I suck at recruiting!

[rckabillyRaider]

I'm in my second year with UCLA. My first year I had a total of 5 recruits that signed with me. 3 of them were 5 star. One of them was a wr, who has now become a 2nd team all PAC 10 and another one was a CB who slowly worked his way up my depth chart to #2. My next game is the rose bowl and so far only 4 recruits have signed with me. And all of them are 4 stars only. I only have like 4 or 5 players on my team with an overall rating in the 90s and I also desperately need speed on my team. My fastest player is only 93. Any good tips for landing some 5 star players? My record last season was 10-3 with a lower bowl win and this season is 10-2 with the rose bowl left.

[Mecca]

Number 1 you have to build your team up before you can start landing 8-10 5 star guys.

With UCLA 2-3 is probably the max you're gonna get...you're gonna have to recruit 3 and 4 star guys likely maybe the occasional 2.

How are you recruiting? I'll tell you right now the most important thing is matching your elites and excellents with the mosts and very highs and hard selling.

[EricM]

There are plenty of 4* players with good speed. Just use the search feature to find them.

Only recruit players that have you in their top 10 (they have the green dot next to their name), or players in state that you think you have a reasonable chance of getting into the top 10 on quickly.

Don't put too many players on your board. You'll just end up not paying enough attention to any of them and losing most of them to other schools.

Use the quick call the first few weeks to get all their stuff unlocked, then manual call and hard pitch the Mosts and Very Highs.

Don't offer them a scholarship until you're #1 on their list. You only have the chance of getting an instant commit if you're #1. I would even wait until you've been in the top spot for a few weeks to give the offer, it seems to increase the chances of getting the commit.

You should preferably schedule them to visit for a rivalry game, but if the only rival is USC and it's the last game of the year that's not going to work very well. Try to schedule against somebody in state you can beat up real good around week 8-10.

For the players stringing you along, try to at least keep them from giving the hard commit somewhere else until you can get to the post-season. Pay attention to where they're visiting and give them more attention those weeks, because the visit always gives a big bump in interest to the competiton. If you make it to the post-season with them, give them three good promises and hard sell everything they're interested in, you should land them easily. If your board isn't overly full, the post-season's a good time to put some more players on it too. You can go from #8 or so to #1 in a week really easily with the promises.

[Mecca]

Even with a good team and being good at recruiting I always wonder how many guys I should have on my board to realistically get.

I usually would say somewhere between 20-25 no more than 27 at max depending upon you're needs, how good your team is and all of that.

[JIMIHEMMY]

One last thing....If I read this correctly, you only have 5 guys and you have not played your bowl game yet?

Normally, you would get the majority of your recruits in the off-season. Most teams are not going to get a lot of players during in-season recruiting.

[Chardon]

Recruit alot of prospects from states like Cali, Texas, Ohio etc etc. You will develop pipeline states.3 or more players currently on your team from a specific state. that state will then become your pipeline state. you'll start to notice when you go to that state from the prospect list more kids will have interest in your school than a none pipeline state. try to get the majors Florida, Texas,Ohio, California, then try states around your school. Next recruiting season, go for alot off 4 star guys. When picking a position and stuff, for CB and WR , put there 40 time really low, you can get some gems. Also, towards the end of the season, some 5* players wont have any scholarship offers, you can usually offer them a scholarship and they will sign, same with 4* dudes.

[65South]

I think EricM hit the nail on the head with all his points. One I'd like to emphasize is using the search feature.

With UCLA you should already have California as a Pipeline and some of the best recruits come from Cali...use that to your advantage. If you are having trouble getting 5* recruits go for the next best thing with the 4*s which there should be plenty to go around just in CA alone. When looking for a specific attribute, i.e. speed as you mentioned, use the search feature to pinpoint a 40 time and sort with Pipeline and Top 10 or even Top 5 interest and start with those guys.

From your post it sounds like you're spreading your time too thin and just don't end up with enough time to get the players you like most. Unless your team is in need at several positions, I would not fill the entire recruiting board so you will have enough time to go around and focus on the main recruits you really want.

I would recommend adding 5 or so top notch or Top 100 'would love to have' or 'wishlist' guys - which would most likely be all 5*s - then 10 or so top notch guys that also fit needs, then 3-4 others that maybe aren't as top notch but still cover your needs for the departing class. This way you can focus your time more heavily on these guys and not spread yourself too thin. Once you get a commit, then search for another recruit based on need or attribute to add him to the mix and begin your work on him.

One final thing, don't overlook Athletes (ATH). You can find a lot of guys who don't have a specific position, but ones that would work great for speed WRs and many other positions. You will notice quite a few of these pop up when using your search feature. I really like recruiting ATHs because even if you lock up your specific position players, you can stick these guys anywhere you think will work best given their attributes.

Hope this helps along with the other great suggestions above!

[jello1717]

I play as Michigan, so obviously recruiting is easier for me than for you with UCLA (IE. I usually sign 5-10 5*s before my bowl game) but I think these tips should be pretty universal.

1. I always completely fill my recruiting board. I ignore most of them, but they're still on my board for me to go after when I start signing guys I want. Also, I think just being on the board increases interest (I could be wrong). I've put guys that didn't have me in their top 10 on my board, and even though I never so much as called them, I eventually got into their top 10.

2. Don't spread your time thin. I always go after 10 guys at a time. Once I start signing guys, people lower on my board will move up, but I always only go after 10 guys at once. Occasionally I'll go after 11 or 12 when I can't narrow down the list, but you really want to give guys an hour per week. This is probably the most important tip.

3. During the 1st week, I'll offer a scholarship to anyone on my board that has me as #1. Sometimes they'll commit right away.

4. I'll quick call during the first week that I talk to a recruit, and only during that first week.

5. I manually call my top 10 recruits every week (besides that 1st week) as I'm much better at that than the CPU. IE. the CPU will hard sell pitches that I suck at (poor, fair, good, etc) even when I have an elite pitch that the recruit is most interested in. The CPU quick calls are really, really stupid. They're only good for uncovering pitches IMO.

6. I find pitches for my elites, then my excellents. I will continue until I've uncovered 3 (and I stop after 3) for:
Elite - Most
Elite - Very High
If I can't get 3 of those, then I'll go for:
Excellent - Most
Excellent - Very High
As UCLA, you may have to try some Greats or Very Goods.
You can sway pitches to get to the good matches if you need to.

7. Once you've got 3 good pitch combos uncovered, hard sell the pitches for the entire/rest of the hour. Continue until it says "pitch complete." If you stop before it says "pitch complete" you don't get an interest boost. Rotate through your 3 pitches. If you only pitch 1 of them, the recruit will get pissed. If you cycle through your 3 pitch combos, you can usually keep him on the phone for at least a couple of hours. Keep an eye on how fast the time goes down when pitching. This'll help you decide if you have time after a completed pitch to try another one or if you should save that extra time for the next guy. IE. if it took you 45 minutes to complete 2 pitches and it's taking ~ 5 minutes per "tick", go for another pitch. If it's taking ~10 minutes per "tick", I'd save that 15 minutes for the next guy since you likely won't complete another pitch in time.

8. Don't pitch bad combos like:
Elite - Low
Poor - Most
Sure he's most interested in getting a good education, but if your school has crappy professors, you really don't want to mention that to him.

9. Plan for good visits. These are as follows:
a. You can win the game. Wins give MUCH more interest boost than losses.
b. Against a rival. Rivalry games give more interest.
c. You have 3 good pitches uncovered. Don't invite him if you don't know 3 good pitch combos yet.
d. He can actually visit before he commits. I'd LOVE to have my recruits see me beat up on Ohio State, but I've found most guys will commit to me or someone else before week 13. Because of this, I have to use a less optimal visit to make sure that I can get one in before he commits.

10. Mainly target guys that already have you in their top 10 (they have a green dot next to their name). However, if there's someone I REALLY want that doesn't have me in their top 10 I'll give myself 2-3 weeks to try to get him. The first week, I'll quick call. The next 2 I'll manually call. If I get in his top 10, I'll go after him. If I'm still not in his top 10, I'll cut bait and go after someone else.

11. If there's someone you REALLY want, go ahead and give him extra time. When I need someone, I'll only go after 9 guys instead of 10 and I'll give the main guy 2 hours per week. I've never not signed someone that I recruited 2 hours per week.

12. I offer scholarships early (instead of waiting until I'm #1) and I'll use them to keep the guy happy. In the early weeks, if I'm still trying to uncover pitches and I'm uncovering bad ones and he's getting pissed (the football head starts to look unhappy) I'll offer a scholarship to get him happy again so I can keep uncovering pitches.