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The center of every sport
Which player sits closest to everyone who ever played? We measured every teammate chain in five sports. It's never the biggest star: baseball's center is Tommy John.
By Austin · October 16, 2026
You’ve probably heard of six degrees of Kevin Bacon: the idea that every actor is a few movies away from him. Sports has a version of this, and it’s built from rosters. Two players are linked if they were teammates. Two players who weren’t are linked through someone who played with both, and so on.
So which player is the true center of a sport, the one with the shortest average chain to everyone else who ever played it? We measured it for five sports, using every roster in Teammate Chain.
| Sport | The center | Average links to anyone | Farthest player |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baseball | Tommy John | 3.18 | 7 links |
| Basketball | Rick Mahorn | 2.74 | 6 links |
| Football | Adam Vinatieri | 2.26 | 4 links |
| Hockey | Jaromir Jagr | 2.09 | 4 links |
| Soccer | Nicolas Anelka | 2.76 | 5 links |
The pattern holds in every sport. The center isn’t the best player, or the most famous. It’s someone with a long career in the middle of the sport’s history, who can reach the old-timers and the newcomers equally well. Baseball’s numbers are the biggest because its history in our data is the longest, back to 1871: more decades means more generations to cross.
Baseball
The center of baseball is Tommy John. Any of the 21,482 players in our data is 3.18 links from him on average, and nobody is more than 7.
Tommy John is best known for the elbow surgery named after him. He might deserve to be known for this too. He pitched for 26 seasons, from 1963 to 1989, missing one to that surgery, for the Indians, White Sox, Dodgers, Yankees, Angels and A's.
His career sits right in the middle of baseball's timeline. His early teammates had played with stars from the 1940s, and his late ones were still playing in the 2000s.
- 1 link555
- 2 links6,653
- 3 links6,494
- 4 links4,968
- 5 links1,838
- 6 links898
- 7 links75
The farthest anyone gets is 7 links. Everyone that far out debuted in the 1870s, 1880s or 1890s, when careers were short and rosters were small.
Basketball
The center of basketball is Rick Mahorn. Any of the 5,099 players in our data is 2.74 links from him on average, and nobody is more than 6.
Rick Mahorn was one of the Detroit Pistons' "Bad Boys", the enforcer on the 1989 champions. He played 18 NBA seasons, from 1980-81 to 1998-99, for Washington, Detroit (twice), Philadelphia (twice) and New Jersey, with a season in Italy in the middle. That's not an especially long list of teams, but it's a long career in exactly the right place: his first teammates had played in the 1960s, and his last were still playing in the 2010s.
- 1 link171
- 2 links2,198
- 3 links1,898
- 4 links477
- 5 links341
- 6 links13
Football
The center of football is Adam Vinatieri. Any of the 25,935 players in our data is 2.26 links from him on average, and nobody is more than 4.
The center of football is a kicker. Adam Vinatieri kicked for 24 seasons, ten with the Patriots and fourteen with the Colts, and retired as the NFL's all-time leading scorer. Kickers last far longer than anyone else on the field, and a long career on 53-man rosters adds up to a lot of teammates.
- 1 link919
- 2 links18,326
- 3 links5,591
- 4 links1,098
Hockey
The center of hockey is Jaromir Jagr. Any of the 7,455 players in our data is 2.09 links from him on average, and nobody is more than 4.
Jaromír Jágr played 24 NHL seasons for nine teams, from Pittsburgh in 1990 to Calgary in 2018, with three seasons in Russia in the middle. His first teammates included players who had started in the 1970s, and his last were still playing in the 2020s.
- 1 link553
- 2 links5,676
- 3 links1,209
- 4 links16
Soccer
The center of soccer is Nicolas Anelka. Any of the 39,728 players in our data is 2.76 links from him on average, and nobody is more than 5.
Nicolas Anelka played for nine clubs in Europe's big five leagues: Paris Saint-Germain, Arsenal, Real Madrid, Liverpool, Manchester City, Bolton, Chelsea, Juventus and West Brom, plus spells in Turkey, China and India that our data doesn't cover. Few players have shared a dressing room with so many of the game's names.
- 1 link450
- 2 links14,878
- 3 links18,705
- 4 links5,215
- 5 links479
What it means for Teammate Chain
If the center is only a few links from everyone, then any two players are at most a few links from each other through him. That’s why even the strangest Teammate Chain pairing is never far apart, and why the shortest chain usually needs just two or three players in the middle. When you’re stuck, think of players like these: long careers, right in the middle of the two eras you need to connect. More in the Teammate Chain strategy guide, and see the players with the most teammates.
How we counted
Two players are linked if both appeared for the same club in the same regular season. For each sport, we took the 300 players with the most teammates, measured the average shortest chain from each of them to every other player, and picked the lowest.
About the data
These numbers come from the rosters behind Teammate Chain, not from every league a player ever played in. Two players count as teammates only if both are on the same club’s roster for the same season in our data, so a player who spent part of his career somewhere we don’t cover has fewer teammates here than he really had.
- Baseball: every MLB and major-league season since 1871. Every major-league season is included, back to the National Association, so baseball careers are complete.
- Basketball: every NBA season since 1946-47 (BAA included). The ABA isn't included, so ABA seasons (Julius Erving's, Moses Malone's, Spencer Haywood's first) don't count. Some rosters from the 1960s to the 1980s are incomplete.
- Football: every NFL season since the 1970 merger. Nothing before 1970, so the AFL and the pre-merger NFL are missing, along with the USFL, XFL and other leagues. A career like George Blanda's (1949-1975) only counts from 1970.
- Hockey: every NHL season since the 1967 expansion. Nothing before 1967-68, and no WHA, so Gordie Howe and Bobby Hull, for example, only count from 1967.
- Soccer: Europe's top five leagues since 1963-64. Only league matches in the Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, the Bundesliga and Ligue 1. Seasons anywhere else (Portugal, the Netherlands, Turkey, MLS, lower divisions) and cup and international matches aren't included. Teammates count from the club's squad list, even a player who didn't play that season; career lengths count only the seasons he played. A career that starts with a newly promoted club may have begun in a lower division, so those careers are left out of the lists.
“Everyone who ever played” means everyone in our data. Outside baseball and basketball, the center of the sport’s full history could be different, because its earliest decades aren’t in it.
Careers that are still going count through the latest season in the data, as of October 17, 2026. Players who share a name are kept apart by their league ids and birth dates, and a player listed on a roster for a season he didn’t play (an injured rookie, a draft pick still overseas) isn’t counted for it. Spot a mistake? Let us know.
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