[quote=Anonymous]good read-
y Bud Poliquin
Syracuse, N.Y. — Because folks through the years have searched for fountains of youth, lost continents and unicorns, it should surprise nobody that we have all these loony parents among us seeking athletic scholarships for their sons and daughters.
Now, these moms and dads may be well-intended, but that doesn't make them any less dunderheaded. And rubes that they are, they're easy targets for those bag men, representing irrelevant travel teams and bogus AAU outfits, who are only too delighted to sell fairy tales while separating fools from their money.
This just in, people: Your kids aren't nearly as good as you think they are. More specifically, they're almost certainly not good enough to grab free rides to college. And you know who says so? The lords who run the NCAA, that's who.
Here is, according to NCAA.org, the hard truth of the matter: "Only about two per cent of high school athletes are awarded athletics scholarships to compete in college."
That's one in 50. And the chances are overwhelming that that gifted one in 50 will receive only a partial scholarship. Like maybe enough of a stipend to buy books. Used. For one semester.
The not-so-very-secret secret is that there are NCAA-mandated limits on how many athletic scholarships any school can offer. For instance, Division I lacrosse programs divvy up just 12.6 scholarships per year … baseball and softball programs split only 11.7 … soccer programs parcel out merely 9.9. And so on and so forth.
Oh, and those numbers dip as you reach down into Division II.
Thus, the arithmetic in the matter of this ongoing folly is easy: Precious few annual rides divided by tens of thousands of yearly dreamers equals massive and continuing delusion.
This is hunting Sasquatch. Chasing shadows. Listening for reindeer up there on the roof. And yet so many mothers and fathers, believing their fantasies and too often taken by charlatans with palms up and promises to deliver their children to college coaches supposedly so very eager to recruit them, hunt and chase and listen.
And it's both comical and disturbing all at once.
Pat Murphy, the Eastwood street urchin who went to CBA and Le Moyne before eventually making it to the top step of the dugout as the manager of the San Diego Padres, once told me a story about the folklore of athletic scholarships.
While he was running the baseball show at Notre Dame, Murphy became intrigued with an infielder from Whitefish Bay, Wisc. So he invited the young man to walk on with the Fighting Irish down in South Bend.
Well, a mating dance resulted and during it, the kid — and/or his parents … I forget — brought up the "S" word. Murphy responded that he was all tapped out, but that he'd see what he could do. He thereupon re-worked his numbers, offered the kid $500 off of Notre Dame's then-tuition/room-and-board/books/fees cost of roughly $15,000 (this, according to the university's archives) … and a deal was reached.
"And you know what the newspaper back in Whitefish Bay said?" Murphy recalled. "It said, 'Craig Counsell gets scholarship to Notre Dame'."
That speaks to the mythology of scholarships. But it also tells this story: Counsell, who would go on to play in all or parts of 16 seasons in the big leagues and win two World Series rings — and now serves as the manager of the Milwaukee Brewers — wasn't good enough to earn a scholarship.
There's a lesson in there for more than a few moms and dads. Those aren't reindeer up there on the roof. It's just the wind.
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Got it...so nobody is getting scholarships...these stories are almost written as often as the full ride stories these days...there are prob 250+ hs lax girls getting money, add the boys lax and this ! out of 50 ratio is blown out of the water.
A good message gets lost with the absolutism about no one getting a scholarship. Simple math says plenty of kids do, they just have to make it to a DI college program (that is the difficult part mathematically). A school spending all parts of 12 scholarships can give total cost of attendance as follows: 50% to 12 players leaving 6 full scholarships. Can now give 25% to 24 additional players. That has 36 players getting 25% or better in athletic money. You could raise a total of six up to 50% or 75% and still give 30 girls 25% or better while incenting "top talent" with a bigger package.
