How to evaluate a TB organization for helping with college placement

[SoCal_Dad]

This seems to be more prevalent as more and more college teams are creating "feeder" TB teams for their players that are verballed.

Please provide some examples because I haven't seen/heard any corral their recruits together onto teams. At least describe the levels of schools and the geographic spread of their recruits.

Colleges mainly want their recruits playing on teams that will prepare them for their level. Their primary concerns are the levels of competition they'll face from opponents and within the team to spur their development.

 

[CoogansBluff]

I don't know about college coaches creating feeder teams, but I do see college coaches steering certain committed players to certain travel teams, often the kinds of teams that have a bunch of committed players who are focusing purely on development for the next level now that the recruiting phase is done. I know of a couple of teams near me that are full of committed players, each with 4 or more from one particular college.

 

[SoCal_Dad]

Name recognition is a factor, not a guarantee. It doesn't matter much with schools that check out everyone that writes them. It's a factor with the other schools that quickly determine which contacts to check out and/or only recruit from name orgs.

It doesn't have to be a top 5 or 10 name org. It just helps to be one that has a good reputation with the schools you're targeting.

 

[SoCal_Dad]

I don't know about college coaches creating feeder teams, but I do see college coaches steering certain committed players to certain travel teams, often the kinds of teams that have a bunch of committed players who are focusing purely on development for the next level now that the recruiting phase is done. I know of a couple of teams near me that are full of committed players, each with 4 or more from one particular college.

What level of schools? I can envision it for programs that primarily recruit locally in their region.

 

[JAD]

Please provide some examples because I haven't seen/heard any corral their recruits together onto teams. At least describe the levels of schools and the geographic spread of their recruits.

Colleges mainly want their recruits playing on teams that will prepare them for their level. Their primary concerns are the levels of competition they'll face from opponents and within the team to spur their development.

Check out the B'ham Thunderbolts Roster and the location of their players and who they are committed to. As a sidebar Flosoftball has done a blog series with Justice Perry, who is from MN and used to play with 29Dads DD. She is listed as being from Auburn, AL on the Thunderbolts website, but check out her latest blog entry. She also did one about her experience with the Thunderbolts summer boot camp, but I cannot find the link. Several of the out of town players stayed in a house that was provided by the Thunderbolts along with a "team mom".

http://www.flosoftball.com/article/34360-justus-blog-back-to-the-fall-routine-9-8

Thunderbolts 2015/2016 Roster

 

[Jquick823]

There are several coaches of D1 schools that I've spoken with that place their rucruits onto a specific organization after they have verballed. This is probably the exception and not the rule.

Thinking about the OP question some more, I think the name of the ORG helps get teams into specific events. The ORG I'm with is new only in it's 3rd year. We are getting into events but not without a few emails or phone calls. The common question is, "what have you done lately". Luckily being new means everything is lately lol. But I think if you throw a big name org on the application it helps to get you in the door. With most things getting in the door is a big step.

 

[riseball]

After perusing some of the player bios from the better college teams I think the value of the name recognition of "top TB organizations" is somewhat overstated. In addition I know of a few players who are listed as playing for "top TB organizations" in their bio, but know for a fact that is not the jersey they wore when they were recruited. The were asked to join the team once they verbaled. If you then dig deeper and look at the performance of players as upperclassmen, the value of the "top TB organizations" seems to be further discounted. Granted some top college teams may tend to recruit from from well known organizations, but it is certainly not exclusive. I have also noticed that many of these "top TB organizations" send a good many players to lesser known and/or less than competitive college programs. History shows that if you have the goods and do your job with respect to the recruiting process no team is out of bounds regardless of the name of your TB team. If your DD is a stud and bound for SEC or PAC12 glory then it may make sense for her to play for a "top TB organization". Then again if she is all that and a bag of chips it probably does not matter

 

[CoogansBluff]

The two teams I'm talking about have multiple players committed from mid-major D-I schools that are in the same state as the travel team. I've also had my DD (10th grader) told by a college coach that if she needed help finding a travel team that the college coach would help her. I don't know how widespread this is, but I see how it might become more common. College coaches can't coach their commits, but they have a lot at stake in who coaches them, and what level of competition and playing time they get, until they get to college. And TB coaches like making key college coaches happy. So there's motivation on both sides.

 

[JAD]

I don't know about college coaches creating feeder teams, but I do see college coaches steering certain committed players to certain travel teams, often the kinds of teams that have a bunch of committed players who are focusing purely on development for the next level now that the recruiting phase is done. I know of a couple of teams near me that are full of committed players, each with 4 or more from one particular college.

A lot of college coaches want their recruits to play at the highest level possible before they get to college in order to prepare them to play as freshmen. Now imagine a college booster with deep pockets and a love for their Alma mater and a sport like softball. And suppose that booster starts a TB program and the booster provides a lot of "assistance" to the players on his team - no team fees, free equipment, no travel costs, summer "boot camp" training, ect....I am not saying all of that is happening now, but there are already a lot of organizations who subsidize their 18U gold teams with money from their younger teams. Where does the NCAA draw the line???

 

[JAD]

After perusing some of the player bios from the better college teams I think the value of the name recognition of "top TB organizations" is somewhat overstated. If you then dig deeper and look at the performance of players as upperclassmen, the value of the "top TB organizations" seems to be further discounted. Granted some top college teams may tend to recruit from from well known organizations, but it is certainly not exclusive. I have also noticed that many of these "top TB organizations" send a good many players to lesser known and/or less than competitive college programs. History shows that if you have the goods and do your job with respect to the recruiting process no team is out of bounds regardless of the name of your TB team. If your DD is a stud and bound for SEC or PAC12 glory then it may make sense for her to play for a "top TB organization". Then again if she is all that and a bag of chips it probably does not matter.

People also need to understand that when you look at the master verbal list on a website like goldfastpitch.com or flosoftball.com that the information is self reported and does not necessarily reflect how a player was recruited.

I will use my DD as an example: DD played for a Tier-2 TB team in GA, picked up with a Tier-1 TB team from NJ for the IDT showcase one summer. That fall DD switched to a Tier-1 TB team in GA. Shortly after changing teams DD verballed one of the colleges that saw her play at the IDT. This season DD moved back to a Tier-2 team because she wanted to play some 1B and bat in tournaments we were not playing to win. If you look up my DD on the goldfastpitch website she is listed as playing for her current TB team, but this team had zilch, zero, nada to do with my DD verballing to the school that she did.....when my DD goes to college her Bio will list the last TB team that she played on before college, even though that team will have nothing to do with her being there.