Getting your players to college

quote:

As a coach, what is the best way to get players into college?

You can help but it is important that the kid know after all is said and done it is what he does on the field and in the classroom. also if a school contacts you about a kid you have to be honest. If you are not it gets around.

Coaches get A LOT of blind emails like that! It's good to see that info, but if it's coming from someone you don't know or have never spoken to it sometimes gets lost. I would suggest picking up the phone and calling the coach and building a relationship that way.

It should be the players responsibility to narrow down the list of schools to 5-10 and go from there. Once he has a few schools that would be a good fit for him and the program, then shoot off some emails and give the recruiting coordinator a call.

Recently I've taken two approaches. A few years ago we made a "media guide" every player (seniors and top juniors) had a page. Inlcuded pictures, height, weight, academics (gpa, class rank, sat/act), contact info, stats, awards (all district, team awards, etc) testing results (squat, power clean, 60, velocity). Got many comments from college coaches on it. Each one bound with the plastic spiral (gvc bind I think is what it is called). Not hard to do, but cost around $300 to do (including postage). Have recently gone to letters and info pages, much cheaper, same info minus picture. Follow up with email updates every few weeks, about every ten games unless requests are made for weekly updates. Was publically thanked by college coach at our last signing for how hard I work getting our kids info out there (nice gesture on his part). I've handled recruiting since 2008 here, truthfully we are a .500 program. Sent over 57% of our seniors to college on baseball scholarships...all that should have played are, 14 over 4 seasons.

May try the media guide again though...very professional in appearance. Probably gets more attention than the letter

Here is what I do. I have the players create a list of 5-10 schools that they want to attend. They have to take some ownership in this process and so asking them to do this is mandatory. Then, we make a "favorites" folder on one of my classroom computers for that player. Then, they make an initial email contact where they send in a player brochure that we have produced for that player. In this brochure is a contact number, email address, ... along with stats, summer team contact ...

Players are expect to then create a time line where they are to make contacts with each of these coaches knowing that the coach can not respond to some of them given NCAA Guidelines. From there, I expect the player to set up and make an unofficial visit. This process begins for most the sophomore year and those "favorite folders" will change significantly throughout the process. The key for most is to just get started! Our school still has "homeroom" and so, that time can be used to make these emails.

I want to add that this process is most effective if you can work with their summer coach as well. Just yesterday I had a summer coach send me a request for all of the schools I have contacted for one of my players so that they can, in turn, also make those contacts.

Good luck with the process. I do believe it is a part of your job BUT it is not your job alone. The parents and players have to work hard at the process as well.

Wow, talking about killing a thread. My last post not only killed this thread but also this forum. Hey where are you guys? LOL!

It's true