UNC

Motivated by the apparent interest in the ability of baseball programs to graduate and retain their players, I decided to look at the track record of Division I baseball programs represented in the list above. For this purpose, I turned to the standard measure used by the NCAA to judge that: the Academic Performance Rate (APR). The APR assigns value to a program's players who meet academic eligibility standards and are retained by the program. Programs are judged by a 4-year moving average.

Here's the order as determined by the most recent 4-year average:
Lafayette 988
UNC-CH 985
Charlotte 984
Florida 979
Army 978
The Citadel 974
TCU 962
Elon 961
Liberty 961
Furman 959
NCSU 959
ECU 950
Average - All Div I Programs 946
UNC-W 944
WCU 939
ASU 937
USC-Columbia 926
VMI 926


Selected Area Schools Not on the List:

Duke 1000
Wake Forest 981
Clemson 974
UVA 973

UNC-A 943
NC A&T 937
UNC-G 937

 

Graduation Rates

http://www.wralsportsfan.com/college_basketball/story/8519500/

"At N.C. State, about 72 percent of student athletes graduated; three state programs, including baseball graduated less than 50 percent of athletes. Football scored 56 percent, and men’s basketball scored 60 percent.

“We want to be a Top 25 Directors Cup University,” N.C. State Chancellor Randy Woodson said. “What that means is we want to be among the top universities for graduation. We want to be among the top universities for competition. That's across the board, that's not just the revenue sports, that's all varsity sports.”"

http://www.wralsportsfan.com/unc/story/8524894/

"Carolina fared exceptionally well in four high-profilesports that the NCAA highlighted in its release.

UNC football’s graduation success rate was 75 percent, eight percent higher than the national average; the men’s basketball team’s GSR was 88 percent, 22 points higher than the national average; the baseball team’s GSR was 89 percent, 19 points higher than the national mark; and the women’s basketball team’s GSR of 100 percent was 17 points ahead of the national rate."

 

Prep- help me out here because I find the APR confusing. I thought the APR is based on academic progress at the time the student is an athlete (meeting academic eligibility during that time), not based on graduation rates.

Case in point, my son's school brought in 21 recruits in his class. Only 2 actually graduated from that school, yet their APR is over 960. I'm confused (of course, that's not unusual.)

 

The APR gives credit for academic eligibility and retention; and, because of that, it became the standard beyond the Graduation Success Rate. Here's what the NCAA's glossary says about it:

Academic Progress Rate (APR). The APR is the fulcrum upon which the entire academic-reform structure rests. Developed as a more real-time assessment of teams' academic performance than the six-year graduation-rate calculation provides, the APR awards two points each term to student-athletes who meet academic-eligibility standards and who remain with the institution. A team's APR is the total points earned by the team at a given time divided by the total points possible.

http://www.ncaa.org/wps/portal/ncaahome?WCM_GLOBAL_CONTEXT=/ncaa/NCAA/Academics+and+Athletes/Education+and+Research/Academic+Reform/General+Information/defining_academic_reform.html

 

True.

 

Another view

I am going to post what most folks believe. Over recruiting is within NCAA guidelines and legal. It is absolutely true that all programs must do some over recruiting to handle what has already been stated (kidding quit, draft, disciplanary action, and academic ineligibility). The question that needs to be addressed is how much do you over recruit? The draft, disciplinary cases, and grade failures make up in my experience about 40% of all turnover. The balance is what no one really wants to discuss. Over recruiting for the sake of over recruiting is done with intention because it has no borders. It allows all the upside to the schools and tons of downside to the players. The approach is simple but wrong, get as many top players committed and sort out the collateral damage to make the 11.7 scholarships, 28 scholarship players, and 35 man roster rules work. Again, some is necessary and some is because it is allowed. This opens the door to abuse which is exactly what we have. Just because it is within regulation and legal for the top tier BB schools in America severely over recruit does not make severe over recruiting right. There will be 100 kids from the top 10-12 BB schools in the country that will have” the meeting” or in allot of cases get “the call” that “we do not have a spot for you next year”. We all know it happens every year and not far from these numbers per school. What these kids did was commit to a school that ultimately they were not good enough to play for. Whose responsibility is that? IMO if you offer a player a scholarship it should be renewed unless you have documented reasons not to. Being beaten out by two players better than you was a misjudgment of the coaches originally not a reason to not renew a scholarship.
An NC schools has 29, 2011 and 2012 scholarships verbally accepted. The freshman and sophomores already there make up for another 22 players. As the commercial says, Really? Simple math, the total is 51 and 16 of those player will not be there when the 2012 HS class hits the roster. Half of the 16 because of normal turn over and half because a better player was found to replace a kid who did nothing more than got beaten out. It can be tapped danced around all day long but that is the truth. If that is going to be allowed as we have already established it is, then those players should be allowed to enter another D1 school next year on scholarship. D II and D III schools would hate it but this would eliminate most over recruiting. You may then drop a kid and face him next year. Man would that be fun!!!
If most businesses were run as this business is run the labor lawyers would have a field day. Wal-Mart was found innocent of price fixing for admittedly selling prescriptions less that the average buying buying price for 17 individual states because they buy on a global level. The Supreme Court found them innocent because they sold at their unloaded cost. It is estimated that 4700 local and regional pharmacies were put out of business in these 17 states. Legal yes, right no. Free enterprise? Hardly, in all 17 states after the competition was eliminated the Wal-Mart’s in every state changed their prices to the Wal-Mart national average which was a 45% price increase.
Over recruiting is done to lock up kids from others schools, give the fittest of the fit a chance to make the roster, and put the best team on the field that current regulations allow. My question is, is this the best we can do. How many on the, that’s the way it is, bandwagon would vote to establish/ change recruiting guidelines if they had to personally tell the 19 year olds what the coaching staff’s decision was.
My son was offered by the above but knew he was a bubble player and is playing D I ball at another NC school where the list of fresman entering on baseball schlorship vs. those same freshman that graduate is the head coaches model of COMMITTMENT!
Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgement.

 

Good post. As someone who spent 20 years coaching college basketball, with the media scrutiny in basketball, I know that this type of recruiting would be met with alot of "interest" in the media. Having said that, I also understand it is difficult for the DI baseball programs to plan due to the draft etc. I also know from some of my old contacts in the NCAA this issue of overrecruiting has been brought to their attention at the NCAA offices, and is being looked into but due to the reality of fan bases and interest in other sports (football and basketball) it is not getting alot of attention. However, if these things keep happening in football as they are, you may see some changes in and along these lines in baseball as well. Just a thought.

 

"my son was offered by the above but knew he was a bubble player and is playing DI ball at another NC school"
There it is in a nutshell. If you don't like what one school has to offer, don't accept it. Are there other schools over recruiting, or are you choosing to focus on UNC because you feel it wasn't a fair situation for your son? In other words, he would have accepted UNC's offer had he not been asked to compete?

 

Although this is under the UNC thread, what I have to say pertains to most schools. Coaches simply fall in and out of love with their recruits. A player they loved a year ago during the recruitment did not improve to the degree they had hoped....or in some cases the committed recruit regressed. They're human and their opinions change. Is it right? In my opinion, No; but that's my opinion. I believe a commitment goes both ways. I don't think a player should be penalized because a coach made the wrong decision...or to use a popular phrase (they didn't do their homework.)

But having said that, the one thing that has changed that absolutely distorts the fairness for all kids is the transfer rules. Obviously the decision was made to change the rule without thought about the players. It's one sided...it's unfair...and it represents the folly of decisions by the NCAA.

 

Congrats to all of the boys and realize more to come but surprised by only 58 boys committed so far. Does this seem low? Just curious...