YouTube video (Aug 19, 2021) by Alex Swenson explaining NCAA recruiting timing and visit types. Key points: the "quiet period" (no off‑campus recruiting) runs Aug 16–Sep 9, 2021, with a contact period Sep 10–Oct 10, 2021, after which a longer quiet/dead period resumes Oct 11 through Feb 2022. The video also explains unofficial vs official campus visits (official visits are paid by coaches) and that coaches may contact juniors starting Sept 1 of their junior year.
Questions this video answers
August 16, 2021 (began at time of recording).
September 9, 2021.
Contact period: September 10, 2021 through October 10, 2021.
October 11, 2021 and continues through February 2022.
September 1 (of the student's junior year).
Chapters
What's up, team? Alex Swinson here. Hey, thanks for joining me. Today we're going to be talking about how recruiting has stopped off campus, AKA the quiet period, and what all that means and the important dates that you need to know going forward to make sure you're getting the most out of your recruiting and not wasting time, money or energy. We're also going to be talking about unofficial visits and official visits and what all that means and the timing of that as well. And we're also going to be talking about how college coaches, they're going to be able to talk to juniors starting September 1st. Let's get into it. But before we do, if you get anything from this video, please select that, like, button that thumbs up and subscribe to my channel if you haven't already. I put out weekly videos on recruiting and just how to get better overall. As a student, athlete and frankly person, I'm all about development on and off the field. All right, let's get into it. All right, team, we are actually in the quiet period of the timing of this recording. And it actually started on August 16th, this past Monday. And it depends on when you're watching this video. You just check your calendar because I'm gonna go over some dates right now. So the quiet period right now started August 16th, and it will go through September 9th of 2021. September 10th of 2021, we will be back into the contact period. I'm gonna put up a calendar actually right here so you guys can visually see that. And you'll see on September 10th through October 10th, we're back into the contact period. And then on October 11th, we are back into the quiet period with some dead period as well mixed in there. But that quiet period goes through all the way through February of 2022. So what does the quiet period mean? If you're asking yourself or if you forgot, the quiet period means is recruiting has stopped off campus, meaning college coaches, Division 1 and Division 2 college coaches cannot come see you play or have face to face contact with you off of their campus. They can't be on anybody else's campus. They can't be on a random field in Georgia, Lake Point, PBR event, perfect game event. They cannot watch you play. That is against NCAA rules. Now, that said, during the quiet period, they can watch you on their campus and have face to face contact with you on their campus. And why is this important to bring up? I just want you to make sure that you guys are saving money, time and energy, not going to showcases or tournaments that are not on specific campuses. Okay. And expecting college coaches to be there because they're not going to be there or they shouldn't be there. Okay. Division one to division two coaches cannot be there during the quiet period. They can watch you play on their campus. So meaning college. College camps can be important during the quiet period because they're not leaving their campus to watch you play. You have to go to them or go on a visit and meet with them, get a tour by them. And we're going to actually get into unofficial and official visits here in a minute. But just understand that. And the contact period. Okay, the contact period, which is going to be September 10th through October 10th, and we were just in for the summer. And means that college coaches can go out and watch you play and have face to face contact with you on the field or off the field, etc. After the game, talk with you after the game. They can do that during the contact period, but not during the quiet period. All right, let's get into visits. In the recruiting process, there's two types of visits. The unofficial visit and the official visits. And of the unofficial visits, there's two types of. Of those visits. All right, sorry if I just confused you, but we're going to get into that. So the first type of unofficial visit is you going on your own. You or your parents going on your own to visit campus, visit a school and take a tour, whether it's on your own or going through the admissions, which I definitely recommend because they can explain things to you in a lot better way of where things are, how things work. And you can stop by the baseball facility, take a look around and. And really try to get a feel of on campus at the baseball facility. If you could see yourself there. That is one type of the unofficial visits. And you're paying this all on your own. You're paying for the travel, you're paying for the food, you are paying for the hotel if you're going to stay in a hotel. And then the other type of unofficial is the college coaches invite you to come to campus and they give you a tour around the facility. Maybe you go to a lunch, but you're still paying for everything. Okay? They don't pay for this. Okay? And we're going to get into the official visit. This is where college coaches pay for everything. They invite you to come to campus. They pay for your flight, they pay for your gas, they pay for your hotel, they pay for food, they pay for it all. Okay? That can start September 1st of your junior year. Okay? Official Visits, unofficial visits can happen really anytime. Okay, you can go whenever you want, or a college coach can invite you to campus whenever they want. But as far as official visits, as of this recording NCAA September 1st of your junior year, the college coaches can bring you to campus. And again, they pay you for everything. When you get an unofficial or official visit and the college coaches are inviting you, things are getting serious. And usually, or I shouldn't say usually, sometimes official visits, they have already actually already offered you or they're going to offer you when you come to campus. Usually how it works is you come to campus, maybe you'll go get some food, some lunch or a dinner, and then either the next day or if you just got lunch, you're going to take a tour around campus. The college coach is going to show you around. You might meet with an academic advisor. They can kind of explain the academic side of it. Then maybe you go into the head coach's office or the recruiting coordinator's office and they explain more to you about the baseball program, how everything works the day to day of their baseball program. And then they end up offering you either maybe a scholarship or a position on the team. Walk ons. Definitely this is, and it's called a preferred walk on. That happens as well. There's a misconception that everybody that gets offered a spot on a college team is on scholarship. That is definitely not the case. And if you watch any of my videos, I go into detail about how scholarships work and maybe I'll put something back out. By the way. Nowhere in the middle. If you guys ever want anything for me to talk about, just comment down below. If you have any questions, comment down below. I get back to everybody. So that's how visits work. I highly, highly recommend that you go visit schools. Don't always wait for college coaches to offer you a visit. Okay, that can come. But sometimes you need to be proactive in going to visit these schools. Especially if you're getting close to making a decision of where you're going to school, make sure you go and visit the college campus. So let's get into communication with college coaches. And I'm going to take the angle of college coaches communicating with you, the student athlete. I've talked a lot about in the past of how you can communicate with them in the right way to optimize your recruiting process. But I'm going to talk about a little bit about a different angle with all the NCAA rules and regulations because these coaches have a lot. So if you are a freshman or Sophomore, it's before September 1st of your junior year, college coaches cannot reach out to you as far as with recruiting. They can send you camp information and things like that, but they can't reach out to you about recruiting. Now you can reach out to them and that's how communication can be done. And how does that usually happen? Because usually you just don't cold call a coach. Nothing really comes from that, honestly. Okay, how this usually works is college coaches will either see you play or they will get information about you or they receive video of you and, and then they talk to a person that knows you or is your summer coach and tell, hey, tell Alex to give me a call at 7pm tonight and I will pick up and we can. We're gonna talk further. That's usually how it works if it's before September 1st of your junior year. Now if it's September 1st of your junior year, which is coming as of this recording, September 1st is coming up. They're gonna be able to contact you whenever they want. After that, they can actually call you you now. Okay, Those are the rules around that. Not a lot of people know about that, but that is the communication as far as on the college coaches in. Let me know if you have any questions or any concerns or if you need any help with recruiting, please leave. Any questions or if you want to talk to me, reach out and I will set up a phone call and go from there. But hey, again, if you like this video, please select that thumbs up and subscribe and I will see you in the next video. Take care.
