College coaches don't rely on newspapers for recruiting

Shocking! Someone who sells services that help recruits downplays the effectiveness of other methods one might use to catch the attention of coaches?!?!?! Definitely an unbiased opinion. Perhaps for your next post, you can ask the President of Ford what brand of car he recommends.

No one is arguing a coach is taking something in the newspaper as gospel. But certainly one has to imagine that some recruits somewhere occasionally get noticed because of media attention.

 

I'm baffled when working reporters try to downplay or refuse to acknowledge the impact of their work.

Of course press coverage generates scholarships for high school kids. Scholarships aren't just limited to the Ohio States and Floridas of the world. The I-AAs, the Division II schools, the non-revenue sports at both the bigger and smaller schools, they all need players.

Exposure doesn't begin and end with assistant coaches. You have alumni, boosters, fans who read newspapers. They let the schools know who they think is good and worth a look.

So the coach might not have read about the player in the paper but he's at the school checking the kid out because someone else did read it.

 

Uh, not to be a dick but this column wasn't really all that spectacular. In fact, I'd say it was self-serving and, to me, came across as a writer trying to write about something he cares about but that none of his readers do.

Maybe if he had gone more in the "this is what they DO care about" direction rather than the "Please don't call and complain to me" direction, I would have liked it more.

As it is, this is something we can whine about on our dimwits thread but an article/column on it? Making a mountain out of a molehill, in my opinion.

 

I'd say it depends on the coverage. Writing a full-length feature on a kid might get him some interest at the very low levels.

But those little blurbs that mention that Little Jimmy only had 8 points instead of 10 isn't going to make an impresson on anyone.

 

I've had a bunch of kids in my coverage area sign JUCO and NAIA schollies. I don't think a damn word I wrote had a damn thing to do with any damn one of them getting any kind of damn ride. It goes back to travel ball or to those tryouts some of those schools get to hold because their not FBS level schools.
Besides, what I resent is a parent's insistence that's my responsibility to get their kid a scholarship. Ain't my job; that's supposed to be the domain of your coach. Tell him to start working the phones for your kid. Otherwise, get off my ass. I have strippers to put through school.

 

Haven't seen him in years, but Bill Wells is good, good people and damn good at his job.

 

Well, there's a column that would be written on the East Coast.