THE REAL TRUTH ABOUT COLLEGE BASEBALL RECRUITING

Please see some of the notes taken from a meeting with Coach Penders, the University of Connecticut Head Coach, as well as two other very prominent state college baseball coaches, where they addressed the recruiting process.

According to them, to be recruited a player from a Connecticut Summer (American Legion) Program needs to do the following:

• First, he needs to decide whether or not he is willing to make the sacrifices (academic, social, etc.) necessary to play a sport in college.

• Second, he needs to get a realistic assessment of his level of ability and try to come up with a list of potential colleges that would meet his academic, social and athletic expectations.

• After reducing this list, he should try to attend a camp or clinic run by these college baseball programs - this is often the best way to be seen and evaluated by the schools you are actually interested in.

• He should ask both his high school and summer coaches to contact the coaches at the colleges he is interested in attending.

• Most importantly, he should personally contact these same coaches and ask them to attend one of his games.

They also were clear that they generally respect the opinion of a player's High School Coach or American Legion Baseball Coach over a "Select Team" Coach since they tend to be more impartial. 

In addition, they said that players do not need to spend thousands of dollars attending "Perfect Game" type showcases or playing "Travel Ball". They particularly like watching kids play American Legion games since each game has meaning.

More than 90 players from our program in South Windsor have played college and/or professional baseball over the past 30 years. 

Sincerely,

Craig Zimmerman
Former State Director

Connecticut American Legion Baseball