Texas A&M fans saw some attrition via the portal during this previous cycle, though not as much as many other teams. The Ags did a great job of retaining a lot of their backups and key players, even getting a guy like Bryce Anderson back from the portal after it seemed all but certain that he would be departing.
One young player that decided to seek playing time elsewhere was Jonte Newman, a freshman from Bridgeland. He was part of a six-man offensive line group in the 2025 class, a haul highlighted by five-star Lamont Rogers. Newman hadn’t seen the field outside of late in the Samford game, where he didn’t exactly grade out perfectly, and his development was apparently such that he and the team were on different pages.
Fans expected to see Newman head to somewhere like Houston, Rice, Baylor, or UTSA— an in-state team where he could maybe see the field more quickly— but Newman shocked the fanbase with his eventual transfer decision, which went public yesterday.
Jonte Newman decides to leave Texas A&M for their biggest rival in head-scratching decision
While Texas doesn’t exactly have the greatest offensive line situation going into the upcoming year, I’d be honestly shocked if Newman is a guy that sees the field in more than wrap-up time against Group of Five or FCS teams. If Newman desired more playing time, there were a lot of good options— Texas simply isn’t one of them.
The Aggies are going to be fine at offensive line after bringing in four would-be SEC starters to learn under Cushing. Pair that with Mark Nabou and some of the other rising young players, and the Aggies are going to be set.
The loss of Newman isn’t a huge deal, in other words, but you wouldn’t know it to see some of the crowing under the announcement post from Texas fans. They clearly have no idea who Newman is and simply want to believe that they’re poaching some high-level player from the Aggies— understandable, given the portal doldrums they’ve had for most of the cycle, but a little pathetic, all things considered.