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Coach Justin Stepp retweeted
Texas HS Football ‏@texashsfootball 5h5 hours ago Austin, TX

ATTN COACHES: @SMUMustangs Chad Morris added to @NikeCoyFootball Clinic lineup - Email [email protected] for details.

Now if only he wasn't in Clemson gear....

Then again, after the beatdown they just gave OU maybe that's not such a bad thing.

This is good. Need him to be showcased in stuff like this right along side the Briles and Pattersons to get our "regional mojo" back. "We won't play second fiddle to anybody."

Being involved in the THSCA and having coached HS football in Texas, he absolutely understands the importance of taking part in these clinics. It's the interaction outside the lecture hall - restaurants, bars, hotel lobbies - that creates and maintains relationships with coaches. He knows all this.

I am not convinced that high school coaches have that much influence on the decisions of the kids. Most kids are recruited based on TLC by the recruiting coaches and the kid's personal impressions and associations with the recruiting staff and strongly influenced by a kid's historical impressions of a school's football history and tradition. My belief is that the most value of the relationship with the high school coaches is the identification and scouting leads of talented kids for the college staff plus the accurate feed back as to the morals, desire, academics, coachable qualities, football IQ, needs ...etc. of the kids.

Not sure it is as simple as that Poco - there is quite a bit of side bar conversations about which programs are on the rise and which ones are not i.e. the "that program is going places" conversations, plus there is often rebounding transfers that the coach hears about first from guys that are one year out and console with their current teammates or HS coaching staff. To be first in line for those guys is very big.

And some of the coaches end up being parent equivalents for their players since there might not be much active parenting going on at home.

So although you may be right in that they don't influence the school the way an AAU coach would in basketball - the information you get from this network is crucial. And our previous staff got close to zero in that area.

PoconoPony wrote:I am not convinced that high school coaches have that much influence on the decisions of the kids. Most kids are recruited based on TLC by the recruiting coaches and the kid's personal impressions and associations with the recruiting staff and strongly influenced by a kid's historical impressions of a school's football history and tradition. My belief is that the most value of the relationship with the high school coaches is the identification and scouting leads of talented kids for the college staff plus the accurate feed back as to the morals, desire, academics, coachable qualities, football IQ, needs ...etc. of the kids.

While a coach is not going to convince a 5 star player to go to a school he is not interested in, I think that they can be helpful/unhelpful in the following circumstances:
1) The player is trying to decide between his 2-3 choices. Often, the coach can provide advice that swings the decision in favor of one school or away from another.
2) Any idiot can find the 4-5 star guy on a campus, the HS coach can help you find the right 2-3 star player if you help.