That NYT article from 2006 was a great read and still applies today, maybe even more so with admissions to selective colleges arguably being much more competitive now.
Which makes me wonder why more HA schools don't issue likely letters to their recruits because that would significantly reduce a lot of anxiety and uncertainty in the process. These schools should have all the information they need (transcripts, test scores, coach ranking) during the pre-read process to decide whether to grant a likely letter or not, and even if they want to first see the fully completed application with essays, they still have time to issue a likely letter after the EA/ED submission.
Although the schools might want to see how their non-athlete EA/ED applicant pool looks like for comparison, they know they need to fill X% of their class with recruited athletes to fill their teams so comparing the athlete pool to the non-athlete pool doesn't seem that useful anyway. Would love to hear what others on board think about why all HA schools don't give likely letters if they care about maximizing their recruiting classes and reducing the randomness of the process for both sides, the college and the student athlete.