I Haven't come across a good forum about informing div II players of your plans to redshirt them. At what point in the recruiting cycle do you inform? What makes you risk it? I've had a couple of bad results when I told recruits in advance -- i.e., they won't let me contact them anymore. Should I continue to be gun-shy about letting recruits know before they've signed?

depending on prestige and the other random factors besides effort (but also depending on effort) if you aren't tight enough with the kid it can create that problem. IMO you need to be tight with him first. The negative from the inform happens immediately, so don't schedule a couple HVs to soften him up and then "schedule" an inform for the same cycle or anything like I did once - the inform negative happened long before the cycle the HVs went out of course. He refused the HVs (refund at least) and was a pita. 

If you have the cash and feel reasonably safe, its worth it IMO to drop a few HVs to get the kid tight then do the inform...

If no one is battling you for a kid and its two or more cycles before signings start, send the kid a few more HVs or CVs to make sure he's more solidly yours. Next cycle, send the inform of redshirt. If he stops considering you then just give him more HVs or CVs.

Obviously if you don't have the cash for this kind of thing then just don't inform him - keep in mind many kids will accept a redshirt even if you don't inform (they ALL accept it if you do inform and they sign).

I've never sent the "inform of redshirt" thing during recruiting, and I 'shirt 1 guy a year, no problem...showing the hand again, so take notes ;)

if the player comes in as one of if not the least talented player on the team, you should be able to redshirt him without a guarantee. if you have the cash, tho, do it in advance, provided the recruit isn't a ranked pulldown.

Posted by colonels19 on 9/3/2013 1:42:00 PM (view original):
I've never sent the "inform of redshirt" thing during recruiting, and I 'shirt 1 guy a year, no problem...showing the hand again, so take notes ;)

let me write this down:

note - colonels19 saves $10 per recruiting season by never pre-informing of a redshirt. got it. Ok, I'll put that to good use!


ETA (for the sake of newer users who might not be completely familiar with colonels - I know that he already knows this) - Just busting balls