NESCAC question

Not dumb at all.  Fair question.  All 3 conferences recruited my son 4-5 years ago.  At that time, I attended a few games or watched their practices incognito (I was on a business trip and had time to kill).  The major difference will be starting pitching, pitching depth & velocity, and overall player depth between the Ivy/Patriot versus NESCAC IMHO.  I think you'll have a number of kids (like my son) who would have done well at either conference, but there are far fewer like him on a NESCAC roster.   I think it is fair to say that the best NESCAC (Tufts and Amherst over the last few years) would give a lower level Ivy a good game, but the Ivy would win the best out of 7.  JMO.

With that said, most don't go to any of these schools with only baseball in mind.  My son just graduated from an Ivy, and frankly I truly believe he would have been happy at any of these schools.  He loved his experience and would do it all over again in a heartbeat.

Dialog me if you want to discuss further.  Good luck.

The top D3 teams can compete against D1 teams on any given day.  Generally, NESCAC does not have the "top" D3 teams but perhaps a strong D3 team year to year.

Having seen many of the teams the last few years across these conferences, I would say generally the Ivy and Patriot teams are deeper in talent than a NESCAC team and play much better competition.  For what it's worth, most of the kids on a Patriot or Ivy roster had other D1 offers and had NESCAC "offers" too.  The opposite (most NESCAC kids with D1 offers) is not true from my experience, though some did. 

Similarly, an Ivy or a Patriot team can beat an SEC team (see LSU and Mississippi State as a couple examples this year) but the SEC teams are much deeper and play much better competition overall.  Yale took one of three games from LSU.  If they played ten total games, maybe Yale wins another one.  From my viewpoint, I'd see the NESCAC teams stacking up against Patriot/Ivy teams the same way.

In order for the NESCAC team to compete they would need 1 super or 2 very strong d3 pitchers for each game.  IMO the difference between the leagues is large.  

I was at a Harvard game a few years ago when this conversation came up. The previous year Trinity (CT) went 45-1 winning the D3 World Series. Someone asked if Trinity could beat Harvard. A person in the conversation was a friend and former teammate of Coach Decker (then of Trinity, now at Harvard). Decker told him Trinity could compete with Harvard with their ace on the mound. That was Tim Kiely who was drafted in the 20s and made it to AAA. That Trinity team also had two other players signed as free agents. But the coach felt after Kiely Harvard would have a distinct advantage. 

As a general observation, what would you estimate is the average velocity across the NESCAC for a team's top 3 starters?

Thanks, guys. Still early for us, as my 2017 has not really figured out who he is yet, both as a student and as a player.  We'll see over the next year, I think.

Fenway, thanks.  I'll be in touch if and when we need more specific advice.  

I do have one related question. Just curious: if a kid went to a D3 school to start a 3-2 engineering program, after he finished his 3 years at the D3, he could theoretically play 2 more years at his D1 engineering school.  Correct?

A player has five years to play four. If he changes schools after obtaining his undergrad degree he only becomes eligible immediately if the new school offers a grad degree the first school does not.

A couple random thoughts....

1) A 3+2 program is an informal academic program where schools associate themselves with another school.  From an academic perspective it may not be transfer as I believe you get your degree from the last school.  However the NCAA may look at it differently.   It is worth looking into to see if there is a way around it if your son is that interested.   I've attached the NCAA Transfer Guide URL below.  Many students athletes consider 3+2 (my son did), but I don't know anyone (athlete) who has done it.  Changing from one school to another is not easy either academically, socially or athletically.

2) Tranferring from a D3 to a D1 engineering school may not be realistic due to the baseball level of play at these traditionally large D1 schools.  There are some exceptions.  However, most D1 engineering schools are large land grant schools.  

3) Engineering doesn't get easier senior year.  My son just graduated with an BS in MechEng, and he was working his tail off academically this year.  What I'm getting at is time may be an issue that is tough to manage or get around.  If he was at the school 4 years, he may learn how to manage his time better knowing the ins and outs....

NCAA Transfer Guide http://www.ncaapublications.co...r-guide-2013-14.aspx

Good luck!