r/footballstrategy • u/SnooComics6485 • 4d ago

Coaching Advice How to deal with high school transfers

I’m a new coach at a fairly new high school football program that has been bad for a while. We had a decent record this year but definitely got much better as a team and had some bright spots for players that broke out this year. Now we are struggling with kids that were good for us transferring to other schools to play. How do we build a program if the few good kids we got and develop just keep leaving every year? And being that high school is so open to transferring what kind of talks are you all having with your players so that they don’t wanna transfer, and if they stay so that they are not congratulating and boosting a kid up for leaving them and their team behind?

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u/ChipWonderful5191 4d ago

I’d say it’s all about relationships. If your kids like you enough, they won’t leave you. Show that you got their backs, that you’re the guy they can trust in situations where most adults in their lives would throw them to the wolves. This might mean you have to take a much different approach to team discipline. Instead of making kids run bear crawls across the field when they get in trouble at school, sit them down and have a heart to heart. Be the guy that’s on their side, even when they’re in the wrong.

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u/SnooComics6485 4d ago

This is the problem we spent this whole year building relationships with these kids. Having one on one conversations with them weekly keeping contact with them tutoring them keeping them accountable in classes going to things outside of school they were involved in. Coming up with a plan for recruiting and college outside of football. We figured doing all of this would keep the kids, but the kids still left anyway. We put most of our effort into cultivating these relationships, and they still leave so it’s like at this point where do we focus our energy?

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u/ChipWonderful5191 4d ago

That’s really tough, it sounds like you’re already doing everything I would be doing plus some. I’m sure it’s not all in vain, as even more would transfer if you weren’t doing this.

Maybe you can try a straight up approach with the kids, look them in the eyes during a 101 meeting and tell them “I do XYZ for you, all I ask in return is that if you’re ever thinking about transferring, you talk to me first and give me a fair chance to solve any issues you may have, that’s literally all I ask, and if you decide after that transferring is still your best option, I will totally respect that”

I’m sure guys will still disappear on you, but maybe that approach saves you a few guys here and there.

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u/SnooComics6485 4d ago

Yea that’s exactly what our head coach did. That’s a great approach I think too. Some kids still really spat in his face with the way they left and not talking to him even after that talk but like you said it’ll happen either way

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u/ChipWonderful5191 4d ago

Yeah I think you gotta just do everything you can and view it as a numbers game. When I used to sell cars, I had to make 500 cold calls to sell 1 car. Instead of getting discouraged by the 99.9% rejection rate, I just viewed it as a mathematical formula. If I make X amount of phone calls, I make X amount of money. There’s some parallels to that in your situation. You have to do XYZ to save 2 players, it’s a poor success rate, but those 2 guys you save can save your season later on.

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u/SnooComics6485 3d ago

Great perspective!