The Truth - How College Coaches Recruit

Hey, team, Alex Swenson here. Thanks for joining me today. I want to go over how actual college scouts and recruiters recruit from a foundational level and so you can better understand how this recruiting process works from their side. Okay? That's very important for you to understand what goes on behind the scenes and what they're doing to better help yourself or your son or daughter get recruited through this recruiting process. Okay? And this comes from a former college senior scout, coach and recruiter, have 11 years of experience and was also mentored by some of the best recruiters in the game and that are still recruiting to this day. Who I talk to and understand their processes and I just want to share those things with you as we go. So, hey, if you get anything from this video, please select like that, thumbs up and subscribe. I put out a weekly video about recruiting and or development on and off the field. And I'm just here to serve and to help you as best as I can. Alright, let's get into it. Alright, guys, the first thing that college recruiters are going to do is get organized. Very important to get organized in whatever you do. It sets you up for success. And this is the board. This is how they get organized in their recruiting. And we want to be on the board. That is a very, very good sign. So this is the format that I use and that also my good friends and coaches that I know and my mentors use this format as well. And you might have seen boards like this, whether it's the NFL draft or MLB draft. And of course we're talking about baseball here, but every sport has their own board because it gets them organized on the people that they're interested, the student athletes that they're interested in. Okay? And for this we have it organized in the class. So 2022s will be here, 2023s will be here. And it could go to 2024, 2025, okay. Depending on the program and how far they're looking out recruiting. Okay. I'm just using this example, frankly, because this is the size of my whiteboard. Okay. We had some that were five times bigger than this in our offices and that they currently have now. But we have each position, right handed pitcher, left handed pitcher, catcher, middle infielder, outfield and corner. And again, these are just examples, just in case you can't see because I know it's a little bit small, but your name would be here. So for example, if it was me, Alex Swenson, my high school and my summer team, okay? And I use the star there. Because each code has. Each coach has their code and labeling of the stars, like maybe of high, high interest or that they've offered already or they're going to offer. So we want to be on this board. It's very important. We're on this board. It's a very good sign. Okay. But depending on each position, you can have anywhere from just two names on here to 12 to 15 names on here of players that they're interested in. Okay. And again, I just. I didn't fill them all out just so you could see this, but again, all the names would be filled out here. And as you go farther down in the class, the less names and as you get closer, 2022s were in the prime, and 23s were really getting into the prime as well. The names would be filled here. Okay. And I use these asterisks here to show, like, the. There'd be a lot of names, but how do you get on the board? Okay, Well, a lot of it is these coaches aren't just out there necessarily just randomly looking. Okay. There's times they do that. We kind of call it freestyling in recruiting as far as you're just kind of watching around. But, hey, they're going to come see guys that one had ever been recommended to them. Like, either guys like me or a coach has recommended to that program, for example, like a Texas, a Florida, Stanford, whatever they call the coaches, like, hey, I got a player that you're interested in, or a video that they got from their email that they really like and feel like this is a great fit athletically and then academically, that could be how you get on the board here. Okay. And then, of course, yes, hey, they could see you just randomly. But most of these scouts and recruiters are organized of who they're going to see. You want to be organized. You're not just randomly going out there. These recruiters and coaches are going to those games, those showcases and those camps based off of these guys on their board. Now, I mentioned before that there's freestyling, okay, where they're just watching a random game. Doesn't happen a lot, but it definitely does happen. Okay? And how that usually works is at tournaments and at showcases, if there are games in between the games that they're targeting these players on their board and they have some time to kill, they're going to watch some baseball and they're going to come talk to your summer team coach, your high school coach, and ask him for a roster to see all the Players and then ask him, hey, do you have any guys that might could play at the next level that I could watch and target during this game? And they would go about and the coach would tell them potentially any of the players that they think, so what does that tell you? You want to have a good relationship with your coach, right? Of course you're going to need skills to play at the next level, but you also want to have a good relationship with your coach where you get that recommendation right from that source, okay? So to get on this board, just to go back over is hey, getting recommendations from just people and coaches, calling these college coaches and recruiters so they can come see you play, okay? Also, email is huge for exposure and video because a lot of people aren't going to call everybody. So you need to go out and talk to these coaches. When I mean talk to is email them and send them your video, send them your schedule, right? So if they really like your video and you do a good job with your video and you do a good job with your email and show them everything that you need to show them and they're going to come watch you play, okay? They're going to come watch you play, which is what we want. So let's get to the next level. Let me move this out of here. Let's get into the next step. So they've come seeing you play and let's say they really like what they see. You check the box. Athletically, they feel that you can come help them. That is great. Now they're going to set up some communication with you, okay? They're going to set up a phone call or they'll talk to you at the field. And this gets into NCAA rules, the timing of it and everything, I won't get into that right now. But let's just use an example of they're gonna call you, okay? So they might call you at a certain time, or they might ask your coach for you to call them at a certain time. Again, this gets into NCA rules. But say they call you at a certain time, they shoot you a text, they're like, hey, we'd love to talk to you at 7 o' clock tonight or tomorrow night. And you guys are going to talk, okay? And they're gonna check in, they're gonna get to know you more. We'll have another video kind of questions to expect from a college coach and what you can be asking too to help you make your decision. But they're going to get to know you a little bit more. They're going to ask for your transcripts, your gpa, your test scores. Okay? Again, depending on the year and everything like that. But they're also going to do some background checks on you as far as talking to people, whether it's like me, people like me or your high school coach or your summer league coach and checking on your character. See if you're a good teammate, see if you're a good leader and see it, make sure that you don't have any issues. Because the last thing a college recruiter wants to bring in is a quote unquote cancer, right? They can't afford that. They can't bring a guy in that is not going to help the team off the field in the locker room. Okay? So now they're going to talk to you and hey, they might want to come see you one more time or they're ready to roll. Okay? And this all depends on the individual, the position and what they're looking for. But let's just say they offer you. So they could offer you a preferred walk on spot, they could offer you a scholarship or okay, they could offer you an academic scholarship. And then you're going to have to respond to that how you probably respond. Most of these coaches let the student athlete, hey, take some time, talk to your parents and so they can your parents. And if you're a parent watching this right now, you can ask questions. The important questions get more black and white, whether it's financials and just get to know the university and the program little bit more. Okay. But hey, that's kind of a very oversight on the background of recruiting. Okay. Behind closed doors from a college scout and recruiters perspective. Hey, if you like this video, if you got anything from it, please select that like and thumbs up button and subscribe. I'm going to put out a weekly video every week and next week will be the next one. All right. Hey, I hope you enjoyed it and I'll see you in the next one.