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Message: [QUOTE="timkay99, post: 3433717, member: 635"] Great response, especially with why HS stats can be misleading. This is one of my more favorite topics to discuss. I was a recruiter at a NAIA school for baseball, so you really have to identify players and look at all data/cast a wide net. Obvious caveat, baseball is an individual sport disguised as a team sport while football really requires the team around you to be good and doing the right thing to capitalize on your talent on each play. So, if any sport should have statistics with recruiting validity, it should be baseball. Every year, would get the top statistical performers in our state (as submitted by their own HS coaches) from a 3rd party website across all classes. Would always track those kids and see what they can do. Probably about 10 % of them could actually play and maybe 1 % of them were unknown and I could get in early. Which is why after I left coaching and took over scouting for a 3rd party company, I utilized in-game video very heavily. Stats will lie to you and get you in trouble as an evaluator. Not just competition stats, but measurables stats as well (these tend to get lost in these conversations). Going football analogy, a guy may have a great 40, but can't read his offensive lineman or takes too long to accelerate to utilize that top-end speed. The true meaning behind HS stats? Get an evaluator to take a look at you. If you put up good stats, they will, at the very minimum, take a peek at your tape or try and get you to a free camp (at least at the NAIA/D2 level) while giving your HS coach a little ammunition to try and get eyes out to you (the real purpose behind the HS coach and recruiting - making sure the schools that you evaluate your players' talent level being for are aware of his existence) with some film. Reading anything into collegiate potential based on stats is going to get you in trouble, as there is no substitute for in game film - not highlight film (I could expound on this for another 5 paragraphs with personal stories and observations, but don't want to derail this thread). [/QUOTE]

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