Team jumping used to be very rare in college sports, but these days, it’s moving closer towards becoming the norm. With the extreme loosening of transfer portal rules and the massive explosion of NIL (Name, Image Likeness) in the two revenue-producing sports (football and men’s basketball) the stigma is long gone.
Nowadays it’s becoming quite common to see an athlete finish his collegiate career having played for at least two different schools.
Some football and men’s basketball players have actually had stints at three different institutions before starting their professional careers. Look no further than the #1 overall pick in this April’s NFL Draft, Cam Ward.
The new Tennessee Titans franchise QB started his career collegiate at the FCS level with Incarnate Word. He then moved up to the FBS level, transferring to Washington State in the Pac-12, and then finished up at the complete opposite end of the country in Miami.
The New Orleans Saints second round quarterback selection, Tyler Shough, started his collegiate career at Oregon before transferring to Texas Tech and then finishing up at Louisville.
Or you could look at the first of the two QBs that the Cleveland Browns drafted, Dillon Gabriel. He was selected out of Oregon, but before putting up huge numbers in Eugene, he had stints at Oklahoma, UCLA (albeit a very brief one) and UCF.
With apologies to Johnny Cash, “I’ve been everywhere man” is an approach that often paves a path to the draft, in both sports. Since players can transfer so freely and easily these days, they have more opportunities to truly find themselves and improve their draft stock.
The NBA Draft is a couple weeks away and Kentucky shooting guard/small forward is among the top prospects at his position. He started his career at Texas A&M before transferring to Arkansas and then later BYU. So if you’re counting that’s four different schools in total, three of which were in the Southeastern Conference.
The final transfer, however, was about something more than just NIL money or added playing time. In Mark Pope, Robinson found the coach that helped him reach his full potential, so he moved with him from BYU to Kentucky.
“Following my coach, I couldn’t ask for a better situation,” Robinson said in an exclusive with RG.org. “Also, his being at a prestigious university like Kentucky, it was really easy for me to just make a simple decision, and come back to school to play for my coach.”
In any sport, sometimes it just takes a couple transfers to find the right coach and the perfect system fit.