Question abouts College Camps

They probably bought a mailing list from an event your son attended or a team or program your son was affiliated. Or he may have been recommended by someone. If it's just a brouchure it's more likely they're recruiting your money than your son.

A lot of times you'll get the answer that camps are just a money-making machine...that's probably pretty true... HOWEVER I would like to share that I was recruited by and ended up attending my number one dream school after attending their winter baseball camp. You will get time in front of the coaches and if you play well enough to open eyes you never know where it will take you.

I remember going to the camp, seeing the coaches in uniform and thinking to myself "WOW, I really want to wear that uniform!" I think they saw that excitement, and of course it didn't hurt that I hit the **** out of the ball that day.

In my case they got my name from a juco camp that I attended the previous fall. Who knew that attending a junior college hitting camp after not being recruited my junior year would lead to a roster spot on my dream division one school.

I know some are money makers.....I was just curious where they got my sons name and if it was worth attending

If you go to a college camp you are telling that school "I want to come to school here". Colleges recruit most of their players from their camps. If you are targeting more than one school, then try to go to their camp as well. It's more effective than going to a general showcase.

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Originally posted by baseball10143:
I know some are money makers.....I was just curious where they got my sons name and if it was worth attending

None of us know where they got your son's name. I would call them and ask them about it. They might say "We got your son's name from a tournament roster but that is all we know about him." Then again, they might say "We saw your son play at *** event. He is a tall/skinny outfielder who we think could become a great college hitter. We would like to see him perform at our camp before comitting to him however." One of those responses sounds like a money-making ploy. Another one of those sounds like there might be some interest there. Don't try and divine these answers from a message board that has no clue. Call the coaches and ask them why they sent the materials. You might be pleasantly surprised by the response.

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If you go to a college camp you are telling that school "I want to come to school here".

I think this is a bit of an overstatement.

I would think you wouldn't want to go to a camp unless you were genuinely interested in at least investigating the school and its coaches, and having them see you first hand. But if you want them to know that you definitely want to go there, you should speak up in no uncertain terms.

My own son went to 4 camps, to compare and contrast what he saw. In the end, he committed to a program that didn't even run a camp. But by then, he knew what questions to ask and he knew what he was looking for, and the camp experiences helped him with that.

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Colleges recruit most of their players from their camps.

This is completely false. Very few colleges do this, if any.

Colleges are happy to find someone via their camps and will do so when they can. They will also use their camps to invite people in for a situation where they can be seen in person and evaluated.
But camps are only one component of the recruiting strategies used.

And, truth be told, a lot of camps exist first and foremost to augment the coaching staff's incomes. Anything they get above that is gravy.

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It's more effective than going to a general showcase.

This might be true for the player who has his heart set on one particular place and who wants to devote his maximum effort to pursuing an offer from that one place.

But it's generally not a good strategy. For one thing, what if the interest is not mutual -- where does that leave you? And, suppose they make you a lowball offer -- will you have any negotiating leverage, if no one else is pursuing you?

I'm not a big fan of serial showcasing, but getting your data into PG's web database as an objective reference source for colleges is a good idea, something to do once anyway. Also, there are some showcases that target particular types of players, e.g., Headfirst's Honor Roll Showcase that matches high academic kids to Ivy League etc. programs. If your son is a top notch student in the truest sense, that's a good buy, too.

Sorry if I mislead anyone with my generalization....didn't mean to. Most college camps I have seen include coaches from other schools as well so you do get additional exposure. But if your dream is to go a particular school, then under all circumstances let the coaches know your interest and attend their camp. I did not mean to suggest this as the only strategy, by any means. There are many other opportunities as these folks suggest but I think it would be somewhat counterproductive to spend $$'s on a camp for a school you didn't want to attend unless there were many other schools there recruiting such as Stanford Camp. Just my opinion.