Please help provide some direction?

Congratulations, I hope all works out for your son.

Sandman, great stuff, congratulations to your son. I would love to hear (and I'm others would as well) some of the details about what you did and how your son did during his first varsity year in HS. No need to go into specifics if you don't want too, about schools and such...

I just feel it could be helpful to others going through a similar situation.

Best of luck to your son and enjoy his senior HS baseball season!

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Son is on cloud 9!

Congrats, that is what it is all about!

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As cliche as it might sound, it really IS about finding the perfect fit for YOUR son.

I couldn't agree more. There is a reason why cliches get old & used too much....it is because most are true. Please update us as things move forward.

Thanks for the update. Great to hear that things have progressed well.

Sandman,

That is fantastic news! I know exactly how proud and happy you, your family and your son must be. You are going to be surprised just as I was how much strength and muscle weight he will gain in a college weight program during the baseball off season. Good luck and keep up the information on his college career!

Thank you all. In a few weeks or so, once he receives his package from Admissions, I'll update this thread with the actual school name (though it's probably not too hard to figure out ).

quote:

Originally posted by birdman14:

"Sandman, great stuff, congratulations to your son. I would love to hear (and I'm others would as well) some of the details about what you did and how your son did during his first varsity year in HS."

Yes, I'd be interested in this stuff - it's all ahead of me and my son (and BTW, kudos to you Sandman for how you laid this all out - very well thought out and between it and the responses a useful and concise blueprint for those of us following in your footsteps).

Congratulations, and best of luck this coming season and beyond!

Congratulations to you and your son, Sandman...and I hope he and your family are now able to relax and enjoy the remainder of his senior year of high school.

Well done Sandman Jr. !! And congrats to Mr and Mrs Sandman too !

I'm sorry I came on kind of hard on you after the original post Sandman. I musta had hyper-recruitment anxiety that day.

I know what a huge relief it is for you and your son. Your story is quite similar to mine. Mood Jr is a basketball player too and very much wanted his college baseball future decided before this senior season. He too has decided and committed to a DIII that he fell in love with at first visit.

Good luck with the basketball season and all the best to your boy as he moves on.

No problem at all, mood. And thank you for the well-wishes.

For those who are interested in our "stuff", I apologize for jumping from the beginning to the end of the story, leaving out the details of the middle. (Just call me an excited dad. )

I certainly understand that there are many paths to the next level and that ours was just one approach. But for a player who was not a blue chip D1 prospect, the onus was on us to get his name out and to get him in front of college coaches. And given that we opted not to begin his recruiting process until he had earned a starting spot on his varsity team this past Spring as a junior, we knew we had to develop a bit of an accelerated approach this summer. I definitely don't claim any expertise at this; I'm just a dad who has been hanging out here for a long time, soaking in all I can. But if consolidating my son's story in one place can help anyone digest the vast amount of information, I'm glad to try to help out.

So... seeing that there appears to be some interest, I will come back to this thread over the next week or so (likely over multiple posts) and share more details of my son's recruiting journey, in which I'll talk about:

• The importance (for our family anyway) of performing to the best of his abilities in the classroom, given the fact that we knew when this started that it would take good merit aid to make a private school baseball opportunity happen.
• The approach we took to identify and document important characteristics of his candidate list of schools (starting broadly with a couple hundred in the Northeast, narrowing down to a couple dozen to contact, and ultimately ongoing, more serious dialogs with just a few).
• His high school and summer seasons and their impact on his recruiting, as well as the continued life lesson of learning to focus on only what you can control. And how true it is what we've all heard many times about, "Don't endlessly fret over your son's high school team role and/or performance because college coaches often place more emphasis on summer teams, as well as what their own eyes can see at camps". That said, even if your high school role or performance isn't quite what you wish it were, staying focused on work ethic and character can still allow your high school coach to honestly recommend you to college coaches as a potential asset to their program.
• How we used free alternatives to commercial recruiting websites by creating his student/athlete bio in Word and using Word/Excel mail merge to contact coaches several times from Spring through Summer, while still maintaining a personal touch. [I will also make these available by email to anyone who would like copies (upon PM request).]
• The role of his YouTube channel.
• His summer and fall showcases and camps, with reviews.
• The importance of continued communication and how polite persistence can help clear confusion and reduce ambiguity - sometimes allowing the "squeaky wheel to get the grease", and other times leading to eliminating some schools from your list when it becomes clearer that the interest from a coach isn't as mutual as you might like it to be.

An added benefit of this entire process was helping my son continue to improve his organizational and communication skills - traits that I'm sure will help him well beyond baseball. In the beginning, I was standing over him at the computer quite a bit, helping him brainstorm and craft emails to coaches. But throughout the process, his attention to detail, his confidence and maturity all improved and he completely took over, to the point where he grew to simply inform me now and then that "Coach So-and-so got back to me; I'm going to reply to tell him x and ask him y".

This whole recruiting effort was really another bonding moment for my son and me. And as we sat at dinner last weekend, the day after his most recent overnight visit to his top school, still discussing his wonderful opportunity, the sincerity with which he turned to me and said "Dad, none of this could've happened without YOUR help; THANK YOU SO MUCH!" was absolutely priceless. Of course, I quickly reminded him that I was just the guide, and that HE was the one who has done, and continues to do, all of the work (on the field, in the gym and in the classroom). A real lesson in ambition and perseverence was learned here and I'm proud to have been a part of it.

Sandman,

Congratulations! Looks like the hard work you and your son put into this has paid off: (a) reaching the goal of finding the right baseball/academic fit, and (b) your son's growth, maturity, and self-confidence. Thank you so much for sharing your insight - I have a 2015 and we're really just now beginning to think about these things. He seems a long way off from being a college student, but I know the next 4 years will fly by and it's time to help him formulate a plan. Your story is certainly a good guide to the process. I look forward to hearing more from you on the details.

Yes - ditto to what fast said! I am very grateful to you for sharing your story in such terrific detail, which I expect WILL give me and my 2015 guidance as we head down the same road.

quote:

Originally posted by Sandman:

This whole recruiting effort was really another bonding moment for my son and me. And as we sat at dinner last weekend, the day after his most recent overnight visit to his top school, still discussing his wonderful opportunity, the sincerity with which he turned to me and said "Dad, none of this could've happened without YOUR help; THANK YOU SO MUCH!" was absolutely priceless. Of course, I quickly reminded him that I was just the guide, and that HE was the one who has done, and continues to do, all of the work (on the field, in the gym and in the classroom). A real lesson in ambition and perseverence was learned here and I'm proud to have been a part of it.

Okay, I teared up a bit at that part. Congratulations! My son is also narrowing down his choices with one more D3 overnight visit in January. His plan is to decide very soon after that visit and definitely before baseball season.

It has been one wild ride from initial interest from a D1 to finally realizing that the best fit for him is D3 (small school, good academics, good baseball with the opportunity to continue developing).

For anyone who is interested, the colleges became aware of my son through the following:

Summer/Fall showcase team: One D1 contact (included Junior Day invite) that died off over the summer. Did give the D3 coaches that were already interested a chance to see him pitch a bit more.

Camps: Two D3 contacts (have visited and applied to both). One camp was at the college that is interested. Another camp was hosted at a local college with several other college coaches in attendance.

High School Team: One D3 contacted us because the new assistant coach has seen our high school team play many times and is aware of the caliber of the players (we are not in the big population areas of Virginia but are a top team in the Region). Our coaches also have been in contact with one of the D3 colleges that became interested after seen my son at their camp.

NCSA: Only valuable if you are casting a very wide net or just can't get it done yourself. Several D3 schools and an NAIA D1 have contacted my son based on his profile; however, they are not really programs or locations that he is interested in EXCEPT for one D3 school that we will be visiting next month.

In a nutshell, the e-mails he originally sent out with his bio did not really develop into anything (but he felt that he had to take a shot at mid to low D1 first). Camps were the most effective with the showcase team allowing more looks (and playing against great competition to see how you match up doesn't hurt either).

Mike,

That is awesome news! I am sure your son is beyond thrilled (as are you!). I hope the financing part all works out as it is a real good up and coming program just hitting their stride! He should enjoy his time at ***U.



Mark