November 28, 2006
Interviewer: Welcome back to Overtime I’ve got with me now on the valley telecom hotline Coach Bob Chmiel, former coach Bob Chmiel who was a coach at the University of Notre Dame, a recruiting coordinator as well at the University of Michigan and now he does some work for ESPNTV and the National Collegiate Scouting Association as well as reality scouting type deal. Coach, I’m glad you took some time and came onto the show today.
Chmiel: Thank you very much; it’s always great to be in the valley. I love coming to Arizona, I have family here and that so… it’s a great assignment and I love being here and I appreciate you giving me a call.
Interviewer: Not a problem. And now coach, you do… you have dealt with a lot of scouting issues and scouting as a career for you. What has been one of the biggest changes over the last couple of years in recruiting to a major college’s level from any part of the country?
Chmiel: Well, that’s an excellent question that basically it comes down to a few things that probably occurred at the same time maybe about ten or fifteen years ago at the most and that’s with the advent of the computer and the portability of the computer in the recruiting process and schools being able to generate very personal notes, literally for some schools, letters… thousands to begin the recruiting process where they can actually use a students athletes first name in the introduction of the letter and then somewhere in the body of the letter and then in the close and a lot of time these letters give these young athletes false hope because early on in the recruiting process basically, their just mail. Then the other deal is, going from 16mm film years ago to the use of the VCR which gives coaches the opportunity to get many tapes from many locations again, on a more portable basis where the 16mm film… (the) college coach had to go to the high schools because high school coaches didn’t want to send the 16mm film out because in case another coach from another university came in and the tape wasn’t there or the film wasn’t there, he wasn’t able to see it.
Interviewer: Right
Chmiel: So now, a coach can make copies and copies of a VCR tapes and send them out to particular schools that interest the individual, gives the college coaches an opportunity to accelerate the recruiting calendar, its recruiting calendar driven. But now, with, as I say, with all the communication that’s available, text messaging, the computer, email and all that, the process is very accelerated.
Interviewer: And now as a recruiting coordinator, was that your job to filter through all that information?
Chmiel: Yeah. There’s no question. And the problem is, say when I was coaching at Notre Dame which was a really great experience for me under the great Lou Holtz; I’d get ten or fifteen tapes a week, sometimes more. And the problem would be actually having the time to get through all the tapes. So, what’s critical is that when the tapes come in is that they’re pre-announced. In other words, someone that I know has sent me the tape as opposed to just the tape coming… at random.
Interviewer: Right.
Chmiel: You know, you would always go through the tapes maybe from a certain recruiting service that you had that would send the tapes or a particular high school coach would let you know a tape was going. Those were the first one that got looked at and a lot of times, in some cases, the other ones really didn’t get looked at because of the time constraints.
Interviewer: Yeah. There had to be some major overflow at a university like Notre Dame or even at Michigan.
Chmiel: Oh sure. And you know, all division I schools, but division II schools, recruiting the same, regardless of the level of the school, so to speak. The two most important components in recruiting, that make great recruiting or recruiting coordinators, are hard work and enthusiasm. If you don’t have a mind for it or a mind set and an enthusiastic love for the recruiting process, you’ll never be successful in it.
Interviewer: Now because you are a former recruiting coordinator now work so much with college scouting and such, give some of the high school athletes and junior college athletes here in our listening area some ideas on what they need to do to make themselves available to or marketable to go on to the next level.
Chmiel: Well, before they do anything from a practical standpoint, from the three things, three components that I think are critically important to an individual being recruited. Number one, the character of the individual, the reputation of the individual in the community. You know, we see problems on television, most recently with the deal down in Miami which was really unfortunate and hopefully that won’t happen again. And you want to recruit people to your university that are going to be problem free and going be the right kind of people and contribute to the overall culture of the university in a positive manner. So number one is, possess great character and work on that. Community service, things like that. Number two, it’s never too late to be a good student.
Interviewer: Right.
Chmiel: Never, ever too late to be a good student. If a young person has struggled their freshman or sophomore year and all the sudden accelerated their junior and senior years, well that, those are the grades that the admissions people are going to see. And those are the grades that the individual probably will be based upon whether he’ll be admitted or not. No matter how if you struggled early academically, you know, there is still an opportunity for you to show admissions people that you are on the rise academically. And the third thing is to play hard on every play. Never loaf, you know.
Interviewer: And don’t take a play off. Coaches are always complaining about that. ‘You know what? He’s good, but he takes he takes about half the plays off.’
Chmiel: You know…..I very seldom found a player on a tape that was unannounced, in other words, not the player I originally was looking for. But when I did find one it was always somebody, especially on the defensive side of the ball, ‘wow! This guy is always around the football. The play-ns, there he is. The play-ns, he’s making the tackle. If you’re on the backside of a play, chase that play down. That will turn coach’s heads. And the other thing is to begin the process early. Make sure if you’re a high school student that you get with your college counselor and make sure that you are on track academically for the Nation Collegiate Athletic Association for the clearing house and I can’t emphasis that enough. You have to have certain grades, you have to have certain test scores, to be scholarship anywhere. Get with your counselor early, as early as your freshman year if you anticipate wanting to play collegiate athletics and get in there and make sure you’re taking the right classes because if you’re a senior and you have the ability to be scholarshiped, you don’t have the right classes and that dream can come to a screeching halt.
Interviewer: Do you find as a whole across the country that most parents and students don’t really know what to do?
Chmiel: Yes I do. And the one thing, if I were a student athlete right now, a parent of a student athlete, get this book. It’s the……excuse me, Guide for the College Bound Student Athlete. Guide for the college bound student athlete. And you can get that from…the NCAA and its www.ncaaclearinghouse.net. www.ncaaclearinghouse.net. Get this book. It is the primer, the primer, for going into the recruiting process. And probably the last thing I’d like to say, if you don’t mind from the recruiting process, remember, high school coaches, they teach five classes, they monitor the parking lot, they monitor the cafeteria, maybe they coach more than one sport, what have you. Your high school coach cannot get you a scholarship. Respect your high school coach, do as he says, but when it comes to the process of recruiting…
Interviewer: You’re on your own.
Chmiel: …Partner with him. Help him to help you. Don’t stand by because you may be one of twenty seniors that are asking for assistance. That means that you have one situation that you have to handle, he may have to handle twenty beside all the other things that he does. So get with your high school, do the things your high school coach says and partner with him to help you.
Interviewer: That is great advice. That’s Coach Bob Chmiel. Coach, one last thing before we let you go on Overtime today, if you don’t qualify for a division I school out of high school, in my opinion, because I do cover the junior college level, that’s becoming a more viable option that it ever has been.
Chmiel: I love junior college, junior college sports. I don’t think there is any question. I’m from the Midwest and we are not as blessed in the Midwest with the junior college programs that you are out here in the Southwest. There are marvelous opportunities here with the junior college system. Take advantage of those. You know there’s a lot of reasons, perhaps, that your not gonna go to a four year university right out of high school. Remember the important thing: it’s not where you start, it’s where you finish that’s critically important. If you have a junior college, community college here, talk to those community college coaches They’re great coaches. And it’s a great opportunity for you. National Collegiate Scouting Association is another great one. National Collegiate Scouting Association has helped many, many student athletes. And they do one thing that no other recruiting service does. And I’m not here as a commercial, I saw this in Chicago. They guarantee success or your money back, so to speak. National Collegiate Scouting Association. And they’re at ncsasports.org. Anyway, I’m glad to be here. I have to tell you this. I coached at Notre Dame and I love Notre Dame, but this quarterback you have here, Matt Leinart, he’s going to be something special.
Interviewer: He is, he is going to be very special by the time he figures out and maybe by the time he gets an offensive line.
Chmiel: Well, you know I watched him play, you know coaching at Notre Dame and that and doing radio and TV at Notre Dame and I love this. I’ve mentioned Notre Dame and we’re fierce rivals with USC, but Matt Leinart, he’s something special.
Interviewer: He sure is. Coach, I appreciate the time and I know you’re a busy man I’m gonna let you get back to your other obligations. That’s Bob Chmiel, former scouting coordinator at University of Notre Dame and University of Michigan. Coach, thanks again and have a great day.
Chmiel: Thank you, you too. Bye-bye.
Interviewer: Alright, bye-bye.
