The Auburn Tigers football program and their new head coach, Alek Golesh, have been active in the NCAA Transfer Portal since it opened on January 2nd. Their biggest transfer portal addition came to fruition on Tuesday morning in the form of a player who is quite familiar with Golesh.
Quarterback Byrum Brown Commits to Auburn
After weeks of speculation, quarterback Byrum Brown has decided to follow his head coach from USF to Auburn. He will be another familiar face on the Plains by joining productive offensive teammates Jeremiah Koger (WR), Nykahi Davenport (RB), Christian Neptune (WR), and Jonathan Echols (TE), amongst others. Brown opted out of the team’s Cure Bowl matchup against Old Dominion, but remained on the sideline in an assistant coaching role.
The North Carolina native posted the eighth-best PFSN CFB QB Impact score in 2025, a mark that also tops the PFSN Transfer Portal Tracker above players like Brendan Sorsby, Drew Mestemaker, and Josh Hoover. He is currently the 18th-ranked prospect overall in the 247Sports Transfer Portal rankings.
Former USF QB Byrum Brown has committed to Auburn, per his agents @drewjrosenhaus and @ShawnODare of Rosenhaus Sports. Brown follows USF coach Alex Golesh to Auburn and has a deal that projects as one of the most lucrative in the NIL era. pic.twitter.com/h54dOSQeNM
— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) January 6, 2026
For starters, it appears to bring some long-awaited continuity amongst the offensive side of the ball for the Tigers; remaining in a historically quarterback-friendly system certainly helps bridge the gap when making a jump in competition levels.
After injuries in 2024 slowed the momentum he generated in 2023, Brown’s profile among the most exciting college quarterbacks has exceeded previous heights, thanks to his performance this season. He became just the 13th player in college football history to eclipse 3,000 yards passing and 1,000 yards rushing in a single season, finishing with the fourth-most rushing yards by a quarterback amongst FBS quarterbacks per PFSN.
Brown sports one of the best combinations of vertical field-stretching capabilities and effectiveness as a ball carrier in the sport, a true weapon in an offense that is a nuisance for defenses before the ball is even snapped due to the stress inflicted by the formations and alignments.
The RPOs and packaged plays in conjunction with said alignments are a staple of this veer-and-shoot/Art Briles that the SEC had become familiar with when Josh Heupel brought it to Tennessee.
Expect a plethora of big plays in Auburn next season, akin to those above.
