Son and I went to watch a competitive D1's fall practice and scrimmage games. A few things surprised me.
First, at the practice, the head coach was very active and yelling out instructions/comments after almost every play. The instructions he gave, though, sounds very basic, such as "tag up on a fly ball", "dive back to base if the pitcher turns towards you", etc. Is that normal? Son was not surprised. He said "baseball has only so many rules, you can't expect college coach to teach something different from HS coach." He said those are exactly the things his HS coach yells in practice.
Second, during practice and scrimmage, I saw a lot of defensive errors. Ex: one time, right field caught fly ball, runner on second ran toward 3rd, RF threw ball to 3rd, but the SS "intercepted" the ball and runner safe on 3rd; Another time, bases loaded, batter hit a grounder right towards 1B, should be an easy double play, but 1B knocked the ball towards fence with his glove, 2 runs came home and batter safe; etc. I know fall ball contains "tryout", but this is a power D1 and all the recruited players are supposed to be highly ranked.
Third, the pitching velo was mid-high 80s. I have pocket radar, and I didn't see 90+. And ironically, the big guy pitching high 80s got hit pretty consistently (he's the guy with base loaded and 1st base error and ended up with 6 runs in an inning); a smaller guy, a crafty lefty, throws low-mid 80s but with a lot of curve and sliders, and got a lot of Ks.
Anyway, just my two days of observation. Need experienced parents to give perspective.
(Next stop for us is to watch a competitive D3 fall practice and game and compare.)