For college quarterbacks, transferring is now standard operating procedure.
If you’re not playing, you’re leaving. If you are playing and one thing goes wrong, like a season-ending injury or a coaching change, you’re probably leaving.
The Athletic studied the careers of the top 50 high school quarterbacks who signed with FBS programs in the recruiting classes of 2017 through 2020. More than 70 percent have transferred during their time in college.
We did this same study at the end of 2019 for the top 50 QB recruits of the 2014-2017 classes and found that 57 percent had transferred from the school they initially signed with out of high school. At the time, that seemed like a high percentage. Not anymore.
Based on these recent classes, if a top-50 QB signee doesn’t start one game in his first two years on campus, there’s an 87 percent chance he’ll end up leaving the program. But among the quarterbacks who did earn a start in their first two years, more than 60 percent still ended up transferring during their careers.
It’s not that these players are all bad at picking schools. This is just the state of quarterback development at the college level. They enroll, learn the offense and compete for the starting job. If they’re not the guy, the typical next step is entering the portal and trying again somewhere else.
Three key changes occurred over the past three years to accelerate the trend. The extra year of eligibility every player was given for 2020 has extended the college careers of these quarterbacks. The one-time transfer rule went into effect in 2021. And then came NIL. All of those factors help incentivize the decision to transfer.
Yet at the same time, we have collectives trying to turn top quarterback recruits into millionaires. The saga of new Arizona State commit Jaden Rashada and his $13 million deal with Florida that fell through is certainly a more extreme sign of the times, but it does raise a valuable question: Is offering six- or seven-figure deals to high school quarterbacks actually a good investment?
To better understand the ROI of quarterback recruiting these days, let’s take a closer look at four recruiting classes and see how many QBs actually succeeded where they signed.
If you dig into the careers of top quarterback recruits from 2017 to 2020, you’ll find a wide spectrum of outcomes. There are NFL Draft picks, Heisman Trophy contenders, multi-year starters and transfer success stories. And there are plenty of players whose college careers didn’t work out like they’d hoped.
We looked at the top 50 recruits in each class according to the 247Sports Composite rankings. From that group of 200 passers, let’s start by removing 22 players who moved to another position in college.
There are some talented players in that group — running backs Roschon Johnson (Texas) and Ja’Quinden Jackson (Texas/Utah), wide receivers Keytaon Thompson (Mississippi State/Virginia) and Isaiah Williams (Illinois) and tight end Jelani Woods (Oklahoma State/Virginia) — who thrived by making a change. Arkansas’ Connor Noland focused on baseball, developed into an ace pitcher and got drafted by the Chicago Cubs.
Let’s also take out 10 players who retired for medical reasons or quit football with eligibility remaining. That leaves us with 168 college quarterbacks who were top-50 recruits.
So far, 126 of the 168 quarterbacks have transferred. That’s 75 percent.
That’s right: Only 42 of these quarterbacks stayed at one school during their career. As you’d expect, there are a bunch of big names in that pool of players. There’s the Alabama trio of Bryce Young, Mac Jones and Tua Tagovailoa. There’s Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence, Pitt’s Kenny Pickett and six more NFL Draft picks. Ohio State’s C.J. Stroud, TCU’s Max Duggan, UCLA’s Dorian Thompson-Robinson and several more are hoping to get drafted in April.
They played early in their careers, proved themselves and found success. There are a few examples like Jones or Stanford’s Davis Mills who waited until they were third-year players to get their shot, but most (30 of 42) earned starts in their first two years on campus.
The increasingly common occurrence now is quarterbacks earning starting jobs early on and still choosing to transfer during their career. Bo Nix, Jayden Daniels and Dillon Gabriel were all true freshman starters. Spencer Rattler, Devin Leary and Graham Mertz won starting jobs as redshirt freshmen. Among these 168 quarterback recruits, 78 were able to start games in their first two years. It’s an important achievement, but it doesn’t guarantee their college years will live up to their expectations.
If you’re not playing, you’re leaving. If you are playing and one thing goes wrong, like a season-ending injury or a coaching change, you’re probably leaving.
The Athletic studied the careers of the top 50 high school quarterbacks who signed with FBS programs in the recruiting classes of 2017 through 2020. More than 70 percent have transferred during their time in college.
We did this same study at the end of 2019 for the top 50 QB recruits of the 2014-2017 classes and found that 57 percent had transferred from the school they initially signed with out of high school. At the time, that seemed like a high percentage. Not anymore.
Based on these recent classes, if a top-50 QB signee doesn’t start one game in his first two years on campus, there’s an 87 percent chance he’ll end up leaving the program. But among the quarterbacks who did earn a start in their first two years, more than 60 percent still ended up transferring during their careers.
It’s not that these players are all bad at picking schools. This is just the state of quarterback development at the college level. They enroll, learn the offense and compete for the starting job. If they’re not the guy, the typical next step is entering the portal and trying again somewhere else.
Three key changes occurred over the past three years to accelerate the trend. The extra year of eligibility every player was given for 2020 has extended the college careers of these quarterbacks. The one-time transfer rule went into effect in 2021. And then came NIL. All of those factors help incentivize the decision to transfer.
Yet at the same time, we have collectives trying to turn top quarterback recruits into millionaires. The saga of new Arizona State commit Jaden Rashada and his $13 million deal with Florida that fell through is certainly a more extreme sign of the times, but it does raise a valuable question: Is offering six- or seven-figure deals to high school quarterbacks actually a good investment?
To better understand the ROI of quarterback recruiting these days, let’s take a closer look at four recruiting classes and see how many QBs actually succeeded where they signed.
If you dig into the careers of top quarterback recruits from 2017 to 2020, you’ll find a wide spectrum of outcomes. There are NFL Draft picks, Heisman Trophy contenders, multi-year starters and transfer success stories. And there are plenty of players whose college careers didn’t work out like they’d hoped.
We looked at the top 50 recruits in each class according to the 247Sports Composite rankings. From that group of 200 passers, let’s start by removing 22 players who moved to another position in college.
There are some talented players in that group — running backs Roschon Johnson (Texas) and Ja’Quinden Jackson (Texas/Utah), wide receivers Keytaon Thompson (Mississippi State/Virginia) and Isaiah Williams (Illinois) and tight end Jelani Woods (Oklahoma State/Virginia) — who thrived by making a change. Arkansas’ Connor Noland focused on baseball, developed into an ace pitcher and got drafted by the Chicago Cubs.
Let’s also take out 10 players who retired for medical reasons or quit football with eligibility remaining. That leaves us with 168 college quarterbacks who were top-50 recruits.
So far, 126 of the 168 quarterbacks have transferred. That’s 75 percent.
That’s right: Only 42 of these quarterbacks stayed at one school during their career. As you’d expect, there are a bunch of big names in that pool of players. There’s the Alabama trio of Bryce Young, Mac Jones and Tua Tagovailoa. There’s Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence, Pitt’s Kenny Pickett and six more NFL Draft picks. Ohio State’s C.J. Stroud, TCU’s Max Duggan, UCLA’s Dorian Thompson-Robinson and several more are hoping to get drafted in April.
They played early in their careers, proved themselves and found success. There are a few examples like Jones or Stanford’s Davis Mills who waited until they were third-year players to get their shot, but most (30 of 42) earned starts in their first two years on campus.
The increasingly common occurrence now is quarterbacks earning starting jobs early on and still choosing to transfer during their career. Bo Nix, Jayden Daniels and Dillon Gabriel were all true freshman starters. Spencer Rattler, Devin Leary and Graham Mertz won starting jobs as redshirt freshmen. Among these 168 quarterback recruits, 78 were able to start games in their first two years. It’s an important achievement, but it doesn’t guarantee their college years will live up to their expectations.
