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For all of the portal hype, the numbers tell a different story...

JPack71

Diamond Wolf
Gold Member
Jan 29, 2011
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For the last several years, this time of year there is a lot of message board chatter, articles by mods and basketball "gurus" hyping the portal. From the number of players that enter, to the supposed chance to really boost a given team's roster, portal talk is all we hear about this time of year other than the tournament results. So it got me to doing a little work on just how effective these guys are that are transferring and is it really possible to make the foundation of a program, any program, the portal guys rather than HS guys. The numbers say that while you can find some guys who can be pieces to an already established roster, looking to build your roster via the portal is simply a losing proposition. Not only that, but far and away the majority of the guys who transfer from one power conference to another power conferences, have a decrease in their output from their former place of play. And when it comes to the guys moving up a level from non power conferences to power conferences, their numbers as expected drop significantly and the number of those guys who have a big positive impact from a scoring or rebounding impact, is pretty low.

In fact, if you look at a list of the guys who were widely recognized as the top 50 guys in the portal last year, 22 of those guys saw a significant decrease in their scoring, rebounding, and assists and for guys taking a decent amount of 3s, their percentages almost always dropped. Only 10 of those guys played at or above what they did in their previous year at their previous school. If you look at the ACC, only 9 guys played at or better than their previous year's numbers, 9 posted worse numbers (most significantly worse) and the remaining 15 posted similar numbers to their previous year/previous school. By the way, 4 of those 9 who posted better numbers, were at Wake Forest. To say he hit on the portal would be an understatement.

So while the portal gets a lot of talk this time of year and fans like us, of schools who have struggled in a given year, like to think we can turn it around in a season by snagging difference makers in the portal, the numbers suggest lots of caution when it comes to pinning your hopes on that strategy. If you have a solid foundation in place, yes, you can possibly grab a guy who can take you to that next level. But if you are a poor team and think you can solve your foundational problems via the portal, it simply isn't likely to happen.
 
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