Non drafted college players future

[Icy]

This is something i have always been curious about, and the incoming NBA draft discussion raised my interest again.

What kind of future awaits non drafted college players?

Let's analyze by sports:

-Basketball: From the 60 drafted players, around 40 will make an NBA team, the rest maybe will go to the Dev League or move to Europe. The top non drafted guys might have also a future in Europe,

- Football: Here a lot more are drafted as NFL rosters are big, but so are college ones, and unlike in basketball, they don't have any professional league outside USA or Canada to go to.

- Baseball: I'm not into college baseball, but i guess that if they were not drafted from high school to enter the minors system, their chances to become pros after their college career are slim. Maybe a lot of them can play in the minor or independent leagues and still make a living from the sport.

- Hockey: Besides the NHL, they can move to Canada and play in any league there, also to move to Eastern Europe, UK or Scandinavia where hockey is huge too. Maybe they have more opportunities than any other college students or at least more places to go to keep their dream.


But what about the rest? of course some college players from minor colleges did not even dream about a pro career, but what about the players in the mid to top colleges, used to the fame, the prestige, etc that end not being drafted? I guess it must be shocking to come back to reality and to be again average Joe's.

What do they do? are there other semi-pro leagues in USA where they can go and at least make a decent living or do they must totally forget the sport and go to find a job like the regular college student? As foreigner i know only the USA sports pro leagues, but maybe there is a big ladder of semi-pro leagues under those where ex-college players can at least earn as much (or as little) as the average Joe in his job?

Can and do they usually find other jobs related to their sports like assistant coaches at colleges, high schools etc?

Do they get jobs in their hometowns because their prestige? like as car dealers or any other job where a known face can help the business?

Did they get a popper education, valuable enough in their curriculum, or are they known for having an easy time at school because being athletes, maybe "helped" by the schools to keep being eligible?

Probably some of you have played sports at competitive level in college and did not make the pros, how did it affect your lives?

[molson]

Just following one college basketball team (Syracuse) with any closeness, I'm always amazed at the number of opportunities for fringe college players to play professionally somewhere. It seems pretty much anyone who plays even 10+ minutes a game for a major DIV I program can play in Slovakia or the USBL if they really wanted to. Of course, some can make more money getting a real job.

I know a couple of former DIV I basketball/baseball players who became attorneys. I don't think their college athletic careers necessarily helped them, but I think traits of successful athletes - work ethic, competitiveness, determination, can obviously help one in any field.

[RomaGoth]

I think this thread pretty much sums it up.

Sam Keller sues EA Sports and the NCAA - Front Office Football Central

[Samdari]

Originally Posted by Icy

- Hockey: Besides the NHL, they can move to Canada and play in any league there, also to move to Eastern Europe, UK or Scandinavia where hockey is huge too. Maybe they have more opportunities than any other college students or at least more places to go to keep their dream.

I think this would actually be basketball. Without doing any research, I would bet that it is second in the world in number of pro leagues (among team sports) worldwide. I would, in fact, be very surprised if there were not more basketball pro jobs in 75% of the countries where you say non-NHL hockey draftees could go.

Pretty much anyone who can get a D-I scholarship can get paid to play basketball, but 90%+ of them have to go overseas to do it.