My son is a 6'0 190lb 2021 RHP. He is rehabbing from TJ and had surgery almost a year ago. He is recovering nicely, but it is a slow process. He had D1 looks before the injury and 91mph fastball but with TJ and Covid he's been advised to look at Post Grad programs instead of JUCO so that he can develop. What advice would you give? Will D1 coaches look for players from JUCo before post grad programs? Thank you.
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With a JUCO he’s using up a year of NCAA eligibility. With post-grad he is not.
D1 coaches are always looking for pitchers who throw 90+.
If you choose the JUCO route, I’d advise being extremely careful as to which coaching staff you choose, and make sure they are on the same page as far as how many innings they think is appropriate for an 18-19 year old coming off of Tommy John. And do your research as far as whether you can trust what they say.
If it was my kid, coming off of TJ, I would do the post-grad or even simply a gap year. More time to recover, more time to gradually get the velocity back up without the possibilities of ramping up too quickly, and more time to mature both physically and mentally.
If he can get back to 90+, or even 88+, he will have a ton of options in competing with the 2022’s for recruiting slots.
Going to a JuCo at less than 100% healthy is a recipe for disaster. Good JuCo baseball is WAY more competitive than most people realize. Post grad or gap year are your options.
My son got injured the first game of travel post junior summer. All the schools who wanted to see how much he improved from the previous summer disappeared. He chucked the sling (separated shoulder surgery from falling while rehabbing from torn MCL/PCL) two weeks before senior high school season began. He had a good season. But he wasn’t college prospect strong.
My son had nothing to gain academically with a PG year. So the strategy was to get stronger over post senior summer and play Legion to prepare for showcases in the fall. Even though any offer was likely to be for the following year he would start attending in January. He would take two classes in the fall at the local JuCo likely to be accepted by any college. At the time taking only two JuCo courses didn’t start the five year eligibility clock.
Two of the previously interested colleges screwed up the plan by making offers for the following year in August after verification of recovery from his travel coach. The Legion team made states. So he faced some top pitching. He had applied and been accepted to two colleges interested in him where he didn’t need baseball help to get accepted.
He made a quick decision and jumped on a plane. Freshman orientation had already started. He was told to try to walk on freshman year. He was forewarned the walk on spot would likely go to a pitcher. But he had an offer for the following year.
