Satellite Football Camps

      College satellite football camps are  done for another year. These satellite camps are both a good and productive time for me. Much can be gotten from these camps. As usual there were good camps and bad camps.  Satellite football camps are and will continue to be very popular.
      Satellite Camps - Primarily Mid American Conference schools take advantage of this opportunity to bring a camp to the prospect. Some schools, like Ohio University, do just two. They are in  Cleveland (Mentor)  and in Cincinnati (Mason). The University of Toledo is all over the state. At least six different sites, including Cincinnati (Withrow), Dayton (Trotwood), Westerville Central, Massillon Washington, Baldwin Wallace, and Girard. Bowling Green State University travels much the same path as Toledo. Some schools like Youngstown State travel, but the MAC schools would be the ones to attend.
      These camps will test a prospect, put him through football related agility drills, and do the important one one drills. Every drill is lead by the college position coach. The head coach roams the field and has a chance to see all of the talent. The "basic combine drills" are good, but for some campers, this gets to be redundant. For example, I was at a satellite camp last week that started at 6:00PM. At 8:25, they were still testing and had yet to run a football related agility drill or had yet to run a football one on one drill.
      Another positive is that some MAC schools bring in D-II and D-III coaches to evaluate players and to help run some of the drills. In a camp with 200 players, many will be D-2 or D-3 level players. The problem there is that some of the younger coaches at this level do not know how to evaluate. They are not aggressive and spend more time talking. Of course, many coaches on the D-2 and D-3 level can and want to evaluate.
      I used to believe attending the one day camps at the BCS level schools was good because Mid American coaches were there. Even some "decision makers" were in attendance. Now I am not so sure how valuable that is. Getting prospects on campus is huge for both the college coach and the prospect. Unless you are a top prospect who really needs to be evaluated by the major college coaching staff, I am starting to question "why."
      Next spring go to the college's football website. Check out satellite camps. Check out the dates. I must warn you, as in anything else, there are good ones and bad ones. A recruit also needs to get on campus. If you are a senior to be, never go more than one day to a camp. Michigan does a tremendous job with their camp, but four days is a long time. But, for any school to recruit you, you almost always have to go their camp. Sad, but I really agree with practice.
      For my uneducated opinion, I believe in satellite camps. For the bang for the buck, they are good. Now for the most part, they are held on high school fields, not in or on college fields. But your purpose is to get evaluated, not dream. But eventually, you will have to get on campus.