COMMENTARY
Every year, about 4,500 young men suit up to play basketball for a Division I program.
Fewer than 60 of them get drafted by an NBA team each year. And many of those players will get cut right around the time of the annual Pumpkin Spice invasion. Often, it’s simply because teams don’t have a spot for them.
The NBA has a very different way of cultivating talent than other sports. Baseball and hockey have extensive multilevel minor league gauntlets that prepare young players for the big leagues. The NFL is too brutal to allow teenagers into the league, so college football serves as a pseudo-minor league where players can be evaluated while playing the sport at a high level for years.