It's one thing to write a college baseball coach. It's a completely different thing to get his eyebrows to perk up; to get him to say to himself, "This is someone I need to keep an eye on." A lot of emails show up in a college coach's inbox. In this episode of the show, we explore two great ways to get a coach's attention because, after all, writing to college baseball coaches is important.

Click below to listen

There are a few things you need to keep in mind when emailing a college baseball coach. First of all, consider the time of year, day, week, etc. Baseball is a spring/summer sport, which means that coaches are bound to be busy during these seasons. Calling or writing a letter to a baseball coach at, say, 5:00 P.M. on a spring Friday, when the coach might have a game, probably isn't the best idea. On the other hand, writing a message on an autumnal Monday morning is an excellent strategy.

Remember, too, that coaches get a ton of emails, regardless of time of year. Sometimes your email can get lost in the fray, and a coach won't respond. That does not mean you should stop trying. All it means is that every email you send should be unique, and should accurately indicate your interest to the coach. That way, when your email receives the attention it deserves, a coach will remember you.

Don't begin your communication with a coach with a phone call. Unlike a letter, a call leaves no physical record. Remember, self-recruiting is about doing the coach's work for him. Start him off with a written outline of who you are.

Don't make him write out the transcript of a phone conversation -- he probably won't anyway. In fact, he's likely to ask you to send him a cover letter and resume. Learn more about contacting college coaches.

What a week! February 4th is National Signing Day, the day that 2009 college recruits sign for a team. The next day, college coaches wake up and trudge back to the office to start it all over again, ready to focus on their next recruiting classes.

February 5th is National E-Mail a College Coach Day. That's the day that your name should show up on a college coach's computer. You want to place yourself squarely on his radar for the next college sports recruitment cycle. This is true whether you've been emailing a coach for a while, or are making contact for the first time.

Emailing even one coach is a huge gesture. It's a way of saying that you're going to take the college sports recruiting bull by the horns; that you're going to take control of the process. By going to OwnTheProcess.com you can take the pledge along with thousands of other high school athletes to email at least one college coach on National E-Mail a College Coach Day.

What should you say in this email? The first thing to do is check out the team's website. Most college teams update their websites right away on National Signing Day, to introduce their new players to the world. See who these new players are and learn about their backgrounds. Then write your email.

Start your email by congratulating the coach on finishing his recruiting, and share an observation that shows that you actually checked out the team's website. Something like, "Since I'm from Illinois, it's cool to see that you've got two new players from here. I actually played against Cameron in high school this season."

Next, explain that you're eager to prove that you're right player for his team, so next year, you'll be one of the new signings that go up on the team's website.

The most important thing is to stand tall, assert yourself, and say, "I'm going to take control of this." Emailing at least one coach on February 5th does exactly that. Don't miss out on the opportunity to join thousands of other players around the country to establish yourself on a coach's recruiting radar.

by Avi - With National Signing Day behind us, recruiting is heating up for the Classes of 2010 and 2011. Now is the time for sophomores and juniors to start to place themselves squarely on a coach's radar by developing an NCAA recruiting schedule.

In this episode of the show, we discuss simple but powerful steps that 2010s and 2011s should take to assert themselves and make sure that when Signing Day comes around next time, they have a spot on a college team. Click below to listen:

Phew. The dust has settled. The college athlete recruiting tournament is over and now the waiting game begins. Will I hear from any coaches? Will they call? Email? Show up at the front door?

It helps to know what a college coach is dealing with when he returns from a tournament. He's just seen hundreds of players, taken pages of notes, and now has to reconstruct what he saw and who he liked. It can take weeks.

Some coaches aren't so, ahem, organized. Often, players they like fall through the cracks. To make sure this doesn't happen, you should always email coaches after a tournament. Remind them that they saw you play. And ask them what they thought.

Even coaches who are organized and able to quickly process all the information from a tournament often take weeks to get back to a player. Imagine opening your inbox only to find that you have 382 emails to respond to. It can be overwhelming for coaches.

This is why persistence is so important for players in college athletic recruiting. Especially after tournaments, players often feel like that was their big chance. If the coach didn't contact me afterward, they think, he clearly wasn't interested. This is where you have to soldier on. You have to keep contacting coaches until they give you a definitive response. Are they interested? Yes or no?

To get a response, you have to persist.

3 tips on what to do during the summer before you go to college:

• Update the coach regularly throughout the summer before your freshman year


• Get fit!


• Maximize your chance to walk on if the coach has not already offered you a spot on the roster

Every high school athlete knows the feeling. You're playing in a big game and there are college coaches in the stands. Every time you do something good, they seem to be looking the other way. Every time you mess up, they are fixated on exactly what you're doing.

The question is, how do you get them to pay attention to you long enough to really see what you're capable of doing? The answer is that you have to be different. Our new Resources page for all paid accounts has lots of ideas on how to stand out. The bottom line is that you have to do something to stand out from the mass of other college-bound athletes around you.

Now, don't take this the wrong way. The point isn't that you have to do something miraculous while coaches are watching you. Instead, you should focus on "playing your game" -- doing things methodically and the way you normally do them. The time to be different is when you're emailing with college coaches.

Think about it. College coaches are constantly being inundated with communications from prospects. There are only so many emails that they can read that say, "Dear Coach, I really want to play for your team. Really, really, really badly. Sincerely, Mercutio." Yawn. The key is to do and say things that are different. Be honest, but different from the obvious lines that everyone else is taking.

An example might be to say in an email that "My family just got back from Yellowstone. Old Faithful is the best! And I just created a 'Save the Yellowstone Wolves' group on Facebook." Granted, it's a goofy example, but it's something different, something that college coaches haven't read 239 times already today. You might also do something really out of the ordinary, like create a collage of pictures of yourself and the college team and quotes from your friends and coaches saying why you'd be a good fit.

Brainstorming stuff like this is fun. Sit down with a piece of paper and just start writing the goofiest ideas that come to mind. Don't do them all, but do some. They will help you stand out from the crowd. Why is this important? Because college coaches will remember you when they are out at your next game. They'll remember the funny card you sent them or the camel riding picture from when your class went to the zoo. And they'll be more inclined to keep watching you to see what you're really capable of doing as an athlete. After all, you've already demonstrated that you know your way around the very process of athletic recruitment.

And distinguishing yourself is especially key if you're seeking college sports scholarships, whether it be baseball scholarships, softball scholarships, or whatever else.

by Farb - So you're going to Portland? What are you doing this weekend to make sure you get seen next weekend by the right college coaches? Do you have a strategy for success at college recruiting camps? It's not enough to just go to the tournament and hope someone happens to see you. There will be nearly 1,000 players there. This means that the odds, unfortunately, are pretty slim that you'll happen to be seen by the right coach at the right moment.

So how can you improve your odds?

Take 5 minutes and send coaches an email with your schedule. That's all it takes. Here are three easy steps:

1. Sign into your CaptainU account and go to the "Colleges" page.
2. Add 5-10 colleges you like.
3. Send the coach a 2 paragraph email. Ask if he'll be in Portland, say that you want to play for him, and include your schedule if you have it.

It takes guts to email a college coach.

The mother of one of our customers shared a powerful story with me this week. Her daughter just signed with a Division I team. But things didn't always look like they'd turn out this well. At first, her daughter was very tentative about emailing college coaches. The question "Why would they want to hear from me?" kept coming up on the ride home from practice.

She got over the initial hurdle and started contacting college coaches, but she didn't hear back from anyone immediately. She dusted herself off and sent another round of emails. Ever so slowly, the responses started to trickle in. And then the trickle became a flood. In some cases, she was receiving contact from coaches who hadn't responded at first. Her confidence surged with each response and she was emboldened to send more.

This is a great story. It shows that writing the first email is tough, and that there are setbacks along throughout the recruiting process. And it demonstrates the importance of taking the risk to contact college coaches and being persistent even when they don't respond.

One thing that struck me so much about this particular story is the point about confidence. Let's face it, cold-emailing a college coach and saying that you want to play for him/her can be a bit humbling. If you don't hear back, it can hurt. It's easy to see how some players get deterred from contacting college coaches very quickly.

But here's the upside: persistence pays off in a big way. When coaches don't write you back, it's okay. The first time you hear back from a coach, it's thrilling. You feel a surge of confidence that says, "Yes, I can do this." Ride that wave and send five more emails. The more you write, the more responses you'll get. And the more responses you get, the closer you'll be to a great college career.

Let's face it: sending emails to college coaches can be intimidating. But emailing a college coach is important, for a variety of reasons. Not only does it put you on the coach's radar, it also shows the coach that you possess valuable qualities: persistence, assertiveness, boldness, etc. Every college coach hopes to find players who match this description.

I feel your pain. There's an email from a college coach in your inbox. You open it, excited to see what it contains, and then, BLAM! It's another coach asking you to attend his college recruiting camp.

This can be pretty frustrating. You've put a lot of effort into emailing coaches and all you seem to get are impersonal responses asking you to spend $500 to attend their camp.

So what do you do?

This may not be what you want to hear, but recruiting camps during the summer are an increasingly important part of the recruiting process. They serve a very important purpose in that they give coaches an extended period of time to observe players -- not just how well they play, but also what they're like as people.

College recruiting camps are also great for high school athletes, because they give you an unrivaled opportunity to show for a coach. They also give you, the opportunity to evaluate the coach and see if you like his style.

Sounds great, right? It is until you see the price tag on these things. They often cost $500 for a 4- or 5-day week. And that's before you factor in transportation.

The bottom line is, you should go to college recruiting camps if you can. But you should pick carefully. If you have 10 colleges on your list, you can't go to them all. There are two key questions to consider:

1. Which coaches need to see you play most? These may be the coaches who are at schools far away, who haven't been able to see you play in a tournament. Or, they may be the coaches at the schools at the top of your list.

2. Where can you get the most bang for your buck? Some college recruiting camps may have coaches from multiple schools on your list. If you can get more than one coach you want to play for to see you at a single camp, that makes your camp tuition go much further.

IMPORTANT: Inevitably, there will be some college recruiting camps that you get invited to but can't attend. Don't ignore those requests. Instead, email the coach and tell him you're flattered by his interest and that you'd love to come to camp, but you can't because it's not in your family's budget, you already have plans during that week, etc.

Be clear that you're still very interested in making his team and want to know what you should do despite not being able to make it to camp.

The Pepsi Showdown is a great opportunity to get seen by college coaches and convince them that you deserve a spot on their team. But here's the rub: there are a lot of players who are going to be there. This is how to get recruited at any tournament you play in this spring, you have to stand out.

There are two ways to do this. The first, obviously, is to play well. The second is less obvious, but probably more important: you have to get them to see you play in the first place. You can't just hope that they'll randomly show up on the sidelines of your game. Here are three simple steps you should take to convince coaches to come watch you play at a tournament:

1. Find out which college coaches will be present. Email them and ask if they'll be there. Ask your coaches if they know which college coaches will be in attendance. Look at various websites for lists.


2. Make sure you have an up-to-date profile that college coaches can easily access. Include photos, grades, test scores, and your soccer history. Make sure that your information makes it into the event's player profile book.


3. Email the coaches with dates, times, and locations of your games. Tell them that you would really like it if they can see you play and name specific reasons why you think that school is such a good fit.

This should take you no more than an hour. It's amazing how a small, but concerted effort on the right recruiting activities can make a major difference.

You know you need to do it. But still, you sit there at your computer watching the cursor blink. Does the coach want to hear from me? Am I imposing on his time? What should I say? Will he respond? What happens if I don't get a response?

Here's what you have to know: college coaches love getting emails from recruits.

Getting emails from players makes college coaches' jobs easier. It also tells a coach a lot about the player. It means that the player is willing to take a risk.

College coaches realize that you have to "put yourself out there" to contact them. Let's face it, coaches can be intimidating, it's hard to know what to say, and it takes some guts to ask them to recruit you. The cool thing is, that's exactly what coaches are looking for: go-getters. Coaches want players who get out on the field and do what it takes to get a result.

How you recruit is therefore a great example of how you'll perform in college. Athletes who do what it takes to get a result in recruiting are often the athletes who will succeed on a college team. So learn more about contacting college coaches.

Regular communication with college coaches will strengthen your cause and help you develop your relationships with coaches.

Through letters, phone calls, and e-mails, you can demonstrate to a coach that you are committed to becoming a member of his volleyball, soccer, or basketball team.

This will give the coach a reason to seek you out specifically at a camp, tournament, or regular season game. Regular communication will put you in a position where college coaches are eager to evaluate your ability.

Learn more about contacting college coaches.

5 tips for communicating with college coaches:

• Write a cover letter and resume introducing yourself to college coaches


• Follow up on your cover letter and resume; don't be deterred if you don't hear back from coaches


• Send a schedule of your games and tournaments to college coaches


• Provide regular updates and progress reports -- maintain monthly contact with each coach
• Make a highlights video

There is much more to know about contacting college coaches.

What should I do in contacting college coaches, how do I approach them. Letter, e-mail? - Sean S.

Good question, Sean. The best thing to do is a blend of emails and phone calls. A snail mail sports resume and cover letter can't hurt, but it's just as good to do it over the computer. In the sample emails that we give CaptainU Online Guidance users, we always emphasize the importance of specific details. In other words, how do you stand out from the crowd? When you communicate with college coaches, give them a cool, unforgettable nugget of information about you as a high school athlete to remember you by. An example? My team went skiing in the Andes last week. Notice that it doesn't always have to be about your sport (unless you're a college-bound skier.)

There are 5 steps you have to take to win in the college recruiting process. Taking these simple steps is how you make a college sports team.

The second step in learning how to get recruited is introducing yourself to college coaches. Introducing yourself to a college coach can be an intimidating part of the college recruiting process. But here’s an amazing fact: they want to hear from you. When you introduce yourself, you’re making the college recruiting process easier for everyone.

(Learn the other steps: Previous: Find good-fit schools; Next: Build relationships with coaches)

Here are some ways you can help introduce yourself more confidently:

• Do a little research on their college so you know what you’re talking about.
• Write a great cover letter that conveys your enthusiasm about competing for them.
• Send them a thorough, well thought out recruiting profile to show your athletic and academic pedigree.
• Demonstrate that you’re academically qualified for the college.
• Include action shots and pictures of you so they can put a face to a name.

Of course, college coaches hear from a lot of athletes, so you have to make yourself stand out. This is why it's important to formulate a good strategy for the college recruiting process.

The best thing to do after a big showcase tournament is to go home and wait for college coaches to contact you. Wrong.

Actually, really wrong. Too many players think that once they've been to a showcase, their work is done. They think that they'll be contacted if coaches saw them play and liked what they saw. This is a recipe for failure.

When it comes to learning how to get recruited for a tournament like the Pepsi Showdown, for example, there are three key components:

1. Telling the coach you're going to be there


2. Playing in the tournament


3. Finding out if the coach saw you play

Not following through with the third step is like buying ice cream, bringing it home, and then letting it melt on the counter. What a waste!

So here's what you should do when you get home from the Pepsi Showdown. Email each of the coaches on your list and ask them if they were able to see you play. Include a quick synopsis of how you played and how your team did in case they didn't see you. It should take no more than an hour. There are three possible outcomes:

1. The coach saw you play and loves you


2. The coach didn't see you play, but appreciates the update


3. The coach saw you play and feels like it's not a great fit

Oh, the last one. It can sting a little bit. But actually, it's a good thing, because it allows you to focus your recruiting on the colleges responded positively.

by Avi - One of the coolest things I've seen in a while came from Hope Spangler, one of our CaptainU athletes. She put together a "Who I am" slideshow of photos, text about herself, and quotes from her friends and coaches.

College coaches love this sort of stuff. Why? Because it's personalized. It's not spam sent to a gazillion coaches. Rather, it's something that Hope clearly spent some time on. College coaches love it when athletes put some imagination into their recruiting. So if you're wondering how to get recruited, know that there are many right ways.

Imagine the boredom of reading through 50 generic emails. Then, suddenly, a breath of fresh air like Hope's slideshow. Or, someone who used green as the font color on their email. Maybe green itself text isn't that interesting, but it's the start of something different. That email goes on to tell a hilarious story about stalling twenty times while learning to drive a stick-shift. Now we're talking! That's good, interesting stuff that's going to bring a smile to the coach's face. It's not even about sports, but it's enjoyable for a coach to read.

Wham! Just like that, the kid with the green text made herself a little different from the 49 other people the coach heard from that day. National Signing Day for the Class of 2009 just passed. Now college coaches are looking for their next recruits. How do you get on their radar? It just requires a little creativity.

This is where recruiting can get really fun. I'm sure Hope had a good time putting that slideshow together. Start with a 5-minute brainstorm. It doesn't matter if the ideas are goofy, just write them down for now and then think about them when you're done brainstorming. Try two of the ideas you come up with and see what happens. In all likelihood, you'll get more of a response from coaches than if you send 25 coaches the exact same email.

A college recruiting cover letter is a big opportunity to express yourself and showcase who you are. It's your chance to make an outstanding first impression that's going to make the college coach think, "Hmmm, this is a player I'm going to keep an eye on."

The college recruiting cover letter guidelines we provide to CaptainU users emphasize the following three points:

1. Be concise - Remember that this is just an introduction, so don't be long-winded. Your college recruitment letter should be succinct and informative.


2. Establish a tone - Make your college recruitment letter stand out from the mass of letters and emails the coach has to sift through.


3. Be different - Don't be afraid to include personal details that distinguish you from the pack—e.g. "I do my training runs at altitude, on Mount Olympus."

Finally, if you're so inclined, be playful, sincere, thoughtful, anecdotal, whatever. Just don't beg. Remember: You are an asset; a college coach will be fortunate to have you on his team. A well-constructed, confident college recruiter cover letter helps to make a positive first impression. Follow these guidelines, and you should be just fine.

Contacting college coaches is a critical component of successful recruiting. If you want to get recruited, you have to put yourself in front of coaches. We interviewed 40 top college coaches and here's what they said about what captures their attention and how they choose which players to send a response:

1. Use email - Contacting colleges coaches by email is really the only way to go. Coaches spend most of the day at the computer. Sending physical mail just makes it that much harder for them to respond. They have to manually enter all your information before they respond to you. If you contact college coaches by email, they can just hit respond and write you back.


2. Be specific - Your email should contain specific details about the college you're contacting. Let's face it, college coaches get lots of recruiting email. And a lot of it, quite frankly, is spam. Your email should show that you've researched the school and that you didn't just send the same letter to a zillion coaches.


3. Include a player profile - Your email should arrive with a recruiting profile that includes pictures, video, statistics, and all your academic info. The more filled out your profile, the more likely you are to get a response.

5 tips for making your recruiting decisions:

• Decide which schools you're going to apply to


• Inform college coaches that you've applied to their schools


• Notify coaches when you've been accepted


• Weigh your options; compare and contrast the qualities of each school.


• Consider the different soccer scholarships you've been offered


• Make a commitment - in some cases a verbal commitment and/or a letter of intent

Okay, you spent all this time, energy, and money getting to a big showcase tournament. The goal was to get seen by college coaches. Now the tournament is over. Did you accomplish what you set out to do? There were definitely coaches on the sidelines, but were the right ones watching? And if so, what did they think? We tackle the post-tournament blues (and confusion) on this week's episode of Radio CaptainU.

Last weekend was a recruiting bonanza. President's Day is always that way. Everyone, college coaches included, is looking for an excuse to go somewhere warm.

The conventional wisdom goes something like this, "I go to a tournament and college coaches watch me play. If they like me, they'll contact me." Don't listen to that line. The silence after a tournament can be deafening, and often demoralizing.

The thing is, the lack of contact is really more about college coaches than it is about you. It's a huge headache for coaches to digest all the information from a tournament, which can take weeks to process. Inevitably, players the coach liked get lost in the shuffle.

All this points towards one thing that you have to do after a tournament: email coaches and ask if they saw you play and what they thought.

This can feel like a tough requirement. A lot of players wonder, "Who am I to demand a college coach's opinion?" The thing is, you have the right to know.

After seeing you play, college coaches owe you an honest opinion on where you stand. They may need to see you play again, but at the very least, they should let you know if things are moving in the right direction, or if you should look elsewhere.

Either bit of info is really helpful. If they think you're the right kind of player, that's a huge step in the right direction. If they don't, you can focus your recruiting on other coaches who are interested.

by Avi - 1 response from a college coach for every 10 emails sent?! No contact for weeks after a big tournament?! Phone calls and snail mail that go unreturned?! Are college coaches the most inconsiderate people around? What's going on here? On the Radio Show this week, we talk about why college coaches are often so unresponsive. Click below to listen:

Ahhh, winter break. Egg nog, 14 hours a day on the Wii, and a Mount Kilimanjaro of presents. It's the perfect time to kick back and do absolutely nothing -- uh, if you're trying to not make a college team.

If, on the other hand, you actually do want to play in college, you can get huge recruiting mileage out of your winter break, and still get plenty of solid time on the Wii. Here's what your New Year's resolution should be: by January 1st, you should find a group of 10 schools and send the coaches at those schools an email with a link to your CaptainU profile.

Not a big deal, right?

Sit down at the computer and resist the temptation to go to Facebook or ESPN. Instead, search for a few of the college teams that interest you. Have a look at their team pages, their rosters, and their coaches' info. Boom. Done. 5 minutes a team. Just like that, you'll have learned a ton. Enter a few quick thoughts on your CaptainU Recruiting Log. Do you like the school? If not, dump it.

Repeat this 10-ish times. Look, that's less than an hour total.

Next, create a great CaptainU profile. Throw a few pictures on it. Add your grades and test scores. This can be accomplished in 15 minutes. Finally, write a quick note that you can send to each of your coaches. Include the link to your CaptainU profile. Each time you send an email, personalize it with a few details about that specific school. College coaches will appreciate it.

All told, this can be done in 2-3 hours. Spaced out over 2 weeks, that's 8 minutes 34 seconds a day. Come on. You can make this happen and still beat Halo 3 893 times!

As you continue to correspond with college coaches, don't lose sight of the ultimate goal: you want to be identified as a high school athlete who's right for the college team.

It's important to have informal conversations with coaches, but don't dance around the central issue. At a certain point, you have to be straightforward and determine where you stand. Don't expect a coach to simply volunteer that you are one of his top recruits.

If he does, great. If not, you shouldn't think that you are out of luck. You must be assertive and find out how serious he is about you.

You should have these conversations once you are well into the self-recruiting process. Before you go asking for an assessment, give the coach plenty of time to review your cover letter and CaptainU profile, check your references, and see you play.

A thorough coach will want the full picture before he decides to bring you onto the team.

Once you are convinced that the coach has a thorough sense of you, call or email him. Phrase your questions in a genuine, non-confrontational fashion. The most important thing is that you actually bring up the subject of your standing. You're asking perfectly reasonable questions; there's no reason to be shy about this.

Whether or not you manage to talk to the coach immediately after the game, make sure to contact him the following week. Send him a thank you email for making the effort to see you play.

Offer some analysis of the game and indicate that you are eager to move forward with recruiting and your application. Ask briefly for his impressions of your play.

Your follow-up email should be short and informal. Yet it should move your dialogue with the coach towards the critical issue of where you stand.

You've been in regular contact now with the coach for months. He's reviewed your cover letter, CaptainU profile, and video, and seen you play in person. Now you need to start figuring out if he truly foresees a role for you on his team. In other words, will he offer you a spot on his team's pre-season roster?

What if I identify an additional college when I have already made a lot of progress with my original list of colleges?

Say you've been diligently self-recruiting for five months. Your mother's friend comes over for dinner and talks up her alma mater. If you're convinced, all you have to do is a little catch-up work for that school.

Fortunately, you have your cover letter saved on your computer and your CaptainU profile is close at hand. That very night, send them off to the coach at the new school and get things rolling.

In addition to your informal e-mails with a coach, you should develop a monthly e-mail update so each coach knows that he?s going to hear from you every four or five weeks.

Use a playful, memorable, and descriptive title like “Socorro LaFortune?s First Monday Report” for your update. Coaches know that they will hear from Ms. LaFortune on the first Monday of every month.

Effort like this will not go unappreciated by college coaches. Regular contact like this demonstrates genuine interest, determination, as well as dependability, which are traits that coaches value immensely.

A creative marketing pitch of this sort will significantly improve your chances of making the team.

If e-mail proves to be an effective tool with a particular college recruiter, use it all the time. Update coaches regularly on your successes on the field and the status of your application.

Respond right away to e-mails that they send you. When you receive an e-mail from a coach, hit reply and write a few paragraphs. Don't let it sit unanswered for days on end.

Have rapid-fire e-mail conversations with coaches and encourage them to have casual back-and-forths with you. Don't agonize over the wording of your e- mails, which should be informal, yet respectful. They don't have to be as polished as your cover letter.

In sum, use e-mail to its full potential. Without spamming coaches, keep them posted on your accomplishments and application progress. This will demonstrate that you are reliable and committed.

Once you've gotten through to your college coaches you have to maintain regular contact with them. Until you've joined a team you cannot stop corresponding with the coach.

If you have the right academic and athletic credentials there is nothing more important to recruiting than regular communication. It sends a clear signal that you're serious about this. It also gives a coach the opportunity to really get to know you.

The best ways to develop your relationships with college coaches are phone calls, e-mails, and letters.

The quality of your early contact with a coach sets the standard for your recruiting experience with that college.

To be effective, the tone of your cover letter and follow-up information must demonstrate enthusiasm and determination. Without being in his ear 24/7, show the coach that you are committed to making this happen. If you slack off, it will be perceived as disinterest. So stay with it.

As much as your college recruiting cover letter is an opportunity to be creative and to express yourself, you should keep it crisp and clean. Don?t be self-indulgent and wander off on fifty different tangents. Say what you want to say in a succinct, articulate fashion.

Avoid these recruiting cover letter pitfalls at all costs:

• Bragging - "I will be the best player on your team. Give me a full scholarship and I?ll score a bazillion goals."


• Putting college coaches to sleep - "I am very interested in being on your team which is a really, really good team at a college which is right for me because I am a pretty good student with a 3.3 GPA." Zzzzzzzzzz. Nap time.


• Begging - "I know you're very, very busy, but if you can find the time, I would love for you to send me some information about your team."


• Asking for too much - "I look forward to being flown out on an official recruiting visit." Or, "Please send one of your scouts to watch my game in Timbuktu."


• Cliches - "I believe in 'no pain, no gain.'" Coaches have heard that line a million times.


• Stating your name - "Dear Coach Firooz, My name is Chadwick Bugg and I am a senior at Tiberius Claudius High School in San Francisco, California." Use your first sentence to state your purpose and attract the coach's attention.


• Too many "I's" - "I am interested in your school. I would like to learn more about your team. I would like to come out and visit." Don?t begin every sentence or paragraph with the word "I."

The best way to initiate contact with a coach is with a personalized cover letter. Include a link to your CaptainU profile.

If you want to get really fancy, you can send your cover letter the old fashioned way: by carrier pigeon. Or, the next best thing, the US Postal Service. Coaches like getting well-formatted, thoughtful letters from recruits -- both via email and in old school letter form.

Either way, you want the coach to receive your letter and create a folder in his filing cabinet with your name on it.

3 tips for getting college coaches to see you play:

• Attend college camps during the summer


• Arrange for coaches to see you at tournaments and other showcase events


• Visit colleges and meet with the coaches