Can you get a recruit to consider you only using letters and a scholarship?

I know the letters stop having value at some point but is it less than 100?

Yes, the letter and a scholarship can get a kid to consider you (I've never seen it happen other than very late in the signing period though). For $5 the 'ship, a phone call and a 10 or 15 minute promise would get a lot more bang for the buck though.

And my age-impaired alcohol soaked brain vaguely remembers the number 50 for letters being posted once, but I certainly wouldn't swear to it or wager any money on it..

it varies by player, or at least it used to. the cutoff used to vary between 60 and 100 per player. it was unlimited for internationals, i dont think the change to internationals (which was totally incidental, it was when the "me love you long time" stuff was removed) impacted the limits for all other players, but i never checked to be sure. so i think you can safely do 60 without worrying. note that a player WILL NOT complain about overages in letters in the cycle that you go over! that is to say, if you send a thousand letters, same cycle, all the responses are normal. so you cannot simply check the response to know if they went through. you will only see the change the following cycle.

letters and calls have the exact same value, so you can at least do 60 of each, which is worth 1500 bucks, enough to get anyone to consider you outside of d1 (dropdowns excluded). assuming you have the scholarship in there, of course.

What exactly is the role of letters? Since their cost remains the same regardless of distance, are they an effective option for long-distance recruits? Any idea how many letters equal one HV? This recruiting method is something new to me

they are the most effective option at long distance, when CVs jump to 2000, or for internationals, when HVs are 1500 and CVs are unavailable. not counting scholarships and promises, that is. under 1400 miles, CVs are the best option, until you get close, and then its HVs (how close exactly, its hard to say). and of course, with calls/letters capped, they are only the best long-distance option for a little while. particularly, they should be used by d2/d3 schools at distance. theoretically they should be used over evals in pulling players down over 360 miles as well, but WIS artificially reduces the effort you get for pulldowns, and im not convinced calls/letters are reduced in the same manner as evals. ive never thoroughly tested but i have had some strange data points that didn't fit the bill if the reduction was the same - however, we know it takes more effort when others are going after the same guy, so i don't have definitive evidence either way. conceptually, i would say use the calls/letters, but in practice i don't know that's right.

in practice, calls/letters are just not very useful in d1 anymore. it was quite the racket when you could use letters only for internationals, unlimited, and just about nobody else knew it. i was pretty bummed when that went away. it gave you TWICE the effort as your opponents, for the same amount of money (roughly, not taking into account prestige). i once poached A+ UNC who had like 30k more than me as B+ south carolina, for an international, after they took a local off of me. it was pretty glorious.

If you really know that you want a specific recruit, what is the earliest that you could or would offer him a scholarship.   In the first cycle?   Do owners commonly do this? 

I offer a scholarship  as soon as I decide I want the guy.  It's sometimes on the first cycle.

Posted by Trentonjoe on 10/22/2013 2:31:00 PM (view original):
I offer a scholarship  as soon as I decide I want the guy.  It's sometimes on the first cycle.

Ok, thanks.   And it can be offered immediately, even before the "signing period" officially starts?

Posted by npb7768 on 10/22/2013 2:24:00 PM (view original):
If you really know that you want a specific recruit, what is the earliest that you could or would offer him a scholarship.   In the first cycle?   Do owners commonly do this? 

most people offer most targets in the first cycle. its big bang for your buck and except in rare cases, if you are going to spend a decent amount on a guy (not just like 1 eval to see how he is, but sometimes even then you should), you should just about always offer a scholarship ASAP.

Posted by gillispie1 on 10/22/2013 5:21:00 PM (view original):

Posted by npb7768 on 10/22/2013 2:24:00 PM (view original):
If you really know that you want a specific recruit, what is the earliest that you could or would offer him a scholarship.   In the first cycle?   Do owners commonly do this? 

most people offer most targets in the first cycle. its big bang for your buck and except in rare cases, if you are going to spend a decent amount on a guy (not just like 1 eval to see how he is, but sometimes even then you should), you should just about always offer a scholarship ASAP.

Great, thanks for the help.

Posted by gillispie1 on 10/22/2013 2:14:00 PM (view original):
they are the most effective option at long distance, when CVs jump to 2000, or for internationals, when HVs are 1500 and CVs are unavailable. not counting scholarships and promises, that is. under 1400 miles, CVs are the best option, until you get close, and then its HVs (how close exactly, its hard to say). and of course, with calls/letters capped, they are only the best long-distance option for a little while. particularly, they should be used by d2/d3 schools at distance. theoretically they should be used over evals in pulling players down over 360 miles as well, but WIS artificially reduces the effort you get for pulldowns, and im not convinced calls/letters are reduced in the same manner as evals. ive never thoroughly tested but i have had some strange data points that didn't fit the bill if the reduction was the same - however, we know it takes more effort when others are going after the same guy, so i don't have definitive evidence either way. conceptually, i would say use the calls/letters, but in practice i don't know that's right.

in practice, calls/letters are just not very useful in d1 anymore. it was quite the racket when you could use letters only for internationals, unlimited, and just about nobody else knew it. i was pretty bummed when that went away. it gave you TWICE the effort as your opponents, for the same amount of money (roughly, not taking into account prestige). i once poached A+ UNC who had like 30k more than me as B+ south carolina, for an international, after they took a local off of me. it was pretty glorious.

So am I correct in saying that if letters become the most cost efficient option when CV's become $2000, and given that approximately two HV's are equal to one CV (I personally used 2.3), then:
-1 CV = 133 letters
-1 HV = 58 letters

After a quick search, it seems like they would become the best recruiting option at 1400 miles, the point where the cost of a CV first exceeds $2000.

no, you took it a bit too far. CVs are what like $1400, 1450 or something at 1390 miles? so whatever that conversion is, CVs win, whatever the $2000 conversion is, letters win. its somewhere in there.

i also think the difference between CVs and HVs may have changed since i started. seems to me they used to get rejected sometimes and you'd get no credit, and i dont think they still do. but im not sure. if/when that went away, the rate might have changed. but i could be wrong, im not very confident either way.

Posted by gillispie1 on 10/23/2013 5:39:00 AM (view original):
no, you took it a bit too far. CVs are what like $1400, 1450 or something at 1390 miles? so whatever that conversion is, CVs win, whatever the $2000 conversion is, letters win. its somewhere in there.

i also think the difference between CVs and HVs may have changed since i started. seems to me they used to get rejected sometimes and you'd get no credit, and i dont think they still do. but im not sure. if/when that went away, the rate might have changed. but i could be wrong, im not very confident either way.

OK, I got you.  Thanks

For ages, I could not understand how I lost some recruiting battles for internationals.  I spent a ton.  I had equal or better prestige.  I had no idea that letters were unlimited.  What a carbon footprint!

Posted by mamxet on 10/23/2013 4:42:00 PM (view original):
For ages, I could not understand how I lost some recruiting battles for internationals.  I spent a ton.  I had equal or better prestige.  I had no idea that letters were unlimited.  What a carbon footprint!

i did a poll after seble changed it, well, after i picked up san fran in tark like 5 months later to verify for sure if he changed it, after losing an international over it on south carolina... i think of the 30+ respondents, only 1 other used letters and it was like, an accident or something. i cant remember the details, he might have said he didnt even recruit internationals or didnt play d1 and had no idea letters were even capped for people in general. i forget what it was but i basically concluded it was more like a 0 of 30 than 1 of 30. so i dont think most coaches were aware. i always thought emy knew the trick but for some reason i feel like i asked him and he didnt even know it, and hes about the biggest international recruiter i know of, on top of being arguably the best d1 recruiter left in the game, now that LM is gone. so i really dont think that many guys were aware of it.