One coach said he'd get innings as a freshman. That was at a cold weather school just transitioning to D1. As far as I can tell kids of similar ability who went there did get innings. The coach from Navy didn't make any promises, he just wanted to see if a Navy career was a reasonable option first. A coach from a good academic D1 in Norcal was absolutely straight with him and told him exactly where he stood - having to compete with 4 or 5 others for the last couple roster spots. A JC coach told him he'd get plenty of exposure by going there. He didn't. In general they were trying to sell but did it honestly. Even the JC coach had things happen beyond his control. The AD made him cancel games against elite scout teams they had scheduled. A coach at a D2 told him he was between D2 and D3 but was more than willing to have him walk on. The JC he went to was stronger than the D2.
Generally speaking we happened to run into the honest ones. Maybe if he had a few more mph on the fastball at the time we would have heard more flattering things.
I hope I'm not speaking out of turn but when CollegeParent's son who was a very good D1 player did a 4-2-4 I think the coach at the local JC told him the same thing he told my son - come on out and show what you've got, no guarantees.