Another recruiting scenario

don't worry about it they probably knew about the change before you did

I think our son's HS coach got all of about 2 phone calls from college coaches.

I don't think I'd worry about it right now.

If I was your son I'd tell the coach that I'm interested in his college and would like to be considered. This just adds one more option for your son.

As far as notifying other schools, I wouldn't waste my time. It doesn't matter.

quote:

by bee: don't worry about it they probably knew about the change before you did

that's my story & I'm stickin to it!!


however - it's a GREAT opportunity for follow-up calls to the
college coach(s) of your choice



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justbaseball - then what's all this I hear about the high school coach being the most important person (besides the player) in the process?
Baseball25 - way ahead of you. unfortunately the school doesn't even come close to my son's academic interests.
Bee> - you make a great point, hopefully I can get my painfully shy son to make these calls. He's not been looking forward to that part of the process. I think the thought of "cold calling" a college coach has him very intimidated. Perhaps someone who's run in to that problem can relate their story? I think once he gets a couple of calls under his belt they'll get easier.

quote:

the high school coach being the most important person (besides the player) in the process?

huh?? other than "very few" who attempt to help - it's YOU & the GUY in the mirror

have your son start with regular mails (preferred - as they cannot be deleted with the press of a key) or e-mails . . even if he composes them & you "doctor" and send 'em



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DITTO on what BEE and Justbaseball have said!
Fungo

Bee> - As I said, he's already sent the letters out, albeit with some "dated" material in them. If you all don't think it's a big deal then I'm not going to worry about it. While I'm here. Do you think college coaches prefer the follow up phone call over emails? It's sometimes difficult to get a hold of a coach by phone. And depending on the division, most aren't allowed to return your call until after your sons' junior year. That's why we're leaning toward emails. Of course I guess there's no guarantee the coach reads his email either. Thanks for your help.

Poptime,
(I like that screen name...I used it on my son's college message board)
Email vs. phone call? PHONE CALL! I would venture to say that many emails are intercepted by an office person and may or may not make it to the coach. Plus, this whole recruiting event is a form of marketing and we all know how important emotions are in marketing. Email lacks emotion and personality and is so easy to ignore or delete. Email is convenient but I look at it as the easy way out of what many young men perceive as a difficult task. We want to make an impression and a voice does it better.
Fungo

PS. A different situation may arise later on in the recruiting cycle when the coach may request information via email.

It is never a choice of one or the other. Both are essential in the marketing process. E-mail is quick and don't get too verbal. Insert pivtures. Follow up with phone calls. All forms of communication get intercepted and the garbage pail is a short distance when the letters start to pile up.
Several coaches were almost impossible to reach by phone. Once I e-mailed them I would set up a time to call them. Worked very well, quick and efficient.
Some schools have blockers on e-mails with photos so you have to eliminate the photos if they can't turn the blockers off.
The point is that most coaches will talk to you are are very polite. One school I sent their Athletic Questionaire in twice on the web. I got no response. I phoned and left a message on his voice mail. " I have sent 2 AQs and I am surprised that I have not heard from you. My 6'4" LHP is good student with an 1130 SAT and a an Elite pitcher playing against top Elite american and Canadian teams,single A, college players etc" He called and appoligized and said he was extremely busy. He red the AQ and asked for his video. He e-mailed me immediately after receivind the video saying "we have to talk ASAP". This is the school he is now playing for.
I get the impression that a lot of people are too worried about upsetting the coach. They love the game and if you have the potential to win they will appreciate the effort you made. Use all the tools that are there for you.

I am responding to your concern about your son not wanting to call coaches. I do not think this is abnormal. In my humble opinion, most athletes are encouraged to stay out of the coach's office, and just play, so it is a complete reversal in the kid's mind to hear that he must call a coach, an unknown authority figure, to show an interest. Athletes are not salespeople, and should not be expected to be. A parent can contact a coach to get things going or to see what info a coach's wants. You can also try e-mail. Having said that, all a coach wants to hear from a prospective player is that I am interested in the school, and wanted to see if there was an opportunity for me on your team. I assure you, the coach will take over after that. Finally, I can understand why coaches would want to speak directly with the prospective player, but it is a teenager/minor trying to talk (negotiate?) with an adult. A parent has a right to monitor and participate in the process about dates, info, visits and the like. Obviously, stay out of any evaluation discussion. (i guess this is more than you wanted. sorry)

quote:

Originally posted by PopTime:
justbaseball - then what's all this I hear about the high school coach being the most important person (besides the player) in the process?

It just wasn't true in our case nor in other friends of ours.

True story...one of our son's coaches knew a D1 head coach pretty well. They ran into each other at a social event...son's coach told the D1 coach, "hey, I've got a real player for you!, etc..., etc..." The D1 coach basically blew him off...later told other mutual friends "can you believe this guy trying to pawn off his players on me?"

A week or two later the D1 coach saw our son pitch at a showcase for the first time...not connecting him to his coach, he apparently really liked what he saw and the mail, email, aggressive recruiting and ulitmately phone calls and scholarship offer came flooding in.

Point is, he didn't even really trust someone he knew for a while until he saw with his own eyes.

Fungo, Dominick, justbaseball, Bobblehead,

Tremendous, tremendous help! You all make such great points. How long after the intro letters are sent out should he follow up? I'm telling you he's dreading it, but he knows it's something that has to be done.

If you do it by E-mail it can be done same day. Put photo inserted in the e-mail (not Attached) If the coach isn't available leave a short message that you will call back. You can do the initial calls if he is timid about it. My guy is slightly shy and a guy of few words.

quote:

You can do the initial calls if he is timid about it. My guy is slightly shy and a guy of few words.

Really? Is everyone in agreement with this?

Pop Time - IMO sooner or later, your son will have to talk to the coach. I can tell you from our experience, if a college coach calls, he'll ask for your son, not you. So, why not have him get some of the experience up front while being proactive. Have him practice and role play. The first college coach we visited in person happened to be my son's #1 choice. He sat there like a knot on a log and he's known as being a very outgoing kid. Afterwards, I asked him "why didn't you talk more"? Remember though that the coaches are used to dealing with somewhat shy and awkward teenagers - they know how to keep the conversation going and make a kid comfortable.

lafmom,
Very good points, as usual. I think my son will be fine. He always seems to impress adults with his personality and maturity when they first meet him. Besides talent, I would guess that that's #2 when a coach is evaluating a kid. But I think my son may be looking at these initial conversations as life or death interactions where one wrong phrase, word, stutter, ect... will spell doom. But as you say, these coaches deal with hundreds of kids and if they didn't know how to make a kid comfortable during these talks/interviews then they wouldn't be where they are. I got an answer earlier from someone who said start making the calls right away. I'm thinking maybe wait a week or two to make sure the coaches have actually had a chance to open their mail. Would you start making calls if there was a chance the coach hasn't even seen the intro letter yet?

Pop - I would have him wait a week or so. If he calls the head coach - in all honesty the guy probably will not have seen it. If your son does the calling, he needs to understand that and not feel uncomfortable if the coach doesn't know anything about it or his name for that matter. He's showing initiative and interest and hopefully inspiring the coach to look for his info or request more. It's an introduction of sorts. My son's favorite coaches were one's that he would make the comment "I'm very comfortable with him", "I could see myself knocking on his door if I had a problem", and "I like talking to him". Talking with the coach can give a player important information.

I'll share something that I found kinda funny. I helped my son's former girlfriend with college recruiting this summer. She mailed out her info and then I had her do follow up emails with the coaches to see if they received everything. One of the coaches meant to forward the email to his assistant and asked "have you seen this kid's stuff - do you know anything about her". Instead he had hit reply. I had to sit for a minute or two and think how to handle this situation. Obviously he wasn't going to get a reply from the assistant as she never received it! I had the kid reply back in a humourous manner what had happened. Maybe out of embarassment, but he made sure he found her info and followed up with her!

Thanks again lafmom!

a point worth mentioning

many schools have an assistant coach whose specific responibility is recruiting -

they are usually easier to contact, quicker to follow up -
often closer to the athletes own age, relate well and are accustomed to carrying on a phone conversarion with a quiet teen or parents

not against contacting the Head coach, but often early contact stuff gets passed off anyway and you can save a step or two


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I have always , as a matter of courtesy and respect, contacted the Head Coach first. If he wants to then have the recruiting coach step in that is fine but until then I go to the Head Coach

Poptime, great advice given above. Just a few thoughts to add: Role playing was mentioned above, a good idea, and when you play the part of the coach, try throwing in a goofy question just to help your son loosen up about the whole thing. Then reverse roles and let your son play the coach's part while you be him - it can be enlightening to pretend to sit on the other side of the desk. Finally, suggest that your son start with just 2 or 3 calls the first day, to colleges that are NOT on the top of his list, so that it doesn't seem so "do or die" if he doesn't think he did well on those first calls. Good luck!

I agree TR - my son only contacted a couple of schools on his own, but that's what he did. First of all, the head coach is the guy making the final decisions, so good to get your name in there, plus he'll direct you someone else if appropriate. If you've been contacted by a particular recruiting coach, that's different as you know to return a call to that assistant.

TR, agree - you as a coach, calling the head coach

quote:

First of all, the head coach is the guy making the final decisions

often true - but, the list is compiled/sorted/prioritized by the recruiting coach

hey tho, if you're getting a good response from the head guy, why change anything, but . . .

questionairs, & recruiting mail when identified is passed on to the recruiting guy



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lafmom, when you say your son only contacted a few on his own, is that because it was only necessary to contact a few? Or did he get help with the others on the list. You see, even with all the great great advice we're getting, I'm still a little lost! And MN-Mom, excellent idea! Though it's hard to pick who gets the "practice calls", that's what we'll work on. And TR Tom, thanks for speaking up, good to know you're keeping an eye on things Have you firmed up any dates for your Norwich and Binghamton events for 2006 yet?

Poptime, Fortunately for my son he had quite a few schools that called him. He hadn't heard from a couple of schools that he was interested in, so he contacted them late in the game. We were ignorant Pop of the recruiting process or he would have contacted many schools that he had received letters from and also had interest in. Didn't come to this site until into his senior year. He's a JUCO kid and I assure you, we'll do somethings differently next time around. Your son is getting good advice and should be proactive - anyone that comes acalling on their own is just icing on the cake! You don't have to wait though to see who calls - you can take control.

PopTime, you have gotten some great advise here....just want to add one thing....the phone calls...to the coaches....in our case this turned about to be the best thing son could have done. He was not crazy about making those calls....and it took a lot of pep talks/nagging on my part to get him to make that first call, but once he got one out of the way....it became easier for him. College coaches get lots of emails, letters, questionaires, videos....but sometimes it's the phone call that helps get their attention. They don't receive so many of those.......for son, that phone contact with the coach made all the difference. Good luck.

Jr's coaches were all fired after this past season, his Junior year. Knowing this was happening, we spoke with the coach, and still use him as the reference. New guy was just hired, knows nothing about the players or nobody in the college world. Old guy has still been in contact with college coaches, glad to help us.

Suggest you contact your old coach and ask that you can still use him as a reference.