A while back I began to share some of the insights gathered over 15 years of covering college football recruiting. I'm not claiming that this take is perfect, or the only way to look at things, or totally comprehensive. But I do think that some of the insights below might help shed some light on how things often work in recruiting behind the scenes. Remember, nothing I post here is unique to Kentucky. Most of this is not even gained from my experience covering UK recruiting, but in the time I covered other schools' recruiting all over the country.
Here I want to talk about the relationships that come into play in the recruiting process, and how those relationships affect the decisions players make.
First, let me preface all of this by identifying what I believe is a misconception. Too much emphasis is placed on the complexity of a player's decision. I contribute to this 'horse race' perception with regular recruiting updates on players throughout a year, asking him to talk about favorites, explain why he likes this or that school, and reporting on which schools he likes the most. I have to do this because the player is the subject and sometimes what the subject is saying, publicly, is the most newsworthy thing at a given time. However, I've tried to tell you time and again that sometimes recruiting updates and a player's comments are less important than what's being said behind the scenes. That's why our War Room features are infinitely more important than a run of the mill player update. Not just because of the breadth of the War Room, but because very often a player is saying what he thinks he ought to say, or he's saying what he thinks someone (a fan base, a coach, etc.) wants to hear. You will almost never hear a player criticize a school in an interview, but does that mean players don't have bad experiences on visits and at schools? Of course they do. That discrepancy alone illustrates my point.
Furthermore, in my experience most players have a better idea of what they want to do than they ever let on. You may never know that unless you're one of his classmates, who's heard what he's said candidly while he's playing a video game, or if you're a teacher that saw the team apparel he wore as a freshman in math class.
But the point is many kids know exactly where they want to go if the opportunity arises. e.g. There are a lot of kids who know they will go to Alabama if Alabama offers. Everything else is a facade or a contingency plan.
There are also many kids who know exactly what kind of school they want to go to. They may have offers from Kentucky, Mississippi State and NC State, but they know the second they get an offer from a so-called 'blue blood' program like Alabama, Florida or even Auburn that they're going there.
In the past I've tried to explain my belief that one of UK's great keys to recruiting success under Stoops has been striking a better balance than ever before, at UK, between recruiting the best player and recruiting the best player that 'Alabama's' not going to offer.
If you're going to recruit a player that you know falls into either of those categories (i.e. he has an obvious dream school and/or he is shooting for the most prestigious pick possible) then you had better be very confident that said dream school or those 'more prestigious' programs aren't going to make him a priority. Or, you had better not pass on too many quality "Plan B's" behind him while you're waiting, and while he waits on those other schools.
In my head I sort of unconsciously file certain kids away as "a Notre Dame kid" (e.g. there's one school he grows up dying to play for, beyond any hope of another school ever convincing him otherwise), an "Oregon kid" (he wants to be wowed and he's willing to go wherever the wow is), an "Alabama kid" (he wants to play for the biggest program at any given moment) and kids who will go through the process with uncertainty and then always come back to the one closest to home that feels most comfortable, frankly, because they're afraid of change and the unknown.
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With that preface I'll move on to another enormous factor in recruiting that is rarely discussed but understood by everyone in the recruiting world very well: Relationships. Not just the relationship between an assistant coach and a high school player. That's sort of the climax of a lot of other things that lead up to what we see on the surface.
I'm talking about the relationships between staffers in a college football program and the people who have a sphere of influence in the recruiting world on the ground at the local level.
Sometimes people have the perception that this part of the recruiting 'game' is sleezy and involves a lot of underhanded dealings with fuzzy details that probably no one wants to know about. Truthfully, when there are significant recruiting violations (whether they're uncovered and punished or not) this is often the level that it happens at. If you look back over the history of NCAA recruiting violations very often it's not an immediate violation between the player and the school, but between one or two staff members and an individual connected in some way with the recruit. This makes sense because for a lot of 'middle-men' or 'handlers' there is no altruistic motive in their relationship with talented high school players. That's not to condemn all of the people in this coach/mentor/friendship roles. Many, even most, do excellent work on behalf of many players, including some that only gain opportunities because of their tireless work behind the scenes. Some of these people are among the best that I've ever met, investing hundreds of hours a year in travel, communication, film cutting, etc., to open doors for players, and to allow them to make the best decisions for themselves.
What kind of people am I talking about?
High school coaches, 7-on-7 coaches, quarterback coaches, trainers, people who operate gyms and workout facilities, family friends with connections to the football world, mentors, former players who have connections to many current assistant coaches in college football, track coaches, speed trainers, etc.
They're not all "street agents." Surely those have existed and unfortunately still do, but they're individuals with their own reasons for helping recruits navigate the process. Sometimes their relationship with the recruit on another level precedes their interest in helping with the process. They may only help with recruiting as a secondary matter.
There are a few things to consider here when measuring the impact of such a person on a player's decision. How closely connected to said player are they? How much does the player trust them in relation to the player's trust in other people? Is the player they're 'guiding' the kind of player that is his own thinker and decision-maker? If so, the 'mentor' will, in my experience, really just serve as a facilitator, educator, travel guide, etc. If the player is the kind of player who has no clue what he wants, has no guidance at home, has trouble saying no to coaches, etc., then in my experience the 'mentor' such as those mentioned above is going to have a lot more to say about where he ends up.
Some people assume that means the mentor is just 'steering' a kid to one school or another. I know that has happened, all over the country. But on that point I'd add this: That doesn't mean anything dirty is happening. Here's an example: Imagine a 7-on-7 team's coach who's helping a 2016 recruit travel around to schools on a bus tour. The player wouldn't otherwise be able to visit any school, besides on official visits. This player is seeing the country for the first time. Everybody's laying out the red carpet for him. He sees incredible facilities and big plans everywhere. At the end of every visit, you can imagine, he thinks this school is the best place he's ever been. All genuine, all confusing.
So if that 7-on-7 coach tells the kid, "You know what? You got a lot of good options. I can't decide for you, but I can tell you this. That coach (name) over at (school)? I've known him for 20 years and he's never done one of my guys wrong. He gives young guys a chance and he's a player's coach. And he's put (names) into the league when nobody thought they'd get there."
Is that bad? If there's anything beyond that, maybe. But on the surface this 'under the surface' advice and input seems to be entirely human, totally understandable, and I'd argue even a duty of the mentor. The reality is many 16- and 17-year old recruits aren't in a position to even make the best decision for themselves. That might seem condescending but if you're skeptical then ask yourself whether uniforms, big screens and bowl game bling are really the most important things that a person will get from college. Some guys think about those things before anything else, so no, I don't think that a mentor giving advice, even sometimes if it "steers" a kid, is necessarily bad. And very often I've found that advice to be 100-percent honest. Especially for kids who do not have other guidance (e.g. from parents, friends, parents of friends, etc), that endorsement of a particular school or coach is the greatest clarity that they could be given. There's a chance that the mentor has an ulterior motive (on the low end, he's trying to benefit a buddy; on the high end of the sketchy scale, manifested in violations). But more often than not that's not the case.
All that's to say mentors have many faces, different degrees of pull and different motives.
Here I want to talk about the relationships that come into play in the recruiting process, and how those relationships affect the decisions players make.
First, let me preface all of this by identifying what I believe is a misconception. Too much emphasis is placed on the complexity of a player's decision. I contribute to this 'horse race' perception with regular recruiting updates on players throughout a year, asking him to talk about favorites, explain why he likes this or that school, and reporting on which schools he likes the most. I have to do this because the player is the subject and sometimes what the subject is saying, publicly, is the most newsworthy thing at a given time. However, I've tried to tell you time and again that sometimes recruiting updates and a player's comments are less important than what's being said behind the scenes. That's why our War Room features are infinitely more important than a run of the mill player update. Not just because of the breadth of the War Room, but because very often a player is saying what he thinks he ought to say, or he's saying what he thinks someone (a fan base, a coach, etc.) wants to hear. You will almost never hear a player criticize a school in an interview, but does that mean players don't have bad experiences on visits and at schools? Of course they do. That discrepancy alone illustrates my point.
Furthermore, in my experience most players have a better idea of what they want to do than they ever let on. You may never know that unless you're one of his classmates, who's heard what he's said candidly while he's playing a video game, or if you're a teacher that saw the team apparel he wore as a freshman in math class.
But the point is many kids know exactly where they want to go if the opportunity arises. e.g. There are a lot of kids who know they will go to Alabama if Alabama offers. Everything else is a facade or a contingency plan.
There are also many kids who know exactly what kind of school they want to go to. They may have offers from Kentucky, Mississippi State and NC State, but they know the second they get an offer from a so-called 'blue blood' program like Alabama, Florida or even Auburn that they're going there.
In the past I've tried to explain my belief that one of UK's great keys to recruiting success under Stoops has been striking a better balance than ever before, at UK, between recruiting the best player and recruiting the best player that 'Alabama's' not going to offer.
If you're going to recruit a player that you know falls into either of those categories (i.e. he has an obvious dream school and/or he is shooting for the most prestigious pick possible) then you had better be very confident that said dream school or those 'more prestigious' programs aren't going to make him a priority. Or, you had better not pass on too many quality "Plan B's" behind him while you're waiting, and while he waits on those other schools.
In my head I sort of unconsciously file certain kids away as "a Notre Dame kid" (e.g. there's one school he grows up dying to play for, beyond any hope of another school ever convincing him otherwise), an "Oregon kid" (he wants to be wowed and he's willing to go wherever the wow is), an "Alabama kid" (he wants to play for the biggest program at any given moment) and kids who will go through the process with uncertainty and then always come back to the one closest to home that feels most comfortable, frankly, because they're afraid of change and the unknown.
------------------
With that preface I'll move on to another enormous factor in recruiting that is rarely discussed but understood by everyone in the recruiting world very well: Relationships. Not just the relationship between an assistant coach and a high school player. That's sort of the climax of a lot of other things that lead up to what we see on the surface.
I'm talking about the relationships between staffers in a college football program and the people who have a sphere of influence in the recruiting world on the ground at the local level.
Sometimes people have the perception that this part of the recruiting 'game' is sleezy and involves a lot of underhanded dealings with fuzzy details that probably no one wants to know about. Truthfully, when there are significant recruiting violations (whether they're uncovered and punished or not) this is often the level that it happens at. If you look back over the history of NCAA recruiting violations very often it's not an immediate violation between the player and the school, but between one or two staff members and an individual connected in some way with the recruit. This makes sense because for a lot of 'middle-men' or 'handlers' there is no altruistic motive in their relationship with talented high school players. That's not to condemn all of the people in this coach/mentor/friendship roles. Many, even most, do excellent work on behalf of many players, including some that only gain opportunities because of their tireless work behind the scenes. Some of these people are among the best that I've ever met, investing hundreds of hours a year in travel, communication, film cutting, etc., to open doors for players, and to allow them to make the best decisions for themselves.
What kind of people am I talking about?
High school coaches, 7-on-7 coaches, quarterback coaches, trainers, people who operate gyms and workout facilities, family friends with connections to the football world, mentors, former players who have connections to many current assistant coaches in college football, track coaches, speed trainers, etc.
They're not all "street agents." Surely those have existed and unfortunately still do, but they're individuals with their own reasons for helping recruits navigate the process. Sometimes their relationship with the recruit on another level precedes their interest in helping with the process. They may only help with recruiting as a secondary matter.
There are a few things to consider here when measuring the impact of such a person on a player's decision. How closely connected to said player are they? How much does the player trust them in relation to the player's trust in other people? Is the player they're 'guiding' the kind of player that is his own thinker and decision-maker? If so, the 'mentor' will, in my experience, really just serve as a facilitator, educator, travel guide, etc. If the player is the kind of player who has no clue what he wants, has no guidance at home, has trouble saying no to coaches, etc., then in my experience the 'mentor' such as those mentioned above is going to have a lot more to say about where he ends up.
Some people assume that means the mentor is just 'steering' a kid to one school or another. I know that has happened, all over the country. But on that point I'd add this: That doesn't mean anything dirty is happening. Here's an example: Imagine a 7-on-7 team's coach who's helping a 2016 recruit travel around to schools on a bus tour. The player wouldn't otherwise be able to visit any school, besides on official visits. This player is seeing the country for the first time. Everybody's laying out the red carpet for him. He sees incredible facilities and big plans everywhere. At the end of every visit, you can imagine, he thinks this school is the best place he's ever been. All genuine, all confusing.
So if that 7-on-7 coach tells the kid, "You know what? You got a lot of good options. I can't decide for you, but I can tell you this. That coach (name) over at (school)? I've known him for 20 years and he's never done one of my guys wrong. He gives young guys a chance and he's a player's coach. And he's put (names) into the league when nobody thought they'd get there."
Is that bad? If there's anything beyond that, maybe. But on the surface this 'under the surface' advice and input seems to be entirely human, totally understandable, and I'd argue even a duty of the mentor. The reality is many 16- and 17-year old recruits aren't in a position to even make the best decision for themselves. That might seem condescending but if you're skeptical then ask yourself whether uniforms, big screens and bowl game bling are really the most important things that a person will get from college. Some guys think about those things before anything else, so no, I don't think that a mentor giving advice, even sometimes if it "steers" a kid, is necessarily bad. And very often I've found that advice to be 100-percent honest. Especially for kids who do not have other guidance (e.g. from parents, friends, parents of friends, etc), that endorsement of a particular school or coach is the greatest clarity that they could be given. There's a chance that the mentor has an ulterior motive (on the low end, he's trying to benefit a buddy; on the high end of the sketchy scale, manifested in violations). But more often than not that's not the case.
All that's to say mentors have many faces, different degrees of pull and different motives.
