infielddad posted:coachld posted:Agree with the above as well. However, in our case, our 2018 RHP is uncommitted and was a really late bloomer...as in the tail end of summer. He is now on radar of D1's that have room for RHP. He could obviously take the fall off and completely focus on football but would definitely hurt his chances with several schools. If he was a 2019, we would more then likely skip some of these events other then PG in October.
Coach, why would playing football hurt his chances as a late bloomer with the D1's? When you say they have "room," is that NLI and scholarship money come November of this year or recruited walk on status?
Are these schools coming on board because he is a later bloomer schools he would have picked before he "bloomed?" If he truly is a later bloomer and still developing with upside, he may end up with more opportunity (but possibly different schools) during the Spring.
Our son had one D1 and one D3 pursue him based on a camp during the Summer after his junior year. During football season and just before the NLI period, the D1 went silent. Our son chose the D3 route and ended being a pretty key performer in attracting national attention for the program which got them knocking on the door for the national championship, which they eventually achieved.
During the Summer after graduation, he received strong interest from one of the top JC's in CA along with 3 more D1's. He stayed the D3 route, had a wonderful career, played Milb at a high level before an injury and never once regretted he did not have the D1 tag (BTW our son got more transfer opportunities to D1's as a result of Summer Wood bat league performances).
While so many on this board and so much information suggests the need to hurry up or be lost, a player with talent who gets exposure is unlikely to get lost. For one, I would not let the pressure of "hurry up" get in the way of picking a school which is a great fit.
Thanks for sharing your experience. Yes, he is definitely a late bloomer with upside. The schools that are showing interest now were definitely not schools that he was looking at even as late as tail end of summer. To be honest, neither him or myself considered these schools because we thought they were out of his league and at the time they probably were. At end of summer, we found a pitching coach who has transformed his life...not only on the field but personally as well. This same pitching coach is also very well connected and has opened up doors for my son to play with some of the best club teams in the country during a couple of tournaments this fall. He has also helped open doors at some high level D1 programs. My son now has a different list of schools and the one at top of list is a high academic Power 5. They lose very few players to the draft and/or players who decommit. So with them, we may find out it is too late. We will know more soon. I do understand and agree that there will continue to be D1's who have needs all the way through spring of 2018. We are just trying to do best job to find his dream school in terms of both academics and baseball. Hope that all that rambling makes sense.