer portal. Hoodjer will mark the first person to fill the distinct position for the blue and white.

The most important thing for him this offseason was roster construction. With the coaching turnover, attacking the transfer portal and evaluating talent across college football were necessary for Penn State to field a competitive team this upcoming season.

Hoodjer and his team are tasked with evaluating nearly every player in college football to determine who may be a good fit for Penn State.

The year-long process takes the utmost time and effort. In just two weeks as a Nittany Lion, Hoodjer has been in touch with nearly 130 players via the transfer portal. 

“You don’t want a guy to go in the portal and start from scratch,” he said. “You want to have a little bit of an understanding of who that player is before they get here.”

One area that Hoodjer attacked in the portal was the quarterback room. With Rocco Becht transferring from Iowa State, as well as his backup Alex Manske, Penn State still made it a mission to find a signal caller who would provide depth. Connor Barry arrived on campus as a transfer from a Division III school, Christopher Newport, and was the answer to the search.

“Recruiting a quarterback in the portal to come in and not be the starter can be difficult. But certainly, those conversations were had, and we’re really excited that Connor Barry chose to come and join this and compete in that room,” he said. “We feel really good about where the quarterback room landed.”

Part of Campbell and his staff’s mission is to establish a unique identity for each position group. In the team’s wide receiver room, Hoodjer evaluated the talent he had known at Iowa State and reimagined how each player would fit into the Penn State offense. 

“Chase Sowell was our starting X wide receiver. We know exactly who he is. Brett Eskildsen is a guy who’s played Z and F and could play X. He’s got great versatility and experience. Koby Howard’s a guy that we had a tremendous opportunity to watch and evaluate,” he said. “Everybody’s looking for the next superstar wide receiver, and we’ve been able to develop that position and hopefully continue to do that.”

The defensive line is a position group that will be completely reimagined this upcoming fall. Hoodjer worked closely with defensive coordinator D’Anton Lynn to determine the team’s needs and shape the team’s identity.

“A priority is to find bigger bodies, and we wanted to find experience,” he said. “That was really the portal entirely for us.”

The staff also took into account the player’s collegiate career longevity and previous coaching relationships. Hoodjer and Lynn aimed to acquire players with a strong understanding of the league to maximize immediate on-field production. 

Despite the focus on experience, Hoodjer assures that developing high schoolers and fielding a large recruiting class will always be a priority.

“Our belief system will always be to recruit a large high school class that we believe can be the foundation in the future, develop those players, and then fill out the team in the portal where necessary,” he said.

Intertwined with the transfer portal is the reality of NIL and athlete compensation in college football. 

During Hoodjer’s time at Iowa State, he worked to develop an NIL fund from the ground up. He has learned well the importance of alignment among the administration, coaching staff, and players to achieve success.

Penn State has significantly more access to NIL funds than Iowa State, which has been a welcome change for Hoodjer and Campbell alike. In fact, it was reported that Campbell’s contract included roughly $30 million in NIL to help construct a roster.

“Penn State’s been unbelievable, from our compliance staff to our academic staff to our life after football to our recruiting staff, our coaches, to the administration,” he said.

But the challenging part of having such a large NIL fund is determining how to allocate the money. 

“Compensation is obviously a part of college football now, and that is a component that every player certainly has earned and deserves,” Hoodjer said.

Deciding which players get paid and in what quantity mainly comes down to evaluating “production versus potential,” in addition to figuring out how significant a role that player will hold on the team.

“Trying to balance your roster versus what the market is,” Hoodjer mentioned, was a key aspect. “I don’t think anybody’s got a perfect answer for that. But ultimately, the goal and the mission is, how do we allow ourselves to create a football team we feel is going to be competitive while also protecting the future?”

As a general manager, Hoodjer takes a conservative approach to spending. While he will always do what he can to make the team better, maximizing the resources that the university has provided him will be of utmost importance.

“If we’re all in it together and believe in the same pathway forward, then we’ll have a chance to succeed,” he said. “We’re really grateful.”