How College Scouts ACTUALLY Recruit?

Hey, team, Alex Switzer here. Hey, thanks again for joining me. And if you're new to this channel, I'm a former Division 1 college scout, coach and recruiter with 11 years of experience. And now I'm here to help you or your son reach the next level. And in today's video, we're going to be talking about three topics. The first one is the misconception on how college scouts find players. Then we're going to get into how these college scouts actually find the players, how they go about doing that. So this can help you. And then actually what these college scouts look for when they're evaluating that player or these players or eventually you. So we're going to dive into that. So if you get anything from this video, please smash that thumbs up that like button and subscribe to my channel. I put out a weekly video on recruiting and how to just get better on and off the field. All right, let's dive into it. Alright. Number one, the misconception. And it's not anybody's necessarily fault of thinking this way. It's just the people that do, they're just not in this world of recruiting. That's, that's most people, that's most parents and student athletes, they're just not in the world of recruiting. College baseball and recruiting, two different worlds. Okay. And it would be like saying, telling somebody if they asked you what you did if you were a college baseball player and like, hey, I'm a college baseball player. Like, oh, you, you know, you play that game, baseball, you play it on, you know, TV or something like that, you know, like. Yeah, but there's just, there's so much more to, than just actually playing the game and how I got to college baseball and how I have to be a good baseball player on the field, in the weight room, training, nutrition, I mean, just all of that, the practices, again, there's just so much to it. Well, that's like recruiting. And the misconception usually is, is that these college scouts will just show up to a field or a tournament or a showcase randomly and just find a player and it's like, hey, I'm going to recruit that person. Doesn't work that way. Okay, now there are exceptions to that. Absolutely. Has that happened? Absolutely. But that is a rare case. These coaches are super, super organized. So we're going to get into number two. So we got into misconception. These college scouts just show up and they'll find players. Which, let me get into this, leads into the mindset of, hey, if I'm Good enough. They will find me. Guys, do not go by that mindset because that's how you get left behind. That's how you get missed by these college scouts. Okay? And we're going to get into the two ways that these college scouts find players. Okay? But first I want to make sure that you understand that these college scouts are super organized. If you look at any successful person, they're usually super organized. They have things, they have an action plan, an action item of what they're going to be doing. Whether it's a day, a week, a month, a year, all of these things that they're doing. You should see the recruiting calendars that I used to have and these college coaches have of planning out where they're going to be, who they're talking to, players that they're going to go watch. Okay? So this is number two, how these college scouts actually recruit. And number one is using their network. As you probably know, they can't be everywhere, right? There's only so many of them, only three of the four coaches on the staff can actually recruit. Okay? And those three coaches, only three coaches that can recruit in tens of thousands, really hundreds of thousands of players now that they could possibly go and recruit. Right? Well, they only have so many eyeballs, so they need help. They want help as far as, hey, who is a good player to come watch. Because again, they're not just going to randomly show up at a random tournament at Lake Point or in Texas or California or the Northeast or in Florida. Not just going to randomly show up somewhere for a week and hope they find something. No, they're going to have a structured plan of who they're going to see. And now there'll be some downtime where they might freestyle and watch some games and there might be an opportunity. But that is complete luck if that happens, right? They're going to have structure of who they're going to go see. But again, this is going off to the network. Who's their network? The high school coaches, the summerfall coaches, people like myself. They'll call me. Hey, you got any players? You got any right hand pitchers, catchers, whoever they're looking for, whoever they're in need of, or I will call them, hey, you're in need of this, you're in need of this position where you guys at in this recruiting class, etc. From there? And then high school coaches would do that, summer ball coaches, depending on there's some good ones out there, there's some bad ones out there, but they use that. Okay, so they can have a structured plan. That's number one, using their network, okay. So they can maximize and use leverage of finding good players. So they're not just hoping that they find somebody. All right, the scouts, recruiters that do that, they're not very good. They don't last very long, and that team's not very good. Okay? So number two is you. You recruit them, you are proactive, you are sending them, you are introducing yourself, you are sending them video, you're letting them know that what your metrics are, etc. To see if this is a good match. So number one is the network that they use. That's the biggest one. Number two is you. You being proactive in this process, and I am huge at advocating this, that you take control of your recruiting process and don't just sit back and get on a summer ball team and hope you're going to be found. No, guys, do not do that. You're making it worse for yourself or not giving yourself really the best chance, I should say, all right, you're not giving yourself the best chance rather than if you're being proactive in this process and doing the correct steps that you need to. Okay, that was number two. So one and two. And some people will say, what about showcases in camps and things like that? Should I be going to them? Hey, some of these are good showcases and camps can be good. But are you proactive in reaching out before and then post after and not just showing up again and hoping that you're there, letting people, people know and where you're going to be? That's important. Your spring schedule, your summer schedule, etc, camps and showcases in tournaments. But these also, these coaches will send you invites of where they're going to be. Maybe, maybe it's not even their camp. Sometimes it's their camp, but maybe it's a showcase or tournament. They've heard about you and they're going to say, hey, I'm going to be here, you're going to be here, or I want to invite you to this. That can be good and beneficial too, going through this. And when you're hearing from the coaches, that's a big deal because that's obviously, hey, they're recruiting your position. Because not all schools are going to recruit certain positions in the year. I've talked about this in the past, right? So if I'm a catcher, which I was a coach, certain teams aren't going to recruit a catcher every single year. So you want to make sure you're targeting the schools that are recruiting your Position as well. But let's get into what college scouts actually look for when they're evaluating. There's five things that they go through and there's three that are on the athletic side and the three are the first ones that they check the box, if you will. Okay, Number one that I like to start off with because it's right away, they see it right away is your physicality. How do you look? Do you look athletic? Do you look like you've been in the weight room? Do you look like you take care of yourself? That is big. Okay. That is a big up. I had a guy in the past that was. It motivated him big time. He had some good actions, he had some projectability. But hey, a coach came up to him like, hey, man, I really like what I've seen. But from a physicality standpoint, you need to get in better shape. Okay. You're kind of plumpy, if you will, and that, you know, that was everything to him in the far as the kid that needed to motivate him to keep going. The guy got in the best shape of his life and he ended up getting recruited by that guy, by that coach and committing and he's playing there currently right now. So physicality is huge. Don't be in yourself. Don't be in a position where a college coach likes you. But it's like physicality wise. Ah, man just doesn't look like he takes care of himself. Right. So we want to make sure we're taking care of ourselves in the weight room with our nutrition and our conditioning and being physical. Physical is a good thing. Physicality is a big thing. Number two, which is probably the most important one. Okay, I'm going to say that is your actions and projectability. I start with number one, physicality. Because they see that version right away. Physicality is right away. Doesn't mean it's the most important, but they see it right away and they. It's kind of first impressions, if you will. Number two is your actions and projectability. What does actions and projectability mean? Hey, how athletic, how smooth are you if you're a middle infielder, how smooth are your hands and your feet? All right, how good is your arm action if you're a pitcher? Are your mechanics smooth? Are they repeatable? Do you have length? As it looks like there's some intangible that these coaches have and that can look into a player that like, hey, they're going to just continue to get better and we're going to watch him or we're going to make a move on him as far as bring them on campus, show them around, give them a tour and eventually offer them. Okay. Offer him a scholarship or position on the team. Okay. So the actions and projectability is the biggest thing because they're looking at your actions and projectability if it matches what they want and what they want in their program, depending on the program. Because every program is a little bit different how they go about things, whether small ball or hey, we're bangers and things like that, pitching staff, etc. From there, there's a lot of small things that these coaches can look for. So some of it is subjective, depending on the players. But the foundations, hey, you can go into measurables, which is number three. Okay, One, we went into physicality, two's actions and projectability. And three, what are your measurables? How are they standing up to. This is just one piece of the puzzle. I believe too many parents and student athletes put too much weight on the measurables. Although they're important. They just put too much. They've almost put too much of the pie. Right? If there's a pie and they put like 90%. Just needs to be the measurables. Right. No, it's not that. I don't even know what the percentage is, but just a piece of, of the pie, I would probably say it's 30 to 40% of the pie of that. Hey, you need to fit this mold. You need to, hey, throw this hard. So if you're looking to go to the university or Vanderbilt, University of Florida, guys, you need to be throwing 90 plus consistently, not just topping out and throwing 86 to 87. You need to be throwing 90 and 90 consistently topping out 94, 95. So that's, that's kind of what I'm saying now. Of course, University of Florida and Vanderbilt, those two are the top of the top. Okay, that's just an example. I'm just kind of trying to get my point across here. Exit velocity. So we got arm velocity, exit velocity, 60. There's a lot of these metricals. Now there's spin rate, etc that, hey, we want to meet the standards of these colleges, depending on where we're looking at. So they're going to look at that again. Physicality, actions and projectability. This, that's two. All right, that's number two. And three is your measurable. Metrics. Some people say metrics. They're measurables. Hey, how do you measure up? What are your measurables as far as your arm velocity, exit velocity and 62 is academics and then character. Should I say 2, 4 and 5. The next things, 4 and 5. Because I said there's five things that the coaches are going to look like. Four is going to be academics and five is going to be character. Academics. You need at least a 2.3 to play at the NCAA level. You should be a way above that. I advocate for, I push for that is a really big so 2.3. You have to be there at least. And of course we're looking at high academic. We would need to be in the high threes. If we're looking the IVs, we need to be close to four. If we're looking in the IVs, SAT act, we need at least 13, 1350 on the SAT act or at least a 30 somewhere around there. That's going to help give you your chance. So it depends on the schools as we go. I covered a lot there. I threw a lot out. Ya, I hope you got something. If you have any questions or comments, please comment down below. I would love to hear any questions that you have, any comments, you have, any topics that you want me to cover, Please go on and put that down there. I hope you guys are having a great day and I'll see you in the next video. Take care. Bye.