The concept of returning production in college football is a key concept that suggests that the more continuity and experience you return from last season, improves chances of improvement. However, as the transfer portal and extreme player movement dominate the sport, it's still beneficial to return a significant amount of production. Clemson led the nation in returning production heading into 2025, but the Tigers slipped from 10-4 and 22nd in SP+ to 7-6 and 34th. Despite disappointments such as Clemson and Baylor, the top 10 in the returning production improved by an average of 1.0 wins and 6.4 spots in SP+. Of the teams with 36% returning production or less, 10 regressed, and eight fell by at least 11 spots. Despite this, transfers have increased by 64% from 13.9 per team (14.2 not including service academies) to 22.8 per team in the past two years. The rise in transfers is slowing down, with the extreme rise of extreme transfers dragging down the overall transfer rankings significantly.