Photo by: National Underclassmen Football Combine
Barry's Recruiting Tips - Highlight Reel
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| Barry's Recruiting Tips Part One:20 Facts About The Football Highlight Tape |
| We hope to answer commonly asked questions regarding how to make a highlight video for college recruiters. This includes tips on what to actually put on the video and how to dispense the highlight. Let's face it the goal of a successful highlight tape is to allow as many college coaches and recruiting services as possible to view the student-athlete. Though the National Underclassmen can never guarantee that your son is a definite DI prospect we can guide you with simple tips that will increase the likelihood that your video will be viewed. |
| 1. The highlight tape should be at least four minutes in length but no longer than eight minutes. College coaches want to see more than a handful of plays before they get excited, but they don't have all day to watch a mini-documentary. 2. Always include an opening slate that contains your full name, size, jersey number, positions(s), along with the name of your school and head coach. Be careful not to include too much personal information if your goal is to upload your video on the internet. 3. If the athlete plays both sides of the ball it is advised to split the highlight into two parts. Show the offensive clips first than the defensive clips or the defensive clips than the offensive clips. But do not go back and forth through the entire highlight. 4. If the athlete lines up on different spots on the field on the same side of the ball it is advised to have some sort of arrow or marker to designate where he is on the video. A good example would be an offensive lineman that plays both left and right tackle. This allows the viewer to find the player before the snap of the ball. 5. Avoid showing the same play over and over regardless of how good you may think it was. Coaches and recruiting analyst have the ability to go back and watch any play. Also never use slow motion this is not only annoying it sends out a red flag about the athletes speed. 6. Make sure your highlight, whether made at school or professionally, can be used by any recruiting service. Avoid using television clips or having someone make your highlight that will not give permission to anyone to use it free of charge. Let's face it the more recruiting services that can legally use your highlight drastically increases the number of college coaches that will have access to it. 7. The internet is a wonderful tool when it comes to video. I highly recommend that once your video is ready load it up on YouTube. Why? Now you can easily dispense your video via email with an attached link to as many college coaches and recruiting services at little or no cost. 8. Again make sure that the video that is uploaded onto YouTube can be used by all recruiting services such as Scout.com, Rivals.com, Scouts Inc., Maxpreps, and of course the National Underclassmen Combine. 9. If you decide to put any music to go along with your highlights keep it clean. If something is inappropriate in the song this could reflect on your character. 10. Make sure when you send emails to coaches or recruiting services you have a specific name of someone at that organization. Do not just blindly send videos out because they seldom if ever get looked at. 11. How will I know if a college coaches are interested in me based on the video? They will almost always contact your head coach first. Remember your best liaison in the recruiting process should always be the head coach or a coach on the staff that has been assigned the responsibility. 12. What about full game tapes? It does not hurt to have hard copies of your highlights followed by a game or two. I would not send college coaches game tape unless it is requested. Let's face it if they are not interested or intrigued by your highlight then they will not be interested in seeing the full game. 13. Should I include practice or scrimmage clips on my highlight? You can but it is highly recommended that most of your video be comprised of clips from actual varsity football games. 14. Should I include an intro on the video that has me talking? I would not recommend this college coaches are always tight on time. You need to have a slate that shows your name, size, jersey number, school, head coach, and position (s) on the video. This should be followed by actual highlights. The idea of a highlight tape is to grab a coach's attention. 15. If my school has end zone and wide copy should I include both? It does not hurt especially if you are an offensive or defensive lineman. Just remember if you decide to have intercut on your highlight the minimum length for a highlight tape should eight minutes in length. 16. Do you recommend parents shooting video from the sidelines? I absolutely do not recommend any video shot from ground level regardless of who shoots the video. It is in your best interest to use the game video shot by the video coordinator at your school. They almost always have the appropriate angle ideal for evaluating players. 17. We are paying a professional to make our video and he would like to show off his skills by adding a lot of graphics and special effects? Again college coaches want to see football not a movie. Stick to the basics and get to the football as soon as possible on the video with no special effects. 18. We have video of our son benching over 300-pounds and running a 40-yard dash at a camp should we include that on the video? Again the college coaches want to see what your son can do on the football field. The bottom line is can your son help their college win football games! 19. Should we add his GPA and test score on the opening slate on the video? Only if the GPA and test score are better the NCAA minimum requirements. Remember some colleges actually have higher standards then the NCAA minimum requirements. So the rule of thumb would be if the grades are worth bragging about then include them on the opening slate. 20. Lastly remember YouTube is the best avenue for getting your highlight video out. And it is a lot cheaper to email 20 coaches then to mail out 20 videos. |
