Stanford and Headfirst Sacramento?

So my 2017 C/RHP did both.  We live in SoCal, so we drove up to Sacramento first and did the second two-day HF and then drove over to the SF Bay Area and he went right into the Stanford camp.  I figured both camps were very expensive but this would minimize travel costs, and more importantly, many coaches he met at HF would have the chance to see him at Stanford in a different environment and follow-up with him.  HF is a true showcase  with a few drills in the morning the first day and then games.  Stanford is more of a camp with many drills and then one game per day, but spread out around Palo Alto versus side by side at HF.  There were some coaches at HF not at Stanford and vice versa, but he got seen by almost 100 academic colleges over 5 days, so IMO it was worth it.

I know others think that doing them back to back is too much on a kid.  But my 2017 is both a catcher and pitcher so he was able to balance out a day of doing one versus the other.  He held up well over the five days--he has played baseball year round since he was 5 and is pretty used to lots of baseball.  If we had to do it over, he would have been more prepared on the D3's at HF and reached out to more coaches at that level before the camp.  Most of his interest came from the D3's at HF, who then made an effort to go see his games over at Stanford if they were not working the drills.  Then when we got home he had e-mails from lots of schools and coaches he had not reached out to before.  I will qualify that he knows he wants to do engineering, so he initially was not interested in the Liberal Arts until he discovered the 3-2 dual degree program as an option. 

All of the schools at both camps are definitely academically focused, so if your 2018 has a high GPA or high test scores or both that data gets into the programs they prepare for the coaches, that is a huge first step.  Rest assured if any of these schools are sincerely interested they will ask your son for a copy of his grades and test scores.  My son kept a few envelopes in his catchers bag to give when a coach asked.

If you do decide to do both, be sure to check the websites almost daily once June rolls around.  The coaches change so if he wants to reach out to a school, it helps to know who will actually be at the event.  My 2017 sent out his contacts about 7 days before the events, which worked pretty well as most remembered his emails.  Good luck.

I would do HF as well, assuming the money works for you and the dates are not so scrunched together that he would not be able to throw well at both. He'll have many more eyes on him, especially high academic eyes, at HF than he will at Stanford, IMO.  Just due to format, a coach at Stanford could easily miss seeing many great kids in game situations at Stanford.  At HF it's easier for them to see more players play.

Go where the schools on your son's vetted list will be IMHO.

Stanford is a fun experience for a player. The schools attending are diverse (JuCo through D1) and smaller in number than HF. 

HF is centralized. With many D1-D3 schools clustered around a few diamonds. Stanford is distributed around many locations. 

Both are expensive. 

If your focus is on college recruiting, your vetted list will drive where your player goes. 

Agree with all of the above, though my HA seeking 2019 is purposefully doing HF #1 with the three day break before Stanford #1 because of the fatigue factor.  YMMV.  We're taking the off days to see a few schools and visit friends. 

The costs are high but between the two events, he will have a chance to be seen by each Ivy, several other HA Div 1's (ex: Davidson, Lafayette, Bucknell, Duke) and many HA D3's (ex: Amherst, Bates, Middlebury, MIT, Cal Tech, Chicago, Emory, Wash U.).  But some schools, as you probably know, are only at one event. Example: Yale and Princeton are at HF #1 but not at Stanford.  Dartmouth, Penn and Columbia are at Stanford but not at HF (not yet, anyway). 

HA D3's at Stanford #1 but not at HF #1 (at least so far): Amherst, Claremont McKenna, and Trinity (TX).

I realize it's early for a 2019 for those types of schools, but he's 6'2" and he'd rather get seen sooner than later.  My 2017 did not go to HF til Nov of 2015 in Florida, and things didn't heat up for him until July 2016, but he was less "projectable."

You might have more coverage if you wait til the July HF event, or even the August ones.

It is never too early to start with the D1 Ivy's and HA's, but I do think the D3's really do wait until the Summer between the Junior and Senior year to really start getting serious about recruiting.  Once in a while they find a kid who really does want to pursue the smaller school D3 option, but most told us they have learned to just wait out the kids who dream of the HA D1's falling back into their pool of candidates.  But there are enough HA D1's at HF to make it worthwhile--it is just a smaller group of coaches who will be looking at the younger class.

I agree with the comments about HF being most effective for D3 players the summer between Jr-Sr year - that is how it played out for our 2016 and falls in line with what the D3 coaches told us about their recruiting timeline.  In my opinion - and again it's just an opinion - it doesn't make sense for a player to go to Headfirst super early unless they are projecting to be D1 level player wise and have the grades to support an Ivy admission (or other very high level D1s).  Of course I understand that many want to or think they'll be at that D1 level but I feel like there are other more affordable options to help determine the potential level prior to attending HF.  

All these perspectives are extremely helpful.