.
While I understand and empathise...coaches are not uncaring, or unaware, or inhuman, but this is the nature of the "game" and the way that it is played...make no mistake it is a hard, and very competitive road and parents and players have to come to grips with the realities...
With all due respects...lets look at this equation from the other side....As a coach at a top school you have a few demands on your time...
- 35 current players...and 70 current possibly whiny parents to take care of 24/7...Parents who want to know why their precious little Johnny isn't getting enough playing time and isn't being represented properly to MLB,and why his scholarship $ isn't being raised....
- plus likley 100 identified HS upper class recruits to stay in close and semi-close contact with (3 deep at each position) for this year....all of whom DEMAND and expect daily stroking and are trying to negotiate, OR are emailing and calling wondering why you haven't kept in contact, threatning to sign elsewhere and wondering how it was that you were SOOOO busy that you didn't catch not at the last travel ball game in Podunk...
- and given the current NCAA rules, my competitors are recruting freshman and sophomores, and getting some of them to committ so I now am forced to spend time looking at frosh and sophs...
- Add to that travel to showcases and travel team events...contact with scouts regarding upperclass current players...academic planning, execution and putting out fires...planning for travel...changes in schedule...conditioning...assistant coaches to direct...field direction and issues...alumni to stay in touch with...fundraising...marketing...losing and interviewing new assistants (turnover is very high)...meetings with athletic departments...NCAA rules and regulations to keep up with...networking...planning, communicating, marketing, and directing camps, and follow up to all players and many parents...college summer ball contacts, schmoozing, placement...
- and that is all BEFORE anything baseball for THIS year(games, practice, workout's, player development) that will develop players, build my team and help me win this year...which is what my job depends upon.
In other words they are sorta busy.
Now...add to that...50 letters and a 100 emails each day from prospects...who are often mass mailed from a service...and frankly, to be brutally honest, are likley NOT to be program changers...
...and is it any wonder that they have time management issues?
Think I'm wrong? At least one Pac 10 school makes it virtually impossible to contact them, simply will not deal with unsolicited communication ...one exceptionally well thought of program uses secretarial answer emails and letters IN the coaches name...without the coach ever seeing the communication on the way in or the way out.
In my world, it's pretty amamzing to get ANYTHING personal back...given the realities.
Sorry to be a bit harsh, but it's the reality...
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