How to Contact a College Baseball Coach

When it’s time to contact a college baseball coach, your son needs to be the one who sends the email. First and foremost. That’s not a slogan. That’s the process.

An agent or a scouting service can help your son in the process by being the trusted reference. However, he needs to make the initial contact to show the initiative and to show he has interest in that school.

Many families have been sold the idea that you need to pay a recruiting service and then sit back while that service reaches out to all of the schools. Coaches build relationships and recruit your son.

When it comes to the email, keep it short. College coaches get fifty, sixty, a hundred emails a day from kids just like him. If his isn’t short and sweet with a link to a video immediately viewable, chances are coaches won’t read long enough to find it.

Three paragraphs is all you really need.

Paragraph one: Coach X, I’m very interested in your program. I want to study X, and I see you have a great program there. That’s the interest. That’s their school — not a mail merge.

Paragraph two: the skillset. I throw 90. I have this bat speed. I run this 60. They have to be honest numbers. If he doesn’t throw 90, he doesn’t write 90. Coaches will find out the truth, so trust is important. The tools have to match the list.

Paragraph three: here’s my video, here is my summer/fall schedule, and here’s my club coach if you want to reach him. That’s it.

The video should be short. Exactly what he’s capable of. Not a twelve-minute mixtape with walk-up music. If he’s good enough, they’ll reach out.

One coach per email. Ensure his name is spelled right. Create an email address for your son and send it from that email address. You can title it something like “Graduation year, Player First/Last Name and his best tool.” Don’t attach a novel. Don’t list every tournament from 11U. Don’t have a service send it for him and call that a relationship.

If he isn’t getting replies, the first question is not “do we need a better template.” It’s whether the tools match the schools on the list.

Finally, when a school replies, respond immediately. Show how interested your son is. Show how responsible he is. Show how much he cares about earning a spot at that school.

Your son is the one who has to play when the coach shows up. Start that habit of him taking ownership now. Your job is to sit in the chair next to him. Not the send button.