attend a college specific showcase?

Basic response that you will see in multiple places. Your son should create a list of colleges that fit what he needs to develop his place in society, whatever he deems that might be, even if its that he does not know and therefore will get a liberal arts or business education.

From there you should select schools that fit that definition, bringing into the mix your ability to pay or to secure academic or need based assistance.

Will he benefit from the school? Will he benefit from the geographic location? Will it be the right social setting? Notice I have said nothing about baseball yet?

Once he defines where he would do well without baseball, he should then look at the baseball opportunities and make contact with the coaches. If the college specific showcase is a college on his list then by all means go. If not, why waste the money and time?

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Once he defines where he would do well without baseball

Yes, that is the basic reponse, however its harder to do then it sounds for a lot of kids. Ultimatly many kids find that playing baseball in college is very important to them and all the stuff about location, weather. type of school, size etc.. goes out the door. For many kids its more important to find a coach that is interested in them rather then a school their interested in. If you're lucky the two will intersect.

My point being don't exclude a school just because it doesn't meet some of the kids......current.... criteria.

I agree on the point that most kids will find it hard to define what they want. That is where the family and guidance counselors come in. And where college visits come in that are more than baseball visits.

If you pick a school purely on baseball, you are basically saying you want to pay the school's tuition just to play baseball.

A lot can go awry. Coaches change. Needs change. Injuries happen. You've got to be ready for life at that school, at least for the year you are in, in the absence of baseball.

I think there are a couple of benefits to attending school-specific camps:

(1) to check out the "competition" (though, with no barrier to entry except the fee, the attendees will probably vary a great deal in terms of skill level).

(2) To check out the coaches, their styles, the facilities, and the campus.

(3) To get used to this type of showcase.

However, given the fact that your son is a 2015 and that many schools have 2-3 of these camp/showcases every year, I suggest it might be worth it to consider a different approach:

Make a big list (20 to start with, perhaps) of schools that are of interest. Include all different kinds of schools on the list: Academic reaches. Academic safties. Baseball reaches. Baseball safties. DI, DII, DIII. Expensive, Relatively Inexpensive. Public. Private. Urban. Rural. Big. Small. etc. etc.

Try to get an objective and informed assessment of your son's abilities. And projectability. Not from Uncle Louie or your son's Little League coach.

Then start the process of getting informed. Make campus visits if possible. Cull the list. Zero in on a couple of programs (8, perhaps?) that are of particular interest. Contact the coaches. Fill out questionaires. Then attend a school's camp.

I think if you start now what you will hear unless your son is a total stud, potentially drafted out of high school type guy is that we will follow you. Then you will get invites to every camp for the next three years and undoubtedly have to attend again.

Let them know you are interested in their school and that you will stay in touch with your son's high school schedule and summer schedule and after they have seen a bit more of him and still interested, you would be more then happy to attend a camp.

If they come watch him play then you can assume if he is interested in the college that it would be worth doing but qualify it a bit before you invest your money

It is probably worth mentioning that a "college specific showcase" is only permitted in D2, and it would be called a tryout. D1 schools can offer camps but not showcases. Ostensibly, the player attends a camp to get instruction. As frequently mentioned on this board, the primary purpose for colleges to put on camps is to generate revenue.

A few schools do run 1 day camps with a fee of $60 or $70 (in Northern California), and these camps are very lightly publicized. If a player is invited to one of these, it is a good idea to go, because the school only invites players in which they have genuine interest. Camps which cost much more than that are really intended to make money.

Having recieved similar invites it doesn't hurt to have your kid check out the facilities and experience and/or see what the comp. is up to. I would say that you can get noticed at these showcases/camps but the bottom line is making the program $ As a dad of a 2015 LHP/1B my son was lucky enough to get an hour of personal instruction for cheap at a SEC school, warm up with a rostered pitcher in the stadium, then throw in there outfield bullpen. It ws just a pitching accedemy but it was quite an experience for him.

There are campers and there are invitees. Bum, Jr. was a camper, the smallest of all the campers, I might add.

They didn't look at him until the last day, when the pitching coach wandered by and saw him throw six straight pitches into a tire-like hole. Then they gunned him at 79. He was 15.

They followed him, was hitting 87-88 as a junior and he was an early signee.

These camps can work if a kid is talented enough. But the vast majority of campers, if they were looking for exposure, had no business being there.

Its local right? What's it going to hurt by going? Maybe your son finds out that he really likes the coaches and they really like him? Maybe he finds out he really doesn't care for them and they really don't care for him? Maybe he gets some good instruction and has a good time as well. He could build a relationship with the coaches or at least start one. Maybe one of the asst coaches ends up as a HC or asst at a school he is interested in a couple of years?

Anytime you get the opportunity to get college coaches eyes on you and give you feedback either positive or negative imo its a good thing when your son is trying to find out where he fits in in all of this. If your son stands out in the coaches eyes they will let him know it. There are several ways they do this. If he doesn't so what he gets the opportunity to gain something from the experience.

I just see these situations as opportunities to get on a baseball field in front of college coaches as golden opportunities. These guys are the people that your son hopes to attract attention from in order to play at the next level. It has nothing to do with this being a school or not being a school your son hopes to attend imo. It has everything to do with seeing if what he has to offer at where he is right now peeks the interest of those that he will need to peek the interest of in the future. And seeing where he stacks up in their opinion since their opinion is going to matter greatly in the future.

Bums son caught someone's eye. Some kid is going to catch their eye at his camp. And even if this school is not an option it doesn't hurt to find out what does that.

Thanks for all the input...especially Coach May's. All very informative and appreciated. I agree with receiving feedback from coaches, whether it be negative or positive can be beneficial for him. It's about 1.5 hours away, so for California, it's local enough.

quote:

Originally posted by 3FingeredGlove:
It is probably worth mentioning that a "college specific showcase" is only permitted in D2, and it would be called a tryout.

A few schools do run 1 day camps with a fee of $60 or $70 (in Northern California), and these camps are very lightly publicized. If a player is invited to one of these, it is a good idea to go, because the school only invites players in which they have genuine interest.

You're pretty spot on. It's a good NAIA school with recent success. Unfortunately, after talking to my son, they don't offer the major/curriculum he's interested in...so he said he'd go for the experience but not necessarily the school.