Ad Disclosure
Arkansas reportedly losing former 4-star duo to transfer portal
Published:
Arkansas watched a load of talent leave Fayetteville in 1 day as 4-star players Shamar Easter and JuJu Pope have entered the transfer portal.
The duo’s exit from Arkansas was reported on Wednesday afternoon by 247Sports.
Easter, a 6-foot-5, 223-pound wide receiver, and Pope, a 6-foot, 216-pound running back, were both prizes of Arkansas’s 2024 recruiting class. But now both will reportedly be taking their talents elsewhere in 2025, which is a big blow to the momentum that Sam Pittman’s program had built over the weekend with its transfer additions.
Easter originally came to Arkansas a highly recruited tight end. But he moved to wide receiver before the Razorbacks’ bowl game. Easter hardly made any noise in his 1 and apparently only season in Fayetteville, catching 1 pass for 16 yards in the Hogs’ season opener against Arkansas-Pine Bluff.
Pope was recruited by Pittman to Arkansas as a running back and a linebacker.
The reported departures of Pope and Easter from Fayetteville means that Pittman has now lost 5 scholarship players to the transfer portal just since spring practice ended. The other 3 departures from Arkansas are quarterback Madden Iamaleava, offensive lineman Zuri Madison and wide receiver Quentin Murphy.
For Arkansas so far, the spring portal has provided big-time rewards and big-time losses, and right now the Hogs are playing the balancing act as best they can.
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
