Moms or Dads Talking to Coaches

Hi Marina,

Of course, everyone is different and every coaching situation is different as to what they feel comfortable with re: parental communication. However, in our experience....our son has handled 99% of the communication with his college coaching staff. There have been threads on this topic before...and it seems the "general" consensus has been to let their son's handle it. But, there are some parents who seem to have a relationship with their son's coaches who feel comfortable in making those phone calls themselves. So, I guess there is no right or wrong approach....all I know is that our son would not be very happy with his mom or dad calling his college coach. But I'm sure there are other posters who would give you a different take on this.

Marina, I agree 100% with Luvbb. If you're talking about the recruiting process, I think the young men should handle this as far as the calls and communication. Now, during a visit, I (mom,) am the one that made visits with him. I don't think this ever turned off a coach. I think some of them actually had an appreciation for my knowledge and participation in the process. Once a young man is on a campus - he's just that, (a young man) and he can communicate with his coach. If there's a question for a professor, mom's not going to call. To me it's no different with the coach.

Marina, I agree with the other Moms. Son did the calling....but....there will be times when you will have to speak with a coach. You'll know when it's appropriate.....think our general rule of thumb was that unless it had to do with son's travel safety/arrangements or our financial resources (as in scholarships)....I avoided calling the coaches.....when I did speak with a Coach....don't think it mattered one bit that I was Mom, and not Dad......

I'll second that...err-r-r, fourth that! My son is a college sophomore, and he has handled 99% of all communication with his college coaches (that's 98% during recruiting and 100% since he's been at the school).

Some college coaches seek out a line of communication with parents, and that's great. I would love it if the coach chose to call us and discuss our son's progress. But unless the coach wants to contact us, in our family we let our son handle it. I did have one question about the schedule this year; I asked my son and he asked his coach and relayed the info to me. The reasons we see it this way are (1) respecting the coach's time - he has quite a few other priorities for the team that are more important than answering my questions! and (2) respecting the fact that our son is an adult (although he handled most communication with high school coaches also).

That's just my opinion and our family's experience, not necessarily right for everyone. And of course if there was a serious safety or health issue, we might expect to have some conversation with the coach.

Thanks, Ladies. My son is only 16. Doesn't sound very comfortable on the phone with potential coaches, but perhaps now is the time for him to start calling....... especially to the coaches where he is the most interested.

Marina,

If your son is only 16...then this is the perfect time and opportunity for him to start handling some of this on his own. I would make sure he comes up with (and this could probably use some of your input to) a list of questions written down on paper for him to fall back on, when talking with coaches. You could even do some "role playing" if he is truly uncomfortable with the idea of talking to a coach. I'm sure it won't be the first time these coaches have talked to an uncomfortable 16 year old on the phone....they are probably very used to it. The whole recruiting process is a learning experience....and learning to communicate with the coaches is one aspect of it! Good luck!

what would be some good questions for the 16 year olds to ask? and is there a certain thing that they should eb looking for a school, coach, and or team?

Marina - First of all, as with others here, I was the parent that communicated with the coaches. From what I could tell, it was no big deal to them to be talking to the Mom. Thanks to some strong advice from others on this site, I did let my son handle most of the communication with the coaches during the recruiting process. We talked in advance about the questions he might want to ask, but then it was up to him. I totally agree with luvbb's post - these guys are quite used to talking to awkward 15 - 17 year olds, so I wouldn't worry about it. Having back up questions ready for him to use is a great idea. The only thing I would add is to be sure that your son does his homework about the schools he is intersted in. For example, knowing a couple of details about how the team performed last year would be a good idea, as it both gives them something to talk about, and also demonstrate that he is interested. Good luck -- these are fun times!

cub1 - I would recommend looking thru the recruiting thread. There are many old threads on the subject a fit. Each person's fit depends so much on too many individual factors to compare to each other IMO. I think everyone should look at the college website, check out current and old rosters - gives you an idea of how many kids left and are coming in. Remember to look at the juniors on the rosters as they are possible JUCO transfers which might indicate a big loss and they need experience or it might indicate a common practice. You can check the prior year's stats to see who played (i.e. does this particular program play freshman/sophs). Location, money offered, size of school, level of play are a few of the common things that most people discuss.

As far as questions, a 16 year old is too young to receive phone calls from coaches, so if you're visiting schools a coach will probably discuss where that player is in HS - is he varsity, position, grades, etc.

Also, don't forget to the see the recruiting timeline in the front of the site - many wonderful tips and articles there on recruiting.

My son sounded extremely nervous when he first started talking to coaches. He begged his dad and I to start answering the phone when the number of calls increased. We refused! This was his recruiting, not ours!
I have two pieces of advice:
1. Have your son start a file on each school. Inside, have him place a little history about the school. This research will make him more comfortable when the coach calls, even if he doesn't use it. Also have him make a list of potential questions. Keep a pen handy and have him place notes in the file after each call (they call once a week when they get really interested. Multiply that by several schools and this will help avoid confusion). The notes he takes will help you get some info from the phone call if your son doesn't remember everything discussed.
2. Start your calls with the lesser schools on his list. My son dealt with small local schools and got comfortable before the big boys started calling. He actually got pretty good at it before it was over!

Just remember, this is an opportunity for your son to grow up and learn to handle things on his own. It would be easy to do it for him, but you wouldn't be doing him any favors.

Regarding the visits, my son and husband went since baseball seemed liked "guy" territory, with all the coaches being men. We were surprised how many schools separate the player from his parents during the visit! In the end, it really didn't matter which parent was there for about 75% of the visit! You're both kept very busy, but not always together and often you're not together overnight.