Werdman89: Thanks! And yeah, that makes both of us! Sandon: Thanks for the feedback. I know very little about any of the coaches in the WCC, to be honest, but the folks at USF seem to genuinely care about KJ, which is very reassuring.
You go where you're comfortable and not where strangers on message boards think you should go. While I'm not enamored with Erik Visser (I think he's underachieved tremendously during his tenure at USF), I've heard good things about asst. coach Josh McKay. But make sure you get a promise from Visser to put put a press release after signing day next year; if you check over on the college board, you'll see he has a bad rep for not always doing that! Regardless, best of luck to your son.
Sandon, Thanks for the insight...it's been great watching you follow my son over the years! BTW, what does the press release after signing day entail and how does that benefit KJ (and I ask that in the most sincerest way)? Thanks, Keoni
I believe the press release benefits Sandon's creation of a complete list of each recruiting class for each school. If Sandon does not have his list completed, there is a slight possibility Sandon will show up to USF preseason and begin heckling for his press release. And you don't want Sandon around KJ heckling for his press release.
We all have our crosses to bear, this is mine. And I will go heckle! To answer the question about the benefit, it's just a courtesy to the family and the player and his coaches and teammates and shows commitment to promoting college soccer. As we've seen in hoops and football, HS recruiting has become a big deal and helps grow the sport. When a player signs with a school in those sports, the programs immediately announce it. Now, the media and fans wait on bated breath to find out where some kids will go. I'm not under any delusions that this kind of attention will happen with college soccer anytime soon, but the programs should at least try to do the bare minimum to promote their program and putting out a release announcing new players who have signed with a school falls into that category. It sends a message that the coach cares about the players and about promoting them and the program and college soccer as a whole. Some programs are much better at it than others. Coincidentally, most of the players that tend to announce their recruits tend to draw well and tend to do well on the field and then they tend to get better players. Go figure. Making USF's situation more galling is that when Visser's kid signed with the program he made damn sure to get a release out good and early trumpeting his new recruiting class, which just so happened to have his kid included on it. But this year? No Visser progeny and thus far no announcement of incoming freshmen for 2013. At the end of the day, it's just a pet peeve of mine and doesn't make a huge difference to the players. But it still shows a commitment to the sport that you'd like to see from someone with whom you're entrusting your kid's future.
Werdman89, that's hilarious! Hey, I don't mind a heckler if he's on KJ's side Sandon, that makes a lot of sense. I think in our case, it would not only have a positive effect on the sport, but also in our small state of Hawaii, where stuff like this rarely happens for soccer athletes; heck, it rarely happens for any of our athletes (football linemen perhaps being the small exception). What's also interesting is that during National Letter of Intent Day, Hawaii lets ANY student who's committed to a any school for any reason sign during the event, regardless if it's an NLI. This, to me, sends the wrong message to local players and parents that it's easy to be recruited and their time certainly will come (since there's like 50 athletes "signing"). What they don't realize is that a bunch of those kids will be walk-on invites, a handful on merit scholarships, and the rest on financial aid...there's nothing wrong with that, except for the fact that maybe only 10% of those athletes actually have earned a spot on someone's roster and is being financially rewarded for it (please correct me if I'm off-base on this). I have a lot of friends whose kids are seniors and they haven't started to seriously look at college options for their kids--many were waiting for coaches to make it all happen. They feel that their kid is so talented that a discovery is inevitable. Or that they will put their faith in God and he will provide the path to success. Well, all I can say is that I started college search process in the middle of KJ's junior year and wish I had started in the previous summer!
Trust me, it's been challenging. I trained and coached KJ until high school, but he's played on other teams along the way, and now high school. A lot of the coaches prefer that he play "simple", but that can be defined in many ways. Many prefer a safe pass over taking on a 1 v 1 situation. Some don't like dribbling--at all. And some will impose a system so strictly that it becomes a mechanical, less organic style of soccer. So when KJ went to Barcelona, it was like a "there is a God" moment for him...ebb and flow, style, quick touch, movement off the ball, etc. I'm really hoping that USF will extract the creative player in KJ and use it to their advantage--given the freedom and encouragement, he will do wonders for them. I used to tell KJ before our games, "A lot of people have taken time out of their weekend to come and watch our team today--don't just play for them--ENTERTAIN THEM!" I felt that this always brought out the creativity in the players, and it was really fun to watch them play.
At the risk of being a downer - and I say this as a FAN of college soccer - but finesse, possession-oriented players tend to find college soccer frustrating. There are exceptions, of course, but there's also little evidence to suggest that he's going to have the teammates who will allow him to flourish in that style and there is certainly even less evidence to suggest the coach is willing to build around such player. I've seen USF play. By college soccer standards it's not bad but jogo bonitio it ain't. Caleb Porter's Akron teams and Bruce Arena's UVa teams with Claudio Reyna are some of the few college soccer teams that were able to pull this off an they both had a combination of excellent coaches and skilled and deep teams. I have no idea what style of play Akron will actually play now that Porter has gone, but were I you I'd consider watching them play this fall and reaching out to them to see if there's interest IF they continue to play a more possession style. Because no one in the WCC is playing that style and don't let them tell you otherwise. (That doesn't mean they may not try and change and try to play it. They might say they want to play it and your son is "just the player" they need to do so. And they might mean it. But till they actually start playing like that, I'd be quite skeptical of such a claim.)
Sandon, You are so on the mark, it's uncanny. BTW, did you know our independent team's name was Joga Bonito? That was the team were KJ and a few other boys made their mark here in Hawaii! They were affectionately coined, "The Joga Boys". Half of the boys from that team are in RAs on the mainland or being recruited, which is wonderful. In any case, what I found interesting during this soccer search for KJ was that each and every school we spoke with said, "Believe me, our style of soccer fits KJ waaaaay better than the other schools you're looking at!" That created somewhat of an issue for us--no one was saying, "Um, well, we play pretty direct so either KJ has to grow another foot or it's not going to happen." I suppose the lack of response from certain schools WAS, in fact, that message, so I guess we focused on the schools who actually responded to KJ's phone calls and emails. I don't expect college to be FCB or anything near that, but I do believe that USF will try to make the best use of KJ's style of play. I can see how a coach might want to play such a style, but simply doesn't have the combination of players to pull it off. Hopefully, KJ can add to that talent pool and help Visser make a go of it. We took their generous athletic scholarship offer as a sign that they won't waste his talents. Messi was fortunate to have been found by the right people, that's for sure...we can only hope for the same for KJ!
Congratulation to you and your son, Keoni. I enjoy watching your son play. I don't want to pry too much but when you get a chance can you address KJ's scholarship situation and funding for college. An important aspect of development and the college vs professional debate is often framed as if every college player is on a full athletic scholarship but often its mentioned that D1 soccer programs only get 9.9 scholarships with some players getting other university offered scholarships. This is obviously contradictory. No one 'in the know' has ever addressed this issue. I don't know if USF handles each player different or if its even different than the traditional soccer powers like UCLA or UNC. If you could add any information regarding this topic you feel comfortable it would add enough information to help in the public debate of the 'true value' of an athletic soccer scholarship. Thanks.
Having just completed the college recruiting process I can say this in general. top d1 schools are offering more full rides than the 9.9 would suggest. They all have a slush fund.
SUDano, Thanks for your kind comments about KJ, it is much appreciated. So basically there's three kinds of scholarships a soccer prospect can receive: 1. Athletic, 2. Financial aid, and 3. Academic merit. Now the trick to figuring all this 9.9 stuff out is knowing what moneys are countable and non-countable. If that college institution is offering you financial aid, it IS countable towards that 9.9. So if your son or daughter was offered $20,000 athletic and $20,000 financial aid, you'd be at $40,000 total scholarship (all countable). Now the team has to stay within that (9.9 x full ride) limit. So even if you think you've hit the jackpot and just got $40K, the coach might say that the most they can offer is $30,000 towards the team limit--which means you'd have to give up $10,000 between the two. And it would be tough to decide, as both awards have stipulations and could change each year. But don's lose hope--academic merit scholarships are often NON-countable, which means you could be awarded as much money as possible ONLY up until you hit the level of a full-ride. Meaning, you can't "bank" the excess if any. Essentially if you can cover the balance of the coach's offer with academic merit money, you'd achieve what most would call a full-ride. Good grades are the best way to get quick money from many colleges--so much so, I have second-guessed my decision to send my son to a difficult private school (Iolani). Since KJ's only at the verbal commitment stage in the game, it would be unfair for me to publicly disclose what he received verbally from USF. But I will say that we didn't qualify for financial aid via the school's Net Price Calculator and KJ hasn't taken his SAT yet, so we don't know if he'll receive any academic money. So the financial aspect of our decision was based solely on athletic scholarship money. We are hoping and praying for some academic grants over the next year. So, for the most part, you probably shouldn't be too concerned WHERE the money comes from, but the fact that it COMES. At least that's my take on it. And you're right, everybody knows someone who has a friend who supposedly got a "free ride". Um, it's highly unlikely. 100% tuition is NOT a free ride--a free ride typically covers just about all expenses, including room and board. But people get so caught up in the free-ride talk that it's almost the norm. Lastly, your son or daughter will only sign a National Letter of Intent (contract) if he or she receives an ATHLETIC scholarship, regardless of the amount. Most areas, including Hawaii, will celebrate NLI day by allowing all students who are attending college to play sports to attend the signing day. Many won't be signing an NLI, but another independent document from their respective school. Anyway, I hope that helps. Please feel free to ask me any other questions that I might be able to help you with. Cheers, Keoni
TopDrawerSoccer.com just did a feature article on KJ. I was completely blown away--wasn't expecting that kind of coverage: http://www.topdrawersoccer.com http://www.topdrawersoccer.com/club...-commitment:-dons-land-internet-star_aid28821 I'm pretty stoked for KJ, although we (our family) never considered him to be a "star" of any kind--but I suppose with Youtube and the internet these days, a young soccer player from Hawaii does stand a better chance of getting somewhere. Now all KJ has to do is live up to that article and he'll be fine
Agreed. While D3, Messiah plays this way too. Since D3 is not a path to professional soccer with rare exception, not a path most of the top players would choose.
Couple quick updates on KJ: USF finally did their combined press release, which included KJ: http://usfdons.com/news/2014/6/2/MSOC_0602143355.aspx?path=msoc Also, KJ was named Hawaii Gatorade Soccer Player of the Year: http://www.gatorade.com/poy/profile.aspx?id=15222 A few local state and division awards: http://www.scoringlive.com/story.php?storyid=11500 1st Team All-State 1st Team ILH Division Offensive MVP Lastly, the entire coaching staff at USF was replaced. This happened a couple months before signing, so it was a pretty stressful time for us. Everything worked out for KJ in the end and USF stood by their commitment (as did we). Eddie Soto is now the head coach, along with a entirely new staff: http://usfdons.com/news/2014/1/13/MSOC_0113140920.aspx?path=msoc KJ is currently training for college and leaves Hawaii in early August for San Fran. It will definitely be a new chapter in his life, including soccer. We'll see how it goes--hopefully he does well and gets a chance to rep USA in some way, shape or form! Aloha, Keoni