Early Commits

I know that is a very common subject but I was just looking at commitments on GoldFastpitch and I noticed that there are 22 girls who are listed as verballing from the 2018 class!!! ..... these girls are just now 9th graders.

4 years is an eternity both for the athlete and the college program. There is no way for a player/family to project how the player will fit in 4+ years out into the future or whether the coach will even be there any more. Based on my experience, most 8th/9th graders have no clue what their major will be. Hence, whether the school is a good fit. While many college coaches admit that the system is broken, they have little incentive to fix it. They simply over sign and weed players out during their freshman year.

NCAA needs to step in and gain control of the situation. Yeah, I know, the same NCAA that is becoming less influential and caring less about the student athlete. Only real solution I see is not allowing verbal offers to be made prior to the point in time. E.g. start of a players junior year?

I've always believed in honoring your commitments, i.e. verbal only when you are 100% sure and honor it. But given the way the system is working, I'm not sure I'd be disappointed if girls signing this early reevaluated and decommitted.

 

System stinks

Nothing any of us can do to stop it. Even if the NCAA steps in there will still be silent commitments etc... Open up signing a year early so when a deal is done it can be signed may help. Pretty sure most of the bigger schools are going to be forced into making 4 year deals so coaches cant run these girls off when they realize THEY made a mistake. Maybe that alone will push off the rush on middle school players. I know things are getting worse when I gets calls on first year 12U players. 7 graders! Really not blaming the coaches because thats what they feel like they have to do.

 

This is where the parents really needs to be "parents". Any girl that gives a verbal commitment 4 years before she graduates is just absurd. Some girls peak at an early age and never really get any better just as others need more time to develop their skill set. I get why a young lady would want to say "Yes, I am going to University of....... Lots of pressure on these girls to make it and play in college not only by the parents, but the TB coaches as well.

If I had to guess, these sites where you find this information, it's most likely being posted there by a parent and or TB coach. In my opinion, a lot of this starts with teams going to the so called high profile tournaments called "Futures". Just seems to be a tremendous amount of unnecessary pressure for a girl playing 14U ball.

Just my opinion but what do I know. I have no doubt that my post will not be well received by some parents and TB coaches which would probably be the type of parent/coach that are posting & encouraging this.

 

Agree that making the scholarship 4 yrs would change the behavior. To do that though, they'd likely need to increase the number of scholarships allowed to deal with "fallout" e.g. career ending injuries, etc... I'd be surprised to see that happen any time soon.

 

Wont be a problem

Big schools will just move players to academic scholarships when injuries occur. Players that transfer will open up money like at always has. NCAA has already appoved letting the big conference make their won rules. Pretty sure the 4 year deal will be one.

 

There is a cure for it!

I spoke with a college coach this past week. She just had '15 grad decommit.
The NCAA should put "teeth" in verbals, period.
Make the kid honor the commitment or lose 2 years of eligibility at any NCAA institution.
Make the university honor the commitment or lose a scholarship for the 4 year period.
If you put a severe enough penalty in place, it sould make everyone think lomg and hard before acting.

 

Do you really think it's a good idea to punish a 14-15 year old kid for making a choice once they have been encouraged to attend camps, participate in showcase tournaments that said coach/college has been to? Once again, parents and TB coaches should NOT encourage these kids to committ to school at such an early age. Furthermore, they shouldn't be publishing all over the internet until the kids get into their Junior year.

Let's be real here, what coach doesn't like to be able to say that he helped this kid go here, that kid go there? All organization do it, just look at their committed player page. You can see that same information on this site all the time from organizations that are looking for new players. Don't get me wrong, I do think TB coaches perform a very valuable service in helping these young ladies but at the same time, they are contributing to the problem at the same time.

College coaches get kids to commit to come to their school and all the sudden that coach has moved on to another school. Why should a kid be held to a different standard than a coach?

 

My take

com·mit·ment noun \kə-ˈmit-mənt\
: a promise to do or give something

: a promise to be loyal to someone or something

: the attitude of someone who works very hard to do or support something

 

The onus is on the parents to be responsible and not allow their children to commit in 7th, 8th, 9th or even 10th grades. How does ANY child know where their heart or dreams will lie for college at those ages? It's like asking these same children to commit to a hair cut and wardrobe that they must wear all through college at the age of 12, 13, 14 and 15.

If the parents are foolish enough to allow their child - CHILD - to commit to an adult course of life, then guess what?

That tuition is on them when things change.

Rick is RIGHT.

 

It goes both ways, not just against the prospective student athlete. Again, I'll ask the question again, why should a kid be held to a different standard than a college coach? I think most people would agree that a coach weather it be a College, TB or HS should lead by example and not the old cliche of "do as I say and not as I do". I will say that ALL should honor a commitment once it's made but that doesn't always happen from either side.

This is just my opinion, some may agree and some will disagree and that is completely fine. I have gone through the whole process of recruiting with my dd as she has been playing at the colligate level for the past 2 years. With that said, her coach from the past 2 years recently departed with very little notice and girls that committed, well they decided not to come since there was a change in coaching staff and not a new coach in place to meet. I can't blame the girls nor do I find fault with them for not coming and that should be held against them at any point. I'm pretty sure the coach at their newly selected school had no issue with coming to school B instead of school A