Here are my thoughts....and how I handled the exact same question you are asking. My son started playing baseball as soon as he could hold a bat. He has played top level travel since he was 9. He's been determined to play college baseball since he knew what college was....and in his mind, D1 was the only option. When he was an 8th grader, he attended a camp at a good D1 school...and was the only 8th grader there. At the time he was probably 4'8 and about 80 lbs. He held his own against kids from the top HS's in the state...some that were already D1 commits...so we started to think he could probably play college ball at some level. The next spring we went to watch my nephew play in a D3 game. It was ok baseball, but some of the kids wouldn't have played on our HS team. After that, we knew he could play college ball...but just weren't sure what level. He started at SS as a sophomore...and was honorable mention all state this spring as a junior. I went to a game this spring between two pretty good D1 "mid-majors" with the goal of watching and deciding "if he could play with these guys". I left the game thinking he could....and told him what I thought. He had been contacted, though nothing real serious at that point, by a couple D1's so that kind of backed up my thoughts. We started the summer leaning towards him playing D1...and never gave much thought to any level lower than than. He had contact with 5 or 6 schools in June and July and committed to a D1 in August.