Kentucky and Duke are only allowed 13 scholarships. If the one and dones stayed, the next year the elite players would have to go somewhere else.
Part of the fun for me was a rooting interest in particular players:teams. I could not stand Duke but it wasn’t because they were Duke -it was because I didn’t like Hurley and Lattner. Same thing with the Fab 5 at Michigan -I was not interested in Michigan per se, but rather in Webber, Rose, and Howard.
I enjoyed watching great teams that stayed together for 3-4 years. You knew the players and developed strong rooting interests for or against them.
One and done has killed that and as a result has killed my interest. My sporting interests in the winter are now football recruiting, NFL, and PGA west coast swing. I’ve not watched a full college basketball game in years.
I completely agree…seems I don’t know the names of individual players any longer, only the schools.
Its just not interesting any more…they’ve killed the game, and don’t seem to care.
You’d think with all the empty arenas these days that they would care, but they just don’t care.
They (media) play a big part in it. They cover about 5 schools and basically promote a 1 and dome culture that is absolutely killing the game.
The kids are now wrongly convinced that there are about 5 schools that are options because those schools are the only avenue to the pros.
And it is ridiculous. Guys like Malik Monk and DAaron Fox could go to UALR and be first round picks.
But they go for the quick money and fame. For the truly elite it works out. What you don’t hear about are the dozens of players who take that route and wash out before they even sniff a 2nd contract in the NBA where the huge money is found.
Instead of talking about that, they annually talk about how Kentucky won the draft even though many of those kids end up as basketball nomads.
The fix–if they cared to address the problem–would be to institute the baseball draft rules.
The industry has no interest in that move, because they are thriving and getting ultra rich.
And the college basketball big wigs don’t care about it, either, because they are using the system to thrive and line their pockets.
Just about the only way there will be an movement to make changes is if the interest in the cash cow that is the NcAAt wanes.
That hasn’t happened, so far, because people don’t have to know the players and teams in order to maintain interest.
They get a crash course introduction in March and it sustains them (with the help of “upsets” and human interest stories) every year.
Meanwhile, the sport is dying a slow death and will be on life support before anyone that matters will care to notice. It’s sad.