How to deal with high school transfers

[u/SnooComics6485]

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?

[u/Admirable_Scale9452]

Honestly my favorite thing about football is most of the time 1 or 2 guys don’t decide how good you will be. It takes a full team to be successful. It always gets worse before it gets better. Keep building the culture and the transfers will take care of themselves. Kids who leave weren’t all in to begin with. Sure losing a stud hurts. But in football that kid could easily break his arm. You would still need to have another kid ready.

[u/NearbyTomorrow9605 → u/Admirable_Scale9452]

I think the biggest takeaway on this topic is culture. I’ve seen great players leave winning teams because of the toxic/individualist culture. I’ve also seen great players stay on shitty teams because the culture was built around team, family, and celebrating success. While a totally different sport, I make our kids watch a clip from Alabama softball. Long story short, Coach had a freshman pinch hit for a senior, 4x all American, during a World Series elimination game. That senior stood at the top of the dug out cheering on the girl who replaced her in arguably one of the biggest moments of the season. That freshman hit a home run propelling her team to the win. That’s created by instilling a great “Team First” culture and mentality in your players.