College has some

[Gambler Bob]

I can't believe it got all the way to page 4 before anyone mentioned NIL. The can be, and is becoming, the reason kids pick the school they do. Even the D1, P5 football coaches are famously speaking out regarding it's effect on the game. While softball NIL's don't compete with football NIL deals, it's still a factor. There are kids playing football making more money through NIL than some NFL receivers make.

Someone mentioned there not being a lot of full paid scholarships, which is true. The max in D1 softball is 12 scholarships. Coaches can divide those any way they want. But, if you're a highly sought after recruit, especially for pitching, full scholarships are something to choose from. D2 has less scholarships, and of course, D3 doesn't offer any (athletic) scholarships. That said, NAIA schools have no rules. One school here in the outside of Omaha, Bellevue University is an NAIA school and I throw BP to them a lot in the spring. Bellevue has every single player on their team with a full scholarship. Every one. So, if a kid can bypass their desire to be on ESPN and take the education without being $300k in debt afterwards, it's not a bad deal!!!!! And, since they're I'm allowed to throw BP. It would be an NCAA violation if I threw BP to Creighton, UNO, or Nebraska as a team on their campus. Usually closer to the end of the season, I'll get individual requests from players from schools for me to throw BP to them. They use it to prepare them as best they can for the postseason.

NAIA has a 10 athletic scholarship limit rule. Less than D1 but more than D2. Not saying that all the girls are not on full rides but it is not possible for the entire team to be full athletic scholarships only. They can certainly give academic scholarships at NAIA schools.

My daughter's first pitching coach went to a local NAIA school. Full ride, 50% athletic, %50 percent academic. She became a nurse, had to take one additional semester of school after her 4 years due to the softball schedule interfering with some of her lab courses for the nursing degree. The school still honored her 50% academic college scholarship for the additional semester. She basically paid very little to get her nursing degree. I would say that worked out very well in her case.

 

[BT3100]

It seems to be mentioned a lot that fully paid scholarships for softball are pretty rare, so if they have to pay for some out of pocket then out of state is way more expensive, no?

I don't think they are as rare as it's made out to be. Pitchers for example are on full scholarship at most D1 schools. At least the #1 and #2 are.

 

[Westwind]

@Orange Socks I didn’t know any of that stuff about Aggieland culture! I really prefer boring and unexciting. I would fit right in there.

Also I was wrong about 100% of the SoCal players not going back. It’s only 3 out of 4 but the 4th one still has class work to finish and will probably go back. Of those 4 kids, 2 parents decided to relocate. I can’t get over that, has to be against the overall numbers.

 

[Hillhouse]

NAIA has a 10 athletic scholarship limit rule. Less than D1 but more than D2. Not saying that all the girls are not on full rides but it is not possible for the entire team to be full athletic scholarships only. They can certainly give academic scholarships at NAIA schools.

My daughter's first pitching coach went to a local NAIA school. Full ride, 50% athletic, %50 percent academic. She became a nurse, had to take one additional semester of school after her 4 years due to the softball schedule interfering with some of her lab courses for the nursing degree. The school still honored her 50% academic college scholarship for the additional semester. She basically paid very little to get her nursing degree. I would say that worked out very well in her case.

Hmmm, interesting. You may be right. When this NAIA coach told me that all the players were on a full scholarship, it never occurred to me to ask whether that was full athletic or not. I do know that NAIA has a lot less rules than NCAA, which allows someone like me to throw BP. They also aren't bound by the recruiting calendar that NCAA follows.