Summer 2026 Will Decide Your Football Future

I don't know where you are in the recruit process, whether you're a freshman, just starting out, going to your first college camp, or you're about to be a senior. And this is your make it or break it moment. This summer is where you are showing coaches what they're missing out on and actually earning scholarship offers no matter where you're at in the recruiting process. Today I'm going to talk about college football camps over the summer, the situations that you need to be aware of, and ultimately there's a masterclass on how to get recruited using camps. So that way you can actually get the tension from the schools without ending up with just a T shirt and a handshake like some of you may have gotten in the past. Now, if you don't know who I am, I'm Trent Lawyer. I'm a former college quarterback. I went from being a backup on my high school team even as a senior, to then getting over 20 scholarship offers and earning a $70,000 scholarship for the last two years of my school after going through the junior college process as well. So safe to say, I learned a lot about my recruiting process. Had to go through it probably differently than you're having to go through it because you're probably a more talented player than I was. So with that being said, let's dive right into it. I'm going to tell you more about college football camps and ultimately how to get recruited at them. Now, the process I break down is very simple. I don't believe in overcomplicating things or making these frameworks over simple stuff that can just be. Simply put, the process for getting recruited to college camps is breaking down into three things. The first one is the pre camp process. It's everything that happens before the camp actually starts. The second is the during camp process. This is what happens during the actual college camp. And the last part is the post camp process. You might have guessed that it is everything that happens after the camp. That's how you need to break this up and how you need to think about it. You need to think about, okay, what do I need to do before the camp to make sure that this camp is actually a success? What do I need to do during the camp to make sure that I'm successful in grabbing the coach's attention and performing at my best? And what do I do after the camp to remind these coaches that I was at the camp or interact with them further? Because most of the time, to be fair, you won't actually earn a scholarship at the camp. Now, if you nail the pre camp stuff, you may, but it's not always the case. And so we want to make sure that we're maximizing every single opportunity. If you're spending money to go to a camp, why would you let the only opportunity where you can maximize those returns of the camp be at this three hour showcase? You want it to be maximizing the opportunities, days, weeks, months, potentially years later down the line. Especially if you are able to perform extremely well, that can stand in a coach's mind a lot. And especially if you're able to capture their attention afterwards, that can turn into some really great results, really great conversations. And like, we've already talked about the ultimate goal of getting scholarship offers. So let's start from the very beginning, the pre camp process. This is where families mess up in the process most of the time. They'll usually do the during camp stuff. Okay? I mean, it's no shocker that you need to perform well the camp. So, you know, obviously get your effort and give your hardest. That's, that's all good and well. And most people know after the camp, hey, we should try to do some things after the camp, you know, post about it, maybe reach out the coaches, but maybe they're just not maximizing as much. The biggest issue is the pre camp stuff. Because here's the thing, you can do that, but like, if you didn't go to the right camp or you didn't set yourself or frame these coaches properly on what they need to be paying attention to, you're just going to blend in with everyone else. The raw reality of college football camps, the coaches know who they want to look at before the camp even starts. That is a fact. You can ask any college coach that they have a list of players that they want to prioritize over everyone else. And thus they will put more eyes on them than they're going to put on you. And really what you want to be is the guy on the list that they pay attention to. Because everyone seems to have this false belief, which it's crazy to think, I get it, like you're special, you're different. But the raw reality is you're not. You're not special, you're probably not different, you're probably not 6, 7, you're probably not £300, you're probably not running an actual 4 4. Even though one time your friend stopwatched it and said you ran a four four, three. And so if you go to a college camp without coaches even knowing who you are in the first Place you are going to blend in and no one is going to pay attention to you. And then you can have the conversations afterwards and be like, oh, I had a good conversation with this coach. But in reality they don't even remember you immediately once you walked off the field or really once you, after you shook their hand and then walked away, they forgot completely who you are. They, they're not going to follow you back on Twitter. So you need to understand that the pre camp process starts with making sure that college coaches know who you are and that you're selecting the camps where college coaches know who you are and have expressed clear interest in you. Now, these are somewhat general terms because they can range widely. Interest could be as heavy as an offer, an offer that's contingent on going to camp and getting an evaluation. Or it can be as light as just responding to one of your messages saying that they liked your film and that they would like you to come to camp and then everything else in between in terms of having multiple visits, having multiple phone calls, having one phone call, maybe they just stopped by your school. So it is extremely wide ranging and that can vary heavily. Obviously, you want to prioritize higher forms of interest first. You know, if you get an offer with a camp evaluation, if you're seriously interested in that school, then yeah, you should probably go to that camp. Versus, like, hey, if you, if you're talking to 30 schools and the bottom of the list in terms of interest is a school that just only reply to one of your messages, yeah, maybe I wouldn't go to that camp. I'd probably agree with you there. But again, a lot of families fall in this trap of, you know, they get a generic email from Stanford and then they end up going to that camp thinking that for some reason they were on their list when in reality they were just on a big email list that went out to tens of thousands of other recruits and families. So you need to be realistic. You need to look at the harsh reality of like, okay, are they actually interested in me or not? Now it is okay to go to a camp with no interest or no communication with coaches. I'm not saying that you should avoid those situations. I'm all I'm saying is that do not expect anything to happen from those because if the coaches aren't even watching at the camp and then they also haven't seen your film beforehand, why would they recruit you after the camp? Nothing has changed. They haven't seen anything that's going to change their opinion on you. And of course you could be that outlier guy. Like, for example, if you are six, seven, like, we, for example, we have a tight end right now that's in the 2028 class. He's the number one tight end in Wisconsin, hands down. Already has a D1 offer. He's 6 6. He's like 220 pounds already. He's legit. Like, he's on track to be a Division 1 FBS guy. We're trying to get him to be a power four guy. And so for him, we're like, dude, go to random camps. It doesn't matter. You're going to stand out. Everybody's like, what grade are you in? You're in 2028. Holy shit. And so if you have those advantages, use them to your liking. But also if you don't, don't play that game. You've got to play a separate game. Recruiting is its own game. And just like, if you have a speed advantage, you're going to use that to your advantage. If you don't have the speed advantage, don't try to beat guys on a straight line. You're going to mix it up. You got to use different moves. And it's the same thing in recruiting. We talked a little bit about the camp selection process. Now, I did say that this is the case for most schools, and it does vary on division level. I kind of look at it as a spectrum of, like, at the very top of the top, you got the power four schools, you got the group of five schools. Those schools are 100% doing this. And you probably have experienced this. Maybe you've gone to camp. You've gone to a Texas A and M camp. You went to the Cal camp, and you probably saw this. The coaches only focus on the guys that they were actually speaking to. They seemed to have some kind of prior relationship, and they did. And so thus they focus on those kids. Maybe they focus on a couple other kids. Maybe they give you a nice compliment. But it didn't look like the conversation was going anywhere because they already knew who they wanted to talk to. It like looked happens at a much higher chance at those schools. Now, if you go lower down the ladder, D2s, D3s, NA schools, those camps with those kinds of schools, their list is very flexible. They're. They're looking at as many kids as they can because they know not every kid's going to be interested in their school. Not every kid is going to even want to talk to them in the first place as well as, like, they need to scout as many Kids as possible because their threshold for talent is also lower as well than a Power 4 school. A Power 4 school, you know, they have specific measurables that they're only looking for. And at an NA, at a D3, at a D2 school, it's a little bit lower of a bar. So they can scout a little bit more kids without having all these qualifiers. But again, even those schools they do have like if you have communication with prior and you go to the camp, like you're going to have a much better experience than a kid that did not have it, a relationship with those coaches beforehand. So it's always beneficial to set up that relationship prior. It's going to lead to a better conversation, lead to more eyes on you because they know who you are, they check out your film and they just want to verify things. It's just going to help you over more all around. So do not discount that pre camp relationship or pre camp interest. And now you may be asking me, okay, Trenton, how do I actually get in touch with these coaches? How do I develop some of this pre camp interest? There's ultimately a bunch of other guides out there that I've done on how to contact coaches, how to get in touch with them, how to get interest from them. They're really the four ways how to get interest. One of them is camps because you can get interest from camps. The other three are email X and connections. That's pretty much other three. We have a bunch of other guides on those. You can go check them out. Not going to go super in depth in here, but you're going to want to do that as soon as possible. I'm recording this in December and we just had a call with my group, your first scholarship. I talked about our winter game plan. I said that, hey, this is pretty much here all the way till camp season, which generally starts in May, is our goal is to drive as much interest and relationships as possible. So that way you guys go into camp season with a clear idea of who actually cares about you and who doesn't. So that way we can attack those that care and go to those camps and not be wasting our time like most families do. So I recommend that if you are planning on going to camps this summer instead of being like, oh, we're going to go crazy, we're going to do 25 camps. Why don't you send out 2,500 messages in between now and then, and then you only have to go to five camps because you know they're going to actually be worth it. And you'll get more interest and more offers than going to 25 random camps. Sounds like a pretty good deal to me. I don't know about you, but that is my recommendation. Start sending out stuff now. So that way you can create that interest, create those opportunities and then get a clear idea of what the short list of camps might actually be. I talked a ton about camp selection. That ultimately is probably a pretty big part of the pre camp process because if you don't select the right camps then you're not going to be in the right opportunities and you're not going to be able to turn them into anything. And so you need to make sure you're picking the right stuff. Now outside of camp selection, I talked about like numbers of camps. So that is also like a very general question. And it really depends. Hate to give a lawyer answer, but it's just the truth. General guidelines for me is like if you're a freshman, probably shouldn't be going to a halt. A lot of camps I would recommend three to five is normally sweet spot. Really whatever grade you're in, definitely juniors or seniors going to be juniors or seniors should attend as many as they can. But you want to be wary of things like risk of injury, fatigue, also your, your own workout schedule within your school. Like be aware of those things. Especially if you're competing for a starting spot at your high school. Like don't risk the chance to start at your high school to go to an extra camp. Like that's not worth it at all because your varsity film is going to do more for you than a camp ever. Well, and if you don't start in your high school, you're gonna have a hard time getting recruited no matter what camp you went to or how well you did. The last thing I'm going to talk about here at the pre camp side is just preparing. You're going to be doing some of the combine drills, you're going to be running a 40, you're going to be doing a lot of different drills. You need to make sure you're prepared when you go to these camps. And I mean physically, I mean mentally, all those kinds of things. So make sure before the camp you're getting a good night's sleep, you're eating the right food, you're, you're dialed in. Because all those things obviously play a factor and you want to make sure you're maximizing yourself for those camps that are very intensive within a anywhere from two to four hour span. So. And they're also in the summer which is extremely hot. So also, you know, make sure you're hydrated as well. So all those things are really key to make sure to focus on. But the biggest one by far is just making sure you select the right camps, you have interest prior to the campsite. Those things are going to help you out a ton. Another note on camp selection is like, what type of camp should you be going to now? There's a bunch of camps out there. You know, there's mega camps, there's camps that are hosted by a single school, there's showcases by, you know, insert company name here, which ones are actually worth going to. So the way I look at it, if your purpose or reason for going to a camp is strictly recruiting, your goal is to turn this into an offer, turn this into interest, have conversations with coaches. You want to go to school hosted camps, camps that are hosted by the schools themselves. Whether this is a mega camp or a single school camp doesn't matter. Just you want to target those kinds of schools because they're going to give you the opportunity to get in front of coaches and talk to these coaches. Most of the camps or showcases hosted by, you know, again, whatever other companies they can think of usually don't have college coaches there in attendance. Now shout out to one exact sports you guys have made. I think they have a pretty wide list that they usually message and email people. They do have college coaches at their camps and we've actually had quite a few families at your first scholarship go to them. This isn't a full time endorsement. I'm not even sponsored by them or I haven't even talked to anybody over them. But you know, I'm always very cautious about sending my guys to certain camps and so far everybody that's gone to one of these has given good feedback. So I will continue to support them until I heard here otherwise. But exact sports is actually one that does have college coaches come to their camps and they're not hosted just by a school. So that is something to check out as well if that happens to be in your area. Now between the mega camps and the single school camps, again, you want to go where you have interest. Mega camps do give you a better chance of getting seen. There's going to be more coaches, but there are also going to be more players. And so that does play a factor as well. But you know, if there's 30 college schools there, potentially, you know, anywhere from 50 to 100 coaches there, yeah, you have a good opportunity to get seen by some really cool schools. I would just Try to make sure that at least one or two of those schools already know who you are or at least message them, you know, a week or two before the camp. So that way you're giving yourself a good chance at getting a little bit of time with the coach prior to it and you'll know you're doing a good job. When after the camp you talk to these coaches, they say, hey, I got your email, love it. Like, thanks for sending that over. Or you know, they just mentioned something about some kind of a message that you sent. Even if they don't respond back to it, they may still be getting it and this is a good sign that they actually got it. They actually read it, they checked out some of the information and you were able to get a step ahead than most of the other guys on the, on the field there. So now we're going to shift from the pre camp process to the during camp process. So during the camp is pretty much anything from the start of the camp to the end of the camp. Now I'm really not going to go super in depth here because to be honest, a lot of these are like tricks and hacks to make sure that you're giving yourself maximum reps and maximum opportunities and eyes on coaches. But the key guidelines is really common sense stuff like this. What I'm going to talk about here is going to get you 80% of the way there and set you had more most recruits and just make sure that you're not doing anything that's going to completely cost you a big opportunity. So making sure you're getting 100% in all reps, like nobody likes anyone that's just loafing on the field, especially in a college camp, like that's just ridiculous. And that's what I think. And of course college coaches are going to think that. And I'm not going to offer you a scholarship that's worth tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars when you're just loafing on a field in an opportunity that is potentially the biggest of your life. Like that doesn't translate well to in game situations. So why would they even want to talk to you or be interested in you at that point? Another thing is just making sure to listen well, pay attention to directions. You're going to be doing different drills I've never done before. So you need to make sure you're paying attention and making sure that you're doing things correctly. I mean, this is a big thing that a coach is going to look for is how intelligent is this guy, is he going to, is he going to pick it up the first try or he's going to pick up the last try or is he never going to get it at all? And you can see like some coaches will actually coach the guy up. Some coaches don't care and they'll just be like, cool, whatever, like this is their evaluation time. They generally may coach you up a little bit, but like really they're just there to evaluate guys, look at guys, and if they just see a guy that clearly isn't paying attention and isn't able to understand directions clearly, yeah, they're probably not going to spend a whole lot of time with you. So make sure you're locked in and you know what you're doing throughout that time period. And I'll give a go with a little secret here. Make sure you're establishing some relationship during the camp. These coaches that you're working with are going to be your position coach at whatever school they're at. And so that means that you're getting one on one time with these coaches. If you have a water break, like go get the water, but then come back, have a conversation with the coach, ask him questions about the drill, ask him questions about his program, ask him questions about what he thinks about the position that you play and what he looks for in players. All those things are great. And then you can lead that into later conversations after the camp. Now let's talk about the post camp process because to me, this is one of my favorite parts because this is where the money happens. This is where you turn some of those eyeballs into actual tension and potentially scholarship offers. Now first off, just understand that like you can get scholarship offers at camps, but that doesn't mean that you're always going to. I personally never got a scholarship offer at a camp. I got them sometimes after camps, but never at an actual camp. And I find it to be pretty rare that you will just, boom. Get a scholarship offer at the camp itself. Because usually there has to be approval process by that coach or by a coordinator. And if that coordinator or head coach isn't present there and they didn't get a proper evaluation on you, then that coach, whoever he may be, may not have the permission to actually offer you a legitimate scholarship. Would you rather have a fake scholarship or would you have a real scholarship? I'd much rather have a real one. A fake one really doesn't matter at all. Once the camp ends, you have to realize that this is the time that you have to talk to college coaches and it doesn't matter what grade level you are. Freshman, sophomore, senior, anyone can talk to these coaches in this period of time. And so you'll notice once the, once the camp ends, everyone breaks to coaches and goes and talks to them. And so there's usually line forming stuff going on and a bunch of conversations happening and it's a little bit madness. And so if you're not prepared for that ahead of time, it's going to be quite confusing and you're probably going to make a couple mistakes. For example, my first big camp I went to was a mega camp that USC used to host. 50 plus schools, bunch of power four schools, bunch of group of five schools. I don't even know if there's any FCS's. Maybe a couple and probably close. 150, 200 coaches. Insane, just insane amounts of coaches and players. It was absurd. I was severely underprepared for this one. And so the camp wraps up and I kind of understood that like, okay, I need to go talk to these coaches after the camp. I really had no plan. I was just kind of walking up to coaches and going, hey coach, I'm Trent Lawyer, I'm a quarterback over here. And at least I had a decent introduction down. But like after that I had no idea what to do afterwards. And you know, they were just giving me the general lines of like, oh yeah, go follow me on Twitter. Oh yeah, like you know, we'll keep your eye on you. And you know, none of those, those things progressed. What my recommendation is, is don't be me, Prepare accordingly. Know who you're going to talk to, what their names are, what you're going to ask them and make sure you're driving that conversation forward. You don't want the coach to drive it for you. You want to take advantage of that. You want to ask some questions. They're going to move your recruiting process forward rather than just sit back there and let them tell you what's next. So you should have like some kind of ranking order in your head going, hey, I'm going to talk to this coach, this coach, this coach, this coach, and those are the coaches I need to talk to. Now coaches you can prioritize are the coaches that you're working with during the camp, coaches that you have prior relationships with. Like you want to make sure to talk to both of those at some point during the camp. Now ideally you talk to every coach, but again, like if there's 150 coaches, not every coach is going to stay after the camp in the first place. You want to prioritize the coaches first and then you can get to other coaches that maybe you didn't think of later, just depending on who's available and how much time you have as well. But you have to remember how these conversations, you have to remember that you need to ask good questions. You need to have good conversations during these times and really maximize every bit of seconds that you get during these moments. And the big thing is questions. You need to be asking good questions, whether it's about their program, about themselves, or about the recruiting process as a whole. You need to ask questions that again, move things forward rather than let it just sit back. A great question to ask is like, what is the next steps in the recruitment process with you guys? Now you may think that, hey, that's like a pretty generic question. And that's exactly the point. It's open ended, allowing them to tell you what's next. Now you may get some generic answers. Hey, follow me on next, follow me, do this, do that, that's perfectly fine. This is also a way to gauge interest from the schools and seeing how interested they actually are in you. Because if they tell you something generic, then okay, cool. I know that, hey, this school's probably not interested. I can do the steps, but I don't see it continuing much longer. And that's perfectly fine. You can't force a coach to like you or to offer you scholarship. The coaches that do give you better steps, go follow those immediately, take actions on those and move that process forward with them so that way you can get closer to that offer. Now, once the camp wraps up, you talk to the coaches, you're finishing everything up, you're going to leave the camp. And a lot of families make the mistake of that. They never talk to the coaches again. They just expect them to magically reach out or they forget or whatever the case might be. You want to make sure to message those coaches as soon as possible. They told you to message or to follow them on X or message them or whatever the case might be. You do it right when you get to your phone, not an hour later, not a day later, right after. You take action on that as fast as possible to take advantage of that recency bias that you just had, that they should remember your face, that they should remember the conversation because every single minute you wait is the chance that they forget it completely and then you lose all that advantage that you just gained. So you want to do that action immediately. You want to follow up as well. Like I would recommend following up the next day and potentially three days after that and then potentially a week after that. You want to make sure there's clear sequence that you're following so that we can maximize those conversations and hopefully get a response. Continue to build on top of that relationship you just established. That way you can turn it into more opportunities later down the line and furthering the conversation, furthering the relationship into a scholarship offer. Once you do whatever else is required, you know, it may be as simple as, again, this is something that they'll probably tell you in your conversation. But, you know, it could go a couple different routes. They could need more evaluation. So usually like, for example, coaches will meet all after kind of camp season. So like sometime in either late June or early July, and they'll meet and they'll talk and they'll say, hey, these are all my notes from the camps. Here's what my thoughts are. And they'll kind of put together a board and then they'll start to offer guys. So it may be, hey, wait till then. It may be, hey, wait until you get filmed this season and then send it to us and we'll take a look at it and we'll go from there. So cool. Just make sure you stay in touch with them throughout that time. Then once you get filmed, send it over to them. So whatever it is, you just want to make sure that you're staying in touch and you're progressing that forward so that way you don't get lost, Lost track of. And then also simple one, make sure you're posting the camp on Twitter. Make sure you're posting videos from the camp, tagging the coaches. All that kind of stuff can also lead to some more interesting conversations after the camp as well. So make sure you're doing that. So with that being said, that is the entire camp process. We got the pre camp, the during camp, and the post camp. But if there's anything I can tell you to make sure to remember, it's that pre camp and that post camp. Again, everyone knows during the camp you need to perform, you need to play well, you need to make sure that you're doing the right stuff. But in the pre camp, it's just not talked a lot about, like what camps you should actually go to. Maybe someone tells you, oh, yeah, I had a good experience at this camp, but it's like, okay, why did that happen? Did they have a connection with the coach before and did they just get lucky? And you want to make sure that you're giving yourself the best chance at these camps and then at Post camp, what do you actually do after camp? How do you have those conversations? How do you move that ball forward more than any other recruit is going to out there? And if there's anything I can leave you with, you have to remember what your goal is with these college camps. Obviously, the ultimate dream goal would be to get an offer, but like I talked about earlier, it's pretty rare to get an offer just from the camp alone. Not impossible, just rare and generally outside of your control. So your goal is just to make sure that you get a proper evaluation of this camp. It's really the entire recruiting process the same way. Your goal is to get properly evaluated by all the programs out there available, because you don't want to be at the end of the process going, man, I wish I would have got my film in front of this school or that school. Instead you want to say, okay, I got my film in front of every single school. I collected all the possible offers I could have gotten, and I have all the options in front of me now. Instead of a what if game, it's a what is the best option game. And that's really ultimately what we want. So hopefully this helped you a ton. If you're looking to figure out, okay, how do I actually reach out to these coaches beforehand, get in touch with them and start that communication and figure out if they're actually interested in me. We've got a complete guide on how to contact college coaches. You can check it out there now, if you really like this. We ultimately have our full program. It's called your first scholarship, where you do have to pay to get in. Ultimately, if we feel like you're a good fit, and we feel like you actually have the talent to be able to play at the next level, and we feel like we can help you, you know, we'll let you in. And inside, there is a bunch more resources. For example, this camp guide that I put together here today, like I said, is a general guideline. I hit on a couple of the main points, but the during camp, the post camp, like those conversations we cover inside your first scholarship, how to have those conversations. We walk through families, what to actually do all the way through. If you're looking for more of that personalized touch, what you can do is click down below, go to our website. You can book in a call with our team. They'll walk you through what we do, how we do it, and then again, they'll see if, like, you're an actual fit and what your situation is. We're going to give you a ton of good value on that call, regardless if you work with us or not. But if you are interested, you can go down that link. Hopefully I'll see you in there soon.