For recruited athletes, are there really viable excuses regarding why stats were down?

Let me state again for the record that I believe your stats have very little to do with your overall recruiting attention.  The reason why I say this is because there have been numerous athletes I have seen in basketball, football, and other sports who did not do all that well at the high school level but then shined at a camp or a tournament.  When everything was said and done, that athlete who stepped up when it mattered most during that time was the one with scholarship offers.

Big stats however can help you early in the recruiting process.  These big numbers will help you make postseason All Conference, All District, and All State teams.  College coaches see this and many schools at least will add you to their early recruiting database if you are making some of these teams (note: it does greatly depend on the school).  It won’t be all that important in terms of getting a scholarship but it will allow you to at least be evaluated and have you do less marketing (by the way, I am actually going to tackle the initial topic, I promise).

When talking with parents, I hear more excuses than you can imagine.  What is strange is that these excuses never seem to have anything to do with their kid.  The first response I usually get is how their teammates are not that good.  This can include dropping passes, not having a good quarterback throwing the ball to them, having a bad offensive line, or anything else you can imagine.  I have heard a lot of excuses and I honestly don’t think it will stop anytime soon.  Shockingly, I have never heard an excuse like this: “His stats weren’t high this year because my son sucks.”

So are there really any viable excuses that can be said about why their stats were down?  The first thing that comes to mind is an injury.  My son was injured all season but he was so f***** tough that he fought through it and still put up decent numbers.  The hardest part about really evaluating his toughness is you can’t really get a feel for how hurt he was.  If the parent says something like he played with a broken leg for three games, then maybe I could give them the benefit of the doubt.

What it normally boils down to, especially in football, is that everyone is at least a little dinged up.  You can’t play a sport like football and expect to be 100% all season.  So I don’t really buy that excuse.  I will buy it if they tear an ACL or something along those lines and miss the entire season.

As for blaming the teammates, there really isn’t much I can do there.  My feeling is that the parents are starting off by being defensive and throwing the blame elsewhere.  Your offensive line may suck but a good running back should go for at least 1,000 yards.  I don’t care the state or the level.  Quality players shine through even if their team is awful.

Another excuse that comes out pretty often is throwing the blame at their coach.  This one just kills me because if you as a parent are more qualified than the coach, my guess is that you should be coaching.  Your armchair analysis is great but if you could do a better job, then you should be out there.  Not much more I can say there.

Overall, the only excuse that I will buy is basically a season ending injury.  Stop blaming teammates, regardless of how bad your team.  There is no point in throwing those around you under the bus to anyone.  Keep that in mind before trying to come up with a reason why your son is not doing as well as your rival quarterback.

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