Satellite Camps

     Hey everyone, this post is going to focus on satellite camps within College Football and my opinions on the recent banning of them by the NCAA. This issue came to light last week after the NCAA ruled in favor of banning schools from holding camps outside of a 50-mile radius of their campus, despite numerous coaches from a variety of conferences supporting them. The ACC and SEC were the main advocates against the camps while the BIG 10 was its biggest supporter. I was very upset with this ruling because it hurts the student athletes tremendously. Satellite camps provided under-the-radar prospects, and those who may not have had the means to travel around the country to big name football camps, a chance to get noticed. The NCAA guidelines state that their top two focuses are to protect the student-athletes and to create a fair and equal balance across all Division I athletics. Banning these camps goes completely against those guidelines as it takes away countless opportunities from the majority of high school prospects that struggle to get noticed by large schools. Geographically, it's obvious that the southern region of the country has a lot more prospects since there is a higher population. A vast majority of those kids have offers from some of the smaller schools around them, but few get the offer from a Power 5 school that they're looking for. Many have the talent that other schools might be looking for, but won't get noticed because they don't have the means to travel to Ohio, or Michigan, or Nebraska, etc. Plus, for smaller schools, they have a tough time attracting anyone to camps at their campus to begin with. Urban Meyer talked about his days coaching Bowling Green and how being able to hold camps outside of their campus or attending camps like Ohio State's allowed him to recruit players that may not get an offer from the Buckeyes. 

     I think that this kind of decision by the NCAA really hurts the future of the game and specifically the student athletes that want to play in the future. DiCaprio Bootle, a member of the Huskers 2016 recruiting class is a friend of mine and talked about how he used the Huskers' satellite camp in Miami last summer to get noticed and get an offer. Prior to the camp on June 16th, 2015, Bootle had a handful of offers from smaller D-1 schools like Temple, South Alabama, FIU and others, but he knew he had the talent to play at a Power 5 school. Lots of kids do, but without these camps, they don't get the chance. Bootle didn't have the opportunity to travel across the country to any big camps, so he set out to prove himself at his opportunity for the Husker Coaches. He ran a 4.4 40 yard dash along with stellar performance in the drills. This earned him an offer from Coach Riley and staff. That satellite camp changed his life. DiCaprio was upset with the banning of the camps, and told me:

     "Satellite camps are a chance to get exposure from multiple different schools in your own home area. Banning the camps takes away that opportunity for those less fortunate who can't afford to take trips to the camps that are held on college campuses. It makes the chances of an athlete less sometimes."

     Many coaches, including Nebraska's Coach Riley, were also upset with the banning of the camps. Mostly members from the BIG 10 and Big XII voiced their opinions against it, along with smaller schools. Coaches from the SEC and ACC however thought the ban was fitting. I'm interested to see where this rule goes over into the summer. The main reason the NCAA gave for banning the camps was that on the recruiting side, it would be difficult for them to make sure regulations were followed. I felt like that was more of a blanket statement without much to it because the NCAA is considering altering the rule of coaches' abilities to text recruits without regulations. This would open it up to be like basketball where coaches can openly text recruit as much as they want. If I were a kid in high school, I think that I would much rather have the opportunity to attend a camp from a far away school in a nearby area to prove myself than receive 50+ texts a day from different schools trying to contact me. I'm not a big fan of this ban, and I hope this ruling gets a second look. It's going to hurt the chances of a lot of great kids like DiCaprio that want their chance to prove they can play at the highest level.

#CollegeFootballKnowItAll

Alex Fernando