Leverage and the Athletic Recruiting Process
January 13th, 2010 - byLast week, I discussed how recruits should respond when a college coach asks, “What other college coaches are recruiting you?”
You can check out the right way to answer that question here. Towards the end, I mentioned that the key to recruiting success is to acquire leverage. While some parents understand the concept, most recruits are probably asking, “What is leverage?” Rather than give my definition, I went straight to the dictionary:
Leverage: Positional advantage; power to act effectively
Positional advantage? Sounds like a great situation to be in if you are a recruit, doesn’t it?
Let’s analyze the following conversation between a college coach and two different recruits of similar athletic and academic ability:
College Coach: “How many other college coaches are recruiting you?”
Recruit A: “I have gotten a few letters, but you are the first coach I have spoken to personally.”
Recruit B: “I have heard from more than 50 college coaches. Aside from hand written letters, I have talked to about 10 of those coaches on the phone, visited 5 and several have indicated a strong possibility of a scholarship. In fact, two of the schools that have expressed serious interest are in your conference.”
Which recruit has a better positional advantage and the power to act effectively (leverage)? Which recruit might have more ability to negotiate a better financial situation? Obviously the answer is Recruit B.
Recruit B simply has more options than Recruit A. When a recruit lacks options, the college coach has all the leverage in the process because they do not feel any pressure to increase or expedite their pursuit of that athlete. They have no competition to do so.
On the flip side, when a recruit has involved dozens of college coaches in their process, their name immediately has more value and competition. Taking it a step further, what if the schools contending for an athlete’s commitment are rivals? If the coach at Notre Dame heard that a recruit they had been pursuing recently received an offer from USC, what do think might happen next? Most likely they will step up their efforts to land the recruit…and probably offer a scholarship.
Recruits who start the process early, put in the recruiting work by connecting with 50-100 schools and leverage those efforts will have a better chance of finding the right school…as opposed to settling for the only school willing to offer.
Which recruit do you relate to more, A or B? If the answer is A, you have a lot of work to do.
