High school football, My 15 yr old is a beast.

[QleanerQuest]

Kendo! Tip my hat to you as a father. You are doing a great job and I dig your pride you have for your young Bulldog! Greatjob my friend.
I played for 5 years.1 for a city team and the rest in High School. I played D End and linebacker also! Wasn't as much if a bone crusher like Micheal, but I wish I had been! Didn't take it as serious as I should have. School either. But I didn't have a Dad at home to motivate and encourage me.
Great job all the way around man. I love football, its American tradition and legacy. Watchout for boosters. Fine print and what not.
Hope your son crushes competition all the way to the Detroit Lions!!! Lol! Big Suh and Fairley would love to have backs like that!!! Me too!
Peace
Quest

 

[Kendo]

taking money puts his college career in jeopardy

I had not thught about that. I wonder if that would really jeopardize as the boosters are a part of the school system. I will ask. @redx @kevinn THx fellas. OOOROOOT!

 

[kevinn]

Not saying that it would ever come out, but if it ever did, he would loose his amateur status and be ineligible for college ball. Happens all the time !!! A booster or coach gives a poor kid train money to go home and see his sick mother. There goes the scholarship. The NCAA only looks at things in black & white. No gray areas. And whether you want to believe it or not, the local booster is more interested in the score on Saturday than your sons long term well being. It is only going to get worse as he will soon start to receive emails and phone calls from college coaches and boosters, each promising the world if he goes to their college.

And another word of advice, is to start looking at colleges early. He needs to pick a college that he would be happy at whether he is playing ball or not. A lot of kids pick a program, then get hurt, cann't play anymore and end up dropping out. Maybe different if he has what it takes to play pro, but 1 out of 100 D1 players make the pros.

Sorry if I am lecturing, but I am an old man that has been thru this with two sons. They were soccer players though. We lived and slept soccer. Playing for top clubs and traveling all over the country. Both went on to play in college. One flunked out (soccer was his #1 priority and not school) and the other decided not to play after his first year because it took up too much time and he couldn't keep his grades up (think there wasn't enough time for partying).

My best
Kevin

 

[Kendo]

I have had the college conversation with him. He was just as you said," All about the football program" He now understands the underlying dynamics. He likes OSU or UofOregon. He is leaning towards a business major from the marketing angle so he has a lot of choices no matter what. OSU and UofO scout this region, they will be around these local high level camps, they are approachable. Plus+++++ he says he does not want to be that far away anyway.

 

[kevinn]

College coaches are not allowed to contact players until the summer before his senior year. But there are no rules as to when a player can contact a coach, who can then respond. I would have him email the coaches at the schools that he is interested in. Tell them a little about himself and what camps he will be attending or, if no camps, his game schedule. Maybe include some references even if it is just his high school coach. This way they will know who he is, that he is interested and will maybe take a look. Now a days, players need to market themselves. After camp, he can use some of the training coaches as references (all the coaches talk to each other). I would start with 20+ schools. Never too late to get the ball rolling. I know he is dreaming D1, but there are plenty of good D3 schools and programs out there.
Good luck.

 

[Kendo]

Kendo! Tip my hat to you as a father. You are doing a great job and I dig your pride you have for your young Bulldog! Greatjob my friend.
I played for 5 years.1 for a city team and the rest in High School. I played D End and linebacker also! Wasn't as much if a bone crusher like Micheal, but I wish I had been! Didn't take it as serious as I should have. School either. But I didn't have a Dad at home to motivate and encourage me.
Great job all the way around man. I love football, its American tradition and legacy. Watchout for boosters. Fine print and what not.
Hope your son crushes competition all the way to the Detroit Lions!!! Lol! Big Suh and Fairley would love to have backs like that!!! Me too!
Peace
Quest

@QleanerQuest Thank you so much. Michael is definitely my pride and joy and football is definitely my passion. I am thinking that once Michael goes off to college I will start coaching again.
I get along well with kids and can get my point accross firmly without being nasty.
There are a lot of kids in the same spot as you were. I have had lots of opportunity to use the coach spot as a means to influence other areas like academics obviously, also social behavior or life in general. Some of the most unexpected questions come up/ You answer the ones you can, the best you can.The others you try to point the kid in the right direction for help.


It's baseball season and Michael decided he is gonna play ball/ LOL
He played one season a few years ago, but he is determined to break into the fold...
The coach has been asking him to come and play. Michael says he wants him him at catcher.The boy lives at the batting cage and hits every ball with meaty fat.

 

[Kendo]

Baseball is kicking Michael's ass. Up at 5:30am to get to football weight training and not home until 7PM from practice. We have had the convo about classwork never falling off and we had a tiff last night. He was dog tired and had homework to do. Made him sit down and do it. He made the choice to play baseball. He knew it was going to be a very difficult row to hoe. I make him own the decision.
The coach gave Michael a ride home last night, he said Michael needed work on his fielding skills. He then spent 5 minutes talking about Michael's batting skills. It seems he shelled every pitcher blasting balls over right, center and left field fences making contact with EVERY SINGLE BALL in the strike zone. and already passing on errant pitches outside the zone.
Michael showed coach the new Glove we got him, coach said," I think you might be using a different mitt son" meaning catchers. WOW! I told Michael years ago that catcher and center were the two positions most important to those sports. He never wanted to be a center but is working hard to take the Catchers spot.
The coach finished the conversation with," ALL SENIOR positions are open to a kid with a bat like that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Holy guacamole, If that boy letters in baseball as a freshmen too he will be impossible to live with.

 

[cannapits]

congrats kendo.