High school, club and travel coaches are handcuffed in promoting their athletes to college coaches for recruiting

Knowing the reality of your situation could make all the difference in the world to your athlete

It is a regular occurrence.  When an NSR on-the-ground scout interviews a prospect and parents, one of the most common concerns they express is, “We thought our coach would handle all the recruiting stuff for us, but nothing is happening.  He (or she) isn’t doing anything to contact college coaches for us.”

Surprising?  No doubt, coaches are to be admired for the uncommon dedication they exhibit toward their craft and the athletes they instruct.  But closer examination clearly reveals that expecting that coaches should add promoting their athletes to colleges as part of their responsibilities is unfair, unrealistic and illogical.

High school coaches are especially targeted in this assumption.  Yet, there’s a fundamental problem with this thinking – where do they find the time?  Add up their hours.  Class prep, class, grading papers or results.  Teacher meetings.  Posting results.  Practices.  Games.  Drive time.  Practice and game prep time.  Equipment care.  Film evaluation.  Coaching staff meetings.  Booster club meetings.  Pre-game meals.  Put pencil to paper on each of these essential duties and you will see that there is not time enough to stop and promote your athlete much less all the athletes on their team that deserve such attention.  Moreover, you will not find any coach’s contract which includes a requirement for this or a budgeted line item to pay for it.  Oh, and then there’s the personal time they need.  Where’s the time, and where’s the money, going to come from?

Club and travel coaches are typically just as limited in time because of their full-time jobs and mostly volunteer work they do for the team.  Yes, they may run into a college coach here or there at tournaments or events, but that is the limit to their exposure to coaches.  They don’t have a database of coaches to contact, at least not enough names to be consequential.

So, who’s really going to help you with recruiting?  Who will answer the hard questions, call the coaches, reach out to not just a few, but to all of them?  Who’s going to explain how to navigate the process so that you maximize every opportunity?  Who will prep you for campus visits?

Consider all this.  Answer the questions.  Do all this because your child’s life and athletic career hang in the balance.  They really do.