Recruiting season starts today, and its an exciting time. We’ve been making contact with coaches and prospects throughout the season, but now it becomes the focal point. Starting tomorrow we’ll be visiting schools throughout the state.
This is what I got into college coaching for – to be on the other end of this process. In reality, there are 3 sides to the process: player, high school coach, and college recruiters. I’ve seen two sides of it, but I wanted to post some of my views from the college side of things. For a number of readers to this blog, that’s probably the side you’ve seen the least of.Football Coaches are Hard People to ReachFor starters, scheduling visits to 35 schools in 8 days is not an easy task. And I had by far the easiest group of schools on our staff. My schools are in the immediate area around the college, and there are not as many of them as some other areas may have. I’m not sure why that is (and don’t want to think of reasons for fear I might figure it out), but it is what it is. Why is it so difficult? Starting in early November, I was sending out e-mails to high school headers, with the date that I wanted to show up, asking for confirmation. The first mailing went pretty well, as nearly half of the coaches responded. I found that was better than a lot of other coaches on staff fared, who tried several different methods. Then it stopped. A couple rounds of phone calls and I was getting closer – probably 20 of the 35 were taken care of after a the first week. Of course, the season was still in full swing, so it was hard to get to everyone. The last part was a struggle. Coaches were taking days off after their season was over (not criticizing, I completely understand), or they weren’t working in the school at all. Honestly, a lot of my final scheduling happened today. With the season over, I was able to try to contact coaches at different times of the day.Lots of guys don’t return e-mails or voice mail. I try to make it a priority to respond to everyone – even if its a quick “Hey I got your e-mail, will get back to you” – but I understand how busy people get. But most of my schools are scheduled.
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