141: Something old, something new
A look at player movement in college hoops, quarterbacks in the NFL draft, and ACC baseball update.
Transfers have become the No. 1 target in recruiting in the spring, not high school kids because the pickings are very slim by the time you get to this point in the year.
Believe it or not, this is a quote from then-VCU head coach Shaka Smart back in April of 2013. The NCAA was starting to amend its previous processes1 for transfer exemptions and waivers, and players were seeking immediate eligibility.
Today, the era of player movement is at the center of college basketball. Programs like Duke and Kentucky helped popularize the one-and-done model, bringing elite talent to campus for a couple semesters before sending them on to the NBA.
While that strategy is mostly reserved for blue bloods, a different trend has taken hold across the sport. The old-and-one approach, where players make meaningful contributions at multiple schools, is becoming more common.
From 2010 to 2015, about 10 percent of players who logged regular minutes2 did so at two different programs. And from 2020 to 2025, that number has climbed to around 26 percent.
It’s tempting to declare a one-and-done strategy as no longer effective and a model of trying to get old and experienced players as the best way to succeed. There is a spectrum of success, despite our best efforts to view everything in extremes.
What’s clear is that player movement is here to stay. Fewer than one percent of players logged regular minutes at three different schools from 2010 to 2015. A decade later, nearly five percent of players have been on the floor for regular minutes for three or more schools in their collegiate careers.
This same trend is not uncommon in other revenue-generating sports too. For instance, consider the first pick of the 2025 NFL Draft.
Quarterbacks in the NFL Draft
Cam Ward, the first overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, began his college career at Incarnate Word (FCS school). After two seasons at Washington State, Ward finished his college career at Miami this past season.
Ward is the 12th different quarterback to be selected first overall since 2010. The chart below shows the 51 quarterbacks picked in the first round across the last 16 NFL drafts.
Seven NFL teams (Denver, Cleveland, Washington, Tennessee, Chicago, Jacksonville, Minnesota) have each drafted three different quarterbacks in the first round over the past 16 years.
The Carolina Panthers are the only team to select multiple quarterbacks first overall during this span (Cam Newton in 2011 and Bryce Young in 2023). Here is the list of the last 12 quarterbacks selected first overall3:
Note that three of the past five quarterbacks selected first overall (Cam Ward, Caleb Williams, Joe Burrow) played in multiple games for more than one school in their collegiate careers.
ACC Baseball Update
As I continue to stick to my word from last week, I’m going to try and surface more charts showing ACC baseball standings.
Three ACC teams - Clemson, North Carolina, and Florida State - rank in the top five of the latest top 25 poll from D1 Baseball. The team atop the league standings, NC State, ranks 12th overall.
Here is a chart showing each team’s record and run differential over the past 10 league games, and the entire ACC regular season.
Teams have still played an uneven number of league games, but as we head into May there are pivotal series left and seven teams within 3.5 games of the first place team.
Thanks for reading this far, and happy Monday. For a recommendation this week, check out Owen Phillips NBA referee database. I often find myself trying to replicate many of Owen’s ideas from his newsletter, The F5 — and this one is no different. A college basketball or college football ref database would be fascinating to put together, if the data is available.
There's a good bit of irony in the fact that the NCAA used to have a rule for everything and now it feels like there are no rules when it comes to player movement and eligibility. Insert your own whole sowing and reaping commentary.
The 'regular minutes' for this exercise refers to a player who logged at least 30 percent of possible minutes at a given school.
None of the six quarterbacks selected first overall between 2010 and 2018 remain with the teams that drafted them.