Anon Sharing Official Visits & College Offers On Social Media (Gymnastics = Football???)

[JBS]

How much to share on social media about your recruiting journey in gymnastics is a very interesting topic that seems to be evolving with each new year of athletes. What do you all think about this topic and the following question...​

Thoughts? Not sure this is going to become a trend. Does anyone have a DD that is planning on following suit? Or has seen this?

 

[Anonymous (597f)]

Not sure how many have been following the C/O 2025 recruits. But this year a few (2 that I have seen on insta) are pro-actively announcing when they receive scholarship offers or official visit offers. The most prominent is Sydney Seabrooks who is also an intern at college gym news. She stated on one of her posts that she wants to mimic college football players. It is kinda standard in the college football world for recruits to create posts the instant they receive an offer from a college. Her premise is that by doing this it will help generate the same level of interest and the sport will be taken as seriously as college football.

First, I know Sydney and she is a wonderfully talented gymnast and is a confident and capable young adult. I really do not want to imply that I am criticizing her. But I do think she is challenging norms and is creating an interesting discussion about recruiting. At first blush, I and I know many members of my DDs gym find it off-putting to announce that a school invited you to an official visit or offered you a scholarship. But I do see her point about college football recruiting. Why should it be frowned upon if the football players do it? Idk, on the other hand, gymnastics is much closer to an individual sport than football, so announcing these things has a braggadocio feeling about it? And if one follows college football, some of the bragging, hats on the table stuff is a big turn-off for a portion of the fans. Also, college football teams have 75 scholarships and around 25 scholarships to give every year, where gymnastics teams only have 3-4 maybe? As a fan though its nice to know definitively who has and hasnt received as scholarship. And I can imagine it helpful to fellow recruits to know who has received offers. Not sure schools would like it that much though.

Thoughts? Not sure this is going to become a trend. Does anyone have a DD that is planning on following suit? Or has seen this?

 

[Anonymous (8b8b)]

I hope it does not become a trend - I really dislike the way the football players do this. Feels tacky.

 

[JBS]

This is very interesting... I think it's great... the more transparency the better...

 

[Anonymous (597f)]

This is very interesting... I think it's great... the more transparency the better...

Yes, that is the one thing that prevents me from totally holding my nose. Recruiting seems to be a pretty asymmetrical exchange of information with schools holding all the info. Recruits putting that information out there could have some beneficial effect on helping other recruits.

 

[gym_dad32608]

Btw, how is she going to take 8 official visits! Logistically that is going to be insane. I know the rule changed but darn, that's a whole lot of travel and energy. Those visits are no joke.

 

[Anonymous (0afa)]

I agree that more transparency is better. The air of mystery around recruiting primarily benefits the schools, not the athletes.

 

[Coach Kate]

I don't do Instagram, but I read this article last month and it seems Avery Neff did the same thing last year

All Eyes On Avery Neff - Inside The Recruiting Journey of a Top Recruit

Top recruit Avery Neff takes Inside Gymnastics through her recruiting journey and how she knew she wanted to be a Red Rock.

www.insidegymnastics.com

 

[Anonymous (2b1e)]

Well i have seen lots of recruits in the past years posting pic of their official visits? Their photo shots in the team leotard etc.. and that was before they announced their acceptance. I don't see any issue with it. I also, don't find it bragging. These girls have worked their hind ends off for years and years! I think it is great!

 

[Anonymous (5071)]

While the curious side of me likes it, overall I dislike it. It definitely feels braggy, and with so few spots and the gymnastics community being small, it’s kind of brutal for other recruits, especially those who may be as strong of gymnasts but not getting the same attention.

On a related note, EIGHT official visits is a lot. These schools have a limited number of official visit spots (budget) and I’ve wondered if the new rules allowing unlimited visits will result in a small pool of athletes taking most of those spots. If I were a college coach, I would want to know that I was more than in the top 8 before I fly out and entertain an athlete and her parents for a weekend. And if Sydney is getting eight, how many are the actual top recruits getting?

I suspect that the official visit policy is going to change the recruiting timeline, at least to a degree. I'm guessing that in the past, the strongest athletes had to narrow down to their top five by now, so the other coaches would know to move on to others down their list. But that's no longer the case. What do others think?

 

[JBS]

Just linking in a couple of threads for those that Google into this one...

Anon - College Recruiting experience, insights and opinions

Since my DD is starting this process, and since the information exchange seems pretty asymmetric with all the information tilted toward the programs I thought I would start this thread to see if others would want to compare notes, observations, experiences, and opinions. My DD is a freshman in...

chalkbucket.com

Parents - Instagram (When Does My Athlete Need One For College Purposes)

I'd like to thank @Summer01 for starting this thread. I'm going to promote this thread as I really think this is a great question... When do parents set up an instagram for their child?

chalkbucket.com

 

[Anonymous (5071)]

In re-reading my post above, I'm realizing that it may have implied that Sydney Seabrooks is not a top recruit, which of course is a subjective term. So to clarify, in the class of 2025 there are gymnasts like Tiana Sumanasekera, Nola Matthews and several other National Team members, as well as plenty of super high scoring L10s. Sydney Seabrooks is listed as 40th on College Gym News' rating system so while she's certainly a very strong gymnast, if she's getting eight official visits, it's conceivable that others are getting 10+. I would think it would be hard to do more than five, but the temptation might be tough to resist.

 

[JBS]

With officials it kind of depends on the athlete too. My daughter did 3… offers that she had no interest in… she did not do officials for. There were plenty of others offering official visits.

 

[Anonymous (af15)]

I kind of wonder whether the top top recruits might get more OFFERS for official visits but have to take fewer official visits because they don’t have to worry as much about which schools are reaches. So they can just focus on their top choices rather than account for the possibility of not getting scholarship offers at some schools into the mix. Does that make sense?

 

[FlippinLilysMom]

Dang, we did one official visit and honestly that was plenty. Doing 8 to 10 just seems exhausting. She's going to be taking visits into December potentially.

 

[Anonymous (e51a)]

With officials it kind of depends on the athlete too. My daughter did 3… offers that she had no interest in… she did not do officials for. There were plenty of others offering official visits.

I feel like doing too many would just make it harder/overwhelming to choose. From my limited knowledge those 8 schools are vastly different. I feel like prioritizing what you actually want in a school should happen and narrow it down to the schools that best align with what you want.

 

[Ty’s Dad]

They all worked hard to be able to brag. I love it, brag away

 

[gym_dad32608]

Well i have seen lots of recruits in the past years posting pic of their official visits? Their photo shots in the team leotard etc.. and that was before they announced their acceptance. I don't see any issue with it. I also, don't find it bragging. These girls have worked their hind ends off for years and years! I think it is great!

I think you are misunderstanding the OP. It is not posting a pic or about when they took their official visit. It is posting when they were offered an official visit or a scholarship. So June 15th was when colleges could contact recruits. Like June 16th, they were posting that they had received a scholarship offer, even though they havent taken an official visit nor were they committing to the school. And now Sydney has listed in advance all the schools that she is going to take official visits to.

 

[Anonymous (9a79)]

My daughter did four visits last year and cancelled her fifth visit because she was ready to commit after her fourth. I will never forget she walked downstairs the day after visit four and said "this is the one I want". Every one said to her that when you know, you know and admittedly after the first three visits she was so unsure but the fourth was just different. She knew it, I knew it and I suspect the coaches knew that was what she wanted.
I can not imagine doing 8 visits! The four we did were a LOT and we were glad to have our weekends back when she committed. JMHO but I would think she would want to narrow it down a bit more to top 4-5?
Regarding posting offers etc tbh It feels like they are just trying to drum up interest and are not thrilled with what they have. Im not a fan but then again I don't like to post my entire life for the internet to watch either.

 

[Anonymous (339f)]

Right now there’s a gymnast at my daughters gym that has every school in the country wanting her, and I have to admit I would love to see the ones she has in mind. So I don’t think it’s bad at all if they post their offers or visits, it’s exciting.