So it must be obvious by now I have no understanding of recruit responses whatsoever.  But I find this odd: I was behind on a guy, put in some effort, and the last few CV responses were of the "Campus was nice.  Thanks for having me a visit.  I still have a few places I want to visit, but I like what you have to offer" variety.  Somewhat positive, but not glowing.  And then the scholarship message came: "Coach, thanks for the scholarship offer -- I wish I could sign right now!"

Now, I UNDERSTAND THAT THE SCHOLARSHIP MESSAGE IS ALL THAT MATTERS.  And, I'm clearly winning right now.  This isn't even a "this is close but you're leading" kind of message -- this means I'm winning by a fair amount (I think?).  But my experience is that when you're winning by a fair amount, the CV responses are always the glowing ones -- "I had a dream I was playing for Alabama," "you know I'm a virgo," stuff like that.  But these CV responses feel like they're saying it's a close race; there's a disconnect between the CV response and the scholarship response.  Again, I KNOW THE SCHOLARSHIP MESSAGE IS ALL THAT MATTERS.  I'm just confused why the two types of responses don't seem to match up.  Unless I'm misunderstanding the "I wish I could sign right now!" message; I've certainly been guilty of misunderstanding before...

Jeff, the responses to CV, HV, etc. are really based on what your status was going into that cycle, while the schollie visit tabulates everything up and give you your new standing. For this reason, it's very common for responses to visits and other effort to portray one thing, and then the schollie message to differ completely. (Thus the maxim that the schollie message is the only thing that matters.)

If you started behind and put 500 visits in one cycle, it's not like the initial visits would indicate you were behind, and then the late visits would indicate that you were ahead. They would all have the same general theme (although we both know that some of the WIS responses are ambiguous). And then when the schollie message came out, it would tell you that you were leading.

Yeah?  Huh -- I guess I never realized that.  Now I feel dumb.  I always got the sense that responses were based on something like, each cycle, taking your first 5 pieces of effort, gauging where you were, then taking the next school's first 5 pieces, then taking your next 5, and going back and forth in some way, constantly "updating" where you were in the race even within cycles.  In fact, don't the tenor of messages sometimes change within one cycle?  I.e., you could start off getting great responses, then they get more subdued?  I guess it never occurred to me it was otherwise.  Huh.

I think it does change ... at least I have seen it change.

As an example, I got these three responses in the same turn very recently:

1.  I'll be honest here buddy -- I think we have better opportunities elsewhere. Mark xxxxxx sounded only moderately interested - at best.

2.  Hey coach! How's it going at xxxxxx? I'm not against playing there, tell me more about your program and what the school has to offer.

3.  Coach, thanks for the visit! You sure know how to motivate, and if you have that intensity for the games, then I know our team is going to win. I think my pop was ready to sign. LOL.

I also think that at the time the "response" is given, it is correct.  However, how are the responses processed?

If all the responses are done in team order, if your team was first, you would get "very positive" messages starting very early.  If your team was processed last, you would likely get negative responses except for the last few.

That is why it doesn't matter ... unless you are the last team processed then the responses don't take into account everyone else ... however the scholarship one does take into account  everyone else's response at the end of the term.  That is why it (the scholarship response) is the only one that is accurate.

Agreed -- but if that's the case, whether you're the first or last team processed, your CV response should never be *less* glowing than your scholarship message.  Which is what I've found happening here.

It could be better ... what if the other team signed their last player or informed of a redshirt?  (After your responses happened)

If you've ever done enough visits in a cycle in which you've started behind but ended ahead, you can see that there is just a randomness there. The first message might be the same as the last, but in between you might get some that sound better and/or worse. It's a rookie mistake to ever read too heavily into specific aspects of those messages.

Posted by jeffdrayer on 11/11/2012 3:25:00 PM (view original):
Agreed -- but if that's the case, whether you're the first or last team processed, your CV response should never be *less* glowing than your scholarship message.  Which is what I've found happening here.

in reality, i dont think the campus visits ever get super positive, like, i wish i could sign right now type stuff. so i think that is what you are experiencing.

im not sure i totally agree with the statements in this thread about how hv and cv responses work, but ive never really studied it in depth, either. it seems to me common that you spend a lot in a cycle, and end with a scholarship message more positive or more negative than the visit responses. however, ive also seen change in the quality of the response over time, but that may just be something tied to your overall level of effort. i think its a possibility that your cv/hv responses are purely a function of the situation at the start of the cycle, combined with your overall effort level with the recruit. im not sure there is any processed first/last stuff going on there, but like i said, ive never taken the time to study it, either. however, i definitely get the feeling that i disagree with the sentiment that your visit responses are changing based on if you are winning or losing compared to the other team(s) based on the continuous processing of credit (yours or theirs).

I am not at all sure that the variations within a cycle in the non schollie responses have meaning.  If there is a pattern, I dont know what it is - and I would watch out lest one see a correlation one or two or three times and think that means that there is a pattern

or maybe there is

Hey, I trust what everyone's saying here.  Truth is, I usually don't bother to read HV/CV responses, just schollie emails, so never paid too much attention to it until it struck me as strange today.  Might just be my fault for not being stricken sooner :)

Posted by girt25 on 11/11/2012 4:07:00 PM (view original):
If you've ever done enough visits in a cycle in which you've started behind but ended ahead, you can see that there is just a randomness there. The first message might be the same as the last, but in between you might get some that sound better and/or worse. It's a rookie mistake to ever read too heavily into specific aspects of those messages.

i agree with this, might not have posted i saw your post first (i grabbed a snack in between hitting reply and posting).

anyway, the only thing i will add is that im not convinced there isnt SOME value in understanding how hv/cv responses work. scholarship messages are the be-all and end-all, but i reject the theory that there is absolutely nothing to be gained by understanding the cv/hv visits. i think i have a good enough feeling for them to say its not total random bullshit, but i never made any sort of focused effort, even for 1 recruiting season, to understand it myself. recruiting was really not my focus when i was trying to break down the sim engine, it was the sim engine itself - how it takes the players and the settings and produces a result. everything else is kind of noise, not to suggest its not important, but i was always much less inclined to study it (although obviously, like many others, i did put time and effort into understanding the really valuable stuff, value of prestige, what it takes to keep players from going pro (there used to be a personality trait and you could find it out, cheap), etc)

Posted by metsmax on 11/11/2012 4:24:00 PM (view original):
I am not at all sure that the variations within a cycle in the non schollie responses have meaning.  If there is a pattern, I dont know what it is - and I would watch out lest one see a correlation one or two or three times and think that means that there is a pattern

or maybe there is

im not sure either, i was more thinking there could be a value in reading them across cycles... and honestly im probably talking more on the investigative/discovery side, than for use in actual recruiting situations.

The argument for their being some kind of meaning is that the scouting trip messages have a meaning. I could see if in a battle you send 3 HV's and your opponent sends one CV, that you'll get lukewarm messages on 2 responses and a good third response. This is if we consider HV's and CV's to carry a relatively consistent value, then all things being equal, you'd have "out-valued" the other coach during this particular cycle. I honestly don't know if this is true, but I feel that apart from very few exceptions, such as a C with a 1 per who hits 9 of 10 3 pt attempts in a season (never happened to me), there is very little that is truly random in the engine.

This thought doesn't take into account prestige. I have just recently gotten my teams prestiges out of the C's so I'm not totally familiar how that would play into any equation. Does anyone else notice how the competing schools will switch from first to second position when looking at their recruiting profiles? I had been assuming that that was also a relative gauge of who the recruit was more interested in.

Posted by artie40 on 11/12/2012 12:10:00 PM (view original):
This thought doesn't take into account prestige. I have just recently gotten my teams prestiges out of the C's so I'm not totally familiar how that would play into any equation. Does anyone else notice how the competing schools will switch from first to second position when looking at their recruiting profiles? I had been assuming that that was also a relative gauge of who the recruit was more interested in.

No. Random. Just like the various responses within a cycle for visits and scouting trips.