After you hit send — following up, camps, visits and reading the signals

The e-mail is the easy part. The next eight months are about reading signals correctly and keeping 40 conversations warm without becoming the recruit coaches dread seeing in their inbox.

Decode the reply

• No reply. Before September 1 of your junior year, D1 coaches often can't respond. After that, silence for six weeks is a soft no for now. Update the film, update the numbers, e-mail again once, then move the school down your pipeline.
• A form letter or camp invitation. Marketing. Every recruit on the list got it. It means nothing about your evaluation unless a coach follows up personally.
• A personal reply asking for something (transcript, schedule, more film, your coach's number). This is real interest. Answer the same day with exactly what was asked.
• A coach calls your high-school coach. This is how serious evaluation starts. Make sure your coach knows your list and has your transcript.
• A request to visit or a camp invite with the coach's cell number in it. You're being recruited. Go.

Follow up on a rhythm

Every program on your list should hear from you when you have new information, not on a calendar:

• New film (junior reel, mid-season update)
• New verified measurables (combine 40, GPS speed, weight-room numbers)
• New grades or test score
• Awards, all-district or all-state selections
• Your schedule for the coming season, with the games nearest their campus

Three lines, one link, subject line with your grad year and position. Never "just checking in." If you've sent three updates with no response, park the school and spend the time on ones that are talking to you.

Camps: where the money is worth it

College camps cost $50 to $150 and are the one place a coach can legally watch you work in person during much of the year. Go where the coaches on your list will be:

• The school's own camp if a position coach has replied to you. E-mail him a week before: "I'll be at your June 12 camp. Anything you want to see?"
• Satellite camps where several staffs from your realistic level attend. Ask the host which schools are confirmed; skip it if none are on your list.
• Skip the national showcases with big banners and no coaches from schools recruiting you. Rankings from those events don't produce offers; coaches do.

At camp: be first in line for every drill, ask the position coach one specific technique question, and thank him by name on the way out. Follow up the same night with the e-mail template from the outreach guide.

Visits: what to ask

An unofficial visit (you pay) can happen almost any time; an official visit (the school pays) comes by invitation. Either way, the questions that matter:

1. Where do you see me on the depth chart as a freshman, and who am I competing with? Look at the roster before you ask so you can tell if the answer is honest.
2. What does the offer look like in dollars, and does it renew automatically each year? Ask for the net cost after all aid, in writing.
3. What happens to the scholarship if I'm injured or if the staff changes?
4. How many players on the current roster came in as walk-ons or partial scholarships and earned more?
5. What's the graduation rate for football, and what do players major in?
6. Who would be my position coach in two years? (Assistant turnover is constant; you're committing to a program, not a person.)

Sit in a class. Eat in the dining hall on a normal day. Talk to a player at your position when no coach is around.

Offers and commitments

• A verbal offer is not binding on either side. Ask when the coach needs an answer and what happens to the offer if you say "not yet."
• Tell coaches who are recruiting you when you receive an offer elsewhere. Honestly, briefly, without leverage games. Boards move when peers move.
• When you commit, call every coach who was recruiting you and tell them yourself. It takes an afternoon and it's the right thing; those coaches also change jobs and remember.

When to widen the list

If by the first game of your senior season you don't have at least three programs in real conversation — visits scheduled, offers discussed, or coaches calling your coach — widen the list that week by ten programs at the next level down. Not in December. The athletes who end up without a place to play in February are almost never the ones who lacked talent; they're the ones who waited.