@RJM posted:I don’t expect everyone to agree with my observations. I believe there is the potential for a lot of good takes based on the house knowledge level.
- How many players do they have on their roster?
- Looking back through the archives, how many players are leaving the program each year?
- How many seniors have stayed from freshman year?
- How many have dropped off?
Roster number doesn’t matter. Do you have the skills to be one of the 18-20 who regularly contribute. Chances are half of recruited players will transfer or quit playing.
- How many players are red-shirting?
- How many players do they have at each position?
- Do they have a lot of upper-classmen returners at your position?
- Will they have a positional need for you in your recruiting class?
Outside pitcher and catcher position doesn’t matter. If you hit there will be a place for you in the lineup. I’ve seen catchers moved to other positions.
- Where are the players from?
- Do they have players from your area on their roster?
- Do they have a lot of players from one area or recruit all over?
This is relevant. Most state universities recruit within the state or neighboring states with a border tuition agreement. An exception are studs and states without enough talent. Then they tend to recruit regionally. Privates tend to be regional to national.
- What physical size are the players at your position?
If you can play the game better than the big guys size won’t matter. All other things equal chances are the shorter player loses the tiebreaker. However, I knew of a coach who was a 5’9” player. He had a short man’s complex. He tended to recruit shorter players. Some rosters only have 6’2” or taller pitchers with a few exceptions.
- What is the balance of right-handed hitters/pitchers versus left-handed hitters/pitchers?
With so many pitchers recruiting the team will have enough adequate arms from each side. It won’t matter in your recruiting.
- What do the player bios tell you about player interests and hobbies outside of baseball?
Not important. You either make time or you don’t. You’re going to be busy with baseball and academics.
- What do the player bios tell you about their past baseball accomplishments? Do they match yours?
A lot of this stuff gets embellished once past the higher ranked teams. You know who the best teams are recruiting. At most levels everyone was at least some level of all conference somewhere.
- Can you find evaluations of the players at your position from high school online? What about recruiting videos or measurables like 60 yard dash times or velocity?
It’s available on Perfect Game profiles. How much access you have is the question.
- What else can you learn by looking at their roster?
What should matter is the quality of the education you receive. If engineering matters and you don’t see any engineering majors playing take note.
My opinion. Here's my "In general the average parent...." answer;
In general, there are too many unknowns for an average parent to know enough to make decisions on a school for their son based on roster evaluation. Other recruits, juco/graduate transfers, injured players returning, draft or not draft, there is just too many unknowns.
But do it anyway to see if anything stands out. If your son is a catcher and the team has a good hitting soph catcher and the top two catcher recruits from your state are committed to the same school and your son is the 30th ranked catcher and is asked to walk-on, well there is something that stands out.
Or if the entire starting nine are seniors (or freshman) there's another.
Adbono is right, teams swing between pitching and hitting. Son's team spent almost entire recruiting class in 2020 on pitchers, and also four more showed up via Juco/Grad transfer. They will have to swing to position players next go-round.
IMO the only real measure of your son's chances are the size of his scholarship. At some point you have to roll the dice. The answer won't be at the bottom of a sum column on a spreadsheet.