Researching rosters and recruiting needs
You know how to read one roster. This is the part where you read twenty of them forward, and the list you started with turns into a list worth working.
An opening is not a need
A gap on the roster in the year you'd arrive. Arithmetic. Count who's at your position, subtract who graduates, look at what's left.
You can calculate this exactly.
What the coach believes they're short of, and intends to recruit. A judgement, held by a person you haven't met.
You can only infer this — and it's what you're actually after.
- The portal. A coach with a hole at shortstop may fill it with a proven college player rather than a high school recruit. The opening is real; the opportunity for you may not be.
- Unannounced commits. Verbal commitments frequently aren't public. A position that looks thin may already be spoken for, sometimes twice over.
- Internal moves. Coaches shift players. A third baseman becomes a catcher; an outfielder moves in. That solves a gap without recruiting anyone.
- They value it differently. You see a position with one player and read urgency. The coach may carry one there on purpose.
Projecting a roster forward
Five minutes per program once you've done it twice. If you haven't read a roster column by column yet, start there — this assumes it.
Your graduation year plus one. Everything below is measured against that single year — not against now, which is the mistake that makes the whole exercise useless.
Use box-score positions, not roster labels. Include anyone who started there even once, and anyone whose listed position is adjacent enough to move.
Anyone who's a junior or senior now, in most cases. Flag rather than assume anyone who might have eligibility left — you can't see redshirts from outside.
Two numbers. How many players at your position will still be there, and how many of them will be upperclassmen by the time you're competing for time.
Those aren't the same thing. Two remaining freshmen is a very different situation from two remaining seniors.
How many players did they take in each recent class? A staff that signs two catchers every year isn't short of catchers. A staff that hasn't signed one in three years may be about to.
Compare rosters across years
Most athletics sites archive several seasons in a dropdown. Two or three years side by side shows you things one year can't.
How many freshmen arrive annually? A consistent five tells you roughly how many spots exist in your class. A number that swings wildly tells you the program recruits reactively.
Players who appear one year and vanish before their eligibility ended. Some turnover is normal now. A pattern of it is information — about playing time, culture or coaching.
Compare how many pitchers, catchers and middle infielders they carried each year. Drift shows what a staff prioritises when they have choices.
If the last three shortstops arrived from other programs, that's how this staff fills that position — and it changes what a high school recruit should expect there.
A roster isn't equally true all year, and nobody tells families this.
The most accurate view. Who's there, who's playing, who's actually at each position.
Mid-churn. Transfer portal activity, departures not yet reflected, incoming players not yet added. The least reliable moment to judge depth.
The new class has arrived and the roster is refreshed. A good time to re-check anything you assessed over the summer.
Practical version: do your projections from an in-season roster, and re-check in the autumn. A judgement made in July about a thin position is frequently wrong by September.
Three buckets, not a number
This is a three-year forecast built from a one-year document. Precision here is fake.
A family that arrives at "2.4 projected openings" has produced confidence, not information — and will act on it as though it were solid. Sort into three buckets instead and the judgement stays honest.
Few players remaining at your position, little recent recruiting there, no obvious internal replacement.
Worth real outreach effort. Lead with what you noticed.
Normal depth, normal recruiting pattern. Nothing that says urgency, nothing that says closed.
Most programs land here. Worth pursuing on fit rather than on need.
Several underclassmen at your position, or a staff that fills it from the portal every year.
Not disqualifying — but it should sit below a thin program you like equally.
Run it across your whole list and the ordering changes — usually more than any other single piece of research in this stop. Programs you were excited about drop; ones you nearly cut move up.
That reordering is the input to building and prioritising the target list, which is the next piece of work.
Everything above is inference. One email converts it into fact.
And the research is what makes that email work. A coach can tell instantly whether a family has looked at their program, and the specific question is the thing that earns a specific answer.
"I noticed you'll graduate both catchers after next season and haven't signed one in two classes — are you recruiting the position for 2028?"
That gets answered. It also tells the coach exactly what kind of recruit you are — which is worth as much as the answer. Writing the email →
Next steps
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