Boston, MA: College Football Recruiting in a "Wasteland"

The city of Boston has for many years been known as a “recruiting wasteland” for athletics.  The public school system’s inability to provide for athletic programs has led others to give it the unfortunate label of being a city where kids can’t qualify academically.  

Each school deals with specific issues regarding lack of funding, equipment and academic ineligibility for many students.  However, the heart of the issue is citywide and applies to all 18 public high schools in the city limits.  

When something goes wrong in society, we typically respond to it and make a concerted effort (as a willing and able group) to come up with practical solutions to our problems.  The question is, why do we wait for things to escalate before responding to them? 

This seems particularly evident in the business world when it comes to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).  When a corporation comes up with a plan for CSR, it’s often in response to a negative public reaction to certain policies, highlighting the very same problem that high school athletic programs face in Boston.  Do recruiters stay away from the city entirely as a result of this lack of funding and facilities?  

I decided to look up the definition of the word "recruiting" in order to get some additional inspiration for this piece.  As usual, dictionary.com gave me several definitions to choose from.  I settled on “to furnish or replenish with a fresh supply".  

When a college coach recruits a player, they are looking for a true replacement and it’s evident that particularly in football, this is a practice that isn’t without controversy.  National Signing Day (NSD), the U.S. Army All-American Bowl and the Under Armour game are all evidence of the fervor that America has for college football recruiting.  In many ways, this makes me feel like I’ve been sitting on my leg funny and I need to shift in my chair.  

According to recent research done by Winthrop Intelligence, there is no correlation between number of recruits with 3 or 4 stars on an FBS team and its subsequent winning percentage.  There are several explanations for this but the most obvious one is that football scouting (particularly when we're talking about undeveloped young men) is subjective.  

There are of course some coaches that are better at identifying talent for their specific systems.  Kansas State's Bill Snyder exceeded expectations in terms or the recruits that he got and their end results.  The Wildcats went 10-3 and played one of this CFB season's most exciting games on November 5 when they fell short to No. 3 ranked Oklahoma State 52-45.  (While it is somewhat of an unfair point given proximity, none of the 200 players on either the Cowboys or the Wildcats are from the state of Massachusetts. Most are from Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas.)   

If there is no connection between how a player is rated coming out of high school and how a college football team does during the season, shouldn't something be changed?  

Thankfully, not all corporations behave like many college recruiters when it comes to finding fresh talent.  When a corporation like Nestlé decides to take responsibility for its actions and commit to working with small milk farmers, they set a precedent both in the business world and in society as a whole.  

They’ve recognized that there is a “symbiotic relationship between social progress and competitive advantage".  In other words, they’ve found that ultimately, the healthier and happier your society is, the greater financial prosperity you’re going to find as a business.  (To simplify even more: treating society with respect and admiration is great for business).     

Student-athletes in the Boston public school system feel that they’ve been cheated in this regard: “They treat us like second-class citizens.  It’s like nobody cares."  Only two of the cities’ 3,500 graduating seniors received full Division I college athletic scholarships in 2009.  In a city with preposterously poor facilities, equipment and training rooms (there is only one full-time trainer for all 18 schools!), the athletes aren’t just second-class citizens—they’re disenfranchised.  

Sports that require a good deal of equipment and a specialized space like football and baseball have suffered immensely in the city of Boston.  Football has the added stress of our country’s nationwide obsession with the sport.  In this context, it is much easier to understand and consume the hype behind NSD and watching 18-year-old athletes stand in front of a table and select a school’s cap to sport.  

Admittedly, I will never fully understand why it’s exciting for anyone to watch the subjugation of these young men on national TV, especially when the athletes can back out of their commitments whenever they choose.  Landon Collins, the nation's No. 1 safety recruit out of Louisiana, experienced how this can actually tear a family apart. (Video below. Try watching the whole thing without cringing or nervously laughing.  I feel like I'm watching Meet the Parents.) 

 Still, in Boston, the city suffers to provide their players with adequate equipment or facilities.  What recruiter would visit a running back with a lousy helmet and shoes with gaping holes? 

Baseball is in even worse shape than football.  As the Boston Red Sox compete as one of the Top 30 most valuable sports franchises in the world (worth almost $1 Billion), many baseball players in the city of Boston are left with no field, no equipment and no chance of playing outside of their hometown.

Regardless of the sport, there is a lesson that can be learned from a major corporation.  From 1989 to 1999, General Electric’s program of adopting under-performing schools near several major American cities set an important precedence. 

The company contributed money to the schools and required management to develop personal relationships with the administration in these struggling institutions.  The results were astounding.  In four out of every five schools that the program was implemented, the graduation rates doubled from 30 to 60 percent. 

Is there any reason why this wouldn’t work with high school athletic programs in Boston?  There is no question that at the very least, participation rates would soar and morale would increase significantly.

The city of Boston employs one athletic director for all 18 public high schools (as of 2010).  Even if solid football programs in the Big East, Big Ten and ACC were willing to invest in the state of Massachusetts, does anyone actually believe that they'd take players seriously?  Furthermore, how can we get recruiters to venture into the city instead of staying in the suburbs where money grows on trees?   

According to recent research, nobody seems to be doing a good job evaluating players anyways. So why not take a chance on Boston?