How often do College Football transfer players find success in the NFL and make it to the Super Bowl?
The College Football landscape has been in a state of constant change for the better part of a decade now. That ultimately has an effect on what the journey looks like for players that inevitably make it to the NFL and compete for a championship in games like this week's Super Bowl LVIII. One of […]
The College Football landscape has been in a state of constant change for the better part of a decade now. That ultimately has an effect on what the journey looks like for players that inevitably make it to the NFL and compete for a championship in games like this week's Super Bowl LVIII.
One of the biggest changes in College Football has been the implementation of the Transfer Portal and the rules no longer restricting players from immediately playing upon transferring to a new school. The latest iteration of transfer rules are still quite new, so it may take a few years for this new generation full of "transfer-at-will" NFL Draft prospects to reach the league.
Yes, there have certainly been key transfer players like Cam Newton and Joe Burrow who have found great NFL success. And it's true, we have seen the number of non-junior college transfers getting drafted spike in the last few years. In fact, that number jumped from 37 in 2022 to more than 50 in 2023.
But how often do we see college football players transfer, find sufficient success to make their way to the NFL, and then end up competing in the Super Bowl? I took a look at the rosters of the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers to find out.
Super Bowl LVIII Transfer Success Stories
Among the top 40 players on each team (via total snaps) there are only eight players who transferred in college. The Chiefs have four. The 49ers have four. That means just 10% of players likely seeing significant snaps in Super Bowl LVIII transferred in college, but that's actually higher than most any other year in NFL history.
Here are those eight players with significant playing time in 2023 in order of total snaps.
- Charvarius Ward, CB 49ers
- Brandon Aiyuk, WR 49ers
- Mike Danna, EDGE Chiefs
- Marquez Valdes-Scantling, WR Chiefs
- Jaylen Watson, CB Chiefs
- Ji'Ayir Brown, S 49ers
- Wanya Morris, OT Chiefs
- Randy Gregory, EDGE 49ers
Charvarius Ward and Brandon Aiyuk are perhaps the most notable and proven success stories among this set of players. They were both junior college transfers who earned their shot at a starting role via transfer after dominating lower level competition. This type of transfer success story has been common for quite some time. In fact, five of the eight transfers playing in this year's Super Bowl LVIII went that route.
But rookie Wanya Morris is the perfect modern transfer success story we're likely going to see more of here in the near future. Morris was a five star offensive tackle that started his career playing two years at Tennessee, but transferred with the ability to play immediately for Oklahoma after a coaching staff change.
The question with the transfer portal isn't "Will we see more transfers?", because the numbers are already through the roof. The question will have to do with seeing just how many transfer players find success and eventually go on to win the Super Bowl over the next few years. If we do see a high percentage of the thousands of transfer players in this chaotic era fail at the collegiate level without making it to the NFL, will we see things change? Will the heavy (often NIL-induced) transfer trends reverse course in the years to come?
For now, the answer to our question of how often transfer players make it to and win the Super Bowl is "not that often," but that very well might change in the not-so-distant future.
