A week from Monday, on Dec. 4, the transfer window for college football will open.

From that point forward, the portal will have its neon “OPEN” sign plugged in and hanging in the window for 30 days, allowing college football players at both the FBS and FCS levels to put their names into the portal and let coaches around the country know that they’re in the market for a new home.

And Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze isn’t a fan.

“I think it’s absolutely ridiculous that this portal window were about to have is as long as it is,” Freeze said. “It makes no sense. We have to go all the way through Christmas worrying about people tampering with players on your team… This idea that we have this long portal window, it wasn’t made by anybody that’s having to live through it, I assure you.”

It’s Freeze’s belief that most players approach the transfer window with a pretty clear-cut idea of what they’re plan is.

“Either they know they’re going in or they’re not,” Freeze said, tabling the idea of a window from Dec. 1-10. “Make your decision and let’s move on.”

That said, Freeze was also asked how he and his staff will handle those conversations with players who might be considering transferring away from Auburn.

And those conversations — aside from being transparent — vary on a case-by-case basis, Freeze says.

“Tell them the truth,” Freeze said. “The truth for some is your chances to play here are probably slim. The truth for other is, man, there’s an element of patience that needs to be involved in your decision.”

When it comes to players who make up the back half of that quote, Freeze said less than two weeks ago that he has a plan in place to keep them from flirting with the idea of transferring. He calls it the SOAR program.

“We’ve got a group of men in this building, that’s one of their sole charges is developing the relationships with these young kids to try to convince them of truth and not believing some lies or hopes,” Freeze explained during the SEC Teleconference on Nov. 15.

However, Freeze recognizes that those efforts aren’t going to land every single time — especially with name, image and likeness being an added factor in a player’s decision-making.

Together, all of it makes for a very difficult situation for coaches when it comes to roster management, Freeze says.

“I don’t think there’s any possible way that any coach can sit here and tell you how he’s going to come up with his 85,” Freeze said Monday. “I don’t.”

Freeze hasn’t been shy about his preference of landing high school recruits and developing them for a season or two before getting them onto the playing field.

But he realizes that’s not the reality in this new, transfer-heavy era of college football.

“I’d love to sit here and tell you, ‘Hey, we’re going to build it with high school kids and you’re going to give me time to build it that way.’ I would love to say that,” Freeze said. “But then this week, if I have 10 guys walk in and transfer and I haven’t been recruiting enough high school kids to replace those, it’s impossible for me to say that. So I have no idea exactly how the makeup of the 85 will look and what we have to replace.”

What Freeze does know, however, is that the transfer portal will likely need to be a part of it his plan, regardless of his negative feelings towards the matter.

“Do we have to replace just 22? Do we have to replace 32? None of us know,” Freeze said. “And I think that’s become the biggest challenge for us coaches is, man, how do you even manage the 85? It will take you all the way through spring and summer to really figure that out because of the way the portal windows are set up.”