NCAA Mens Baseball Rules for Recruiting

The National Collegiate Athletic Association closely regulates the recruiting of athletes to protect young high school student-athletes and to maintain fairness among its member schools. NCAA rules limit recruiting visits and other contact between coaches and high school players. They also put additional limitations on the scholarships that can be awarded. As of 2010, 900 colleges participated in NCAA baseball, split among three divisions. The recruiting rules vary slightly in Division I, Division II and Division III.

  1. Freshman/Sophomore Contact

    • College baseball coaches are prohibited from calling or sending recruiting information to players prior to Sept. 1 of the player's junior year in high school. A school can invite players to participate in sports camps on campus prior to that time, but that is the extent of allowed contact initiated by the school. Players may call or visit the campus on their own if they wish. Coaches may attend camps and tournaments to see players, but they must do so without talking to any specific players.

    Official Visits

    • College baseball coaches can start making contact with players by email and by sending literature during the player's junior year, but are still not allowed to place phone calls to the players until July 1 following the players' junior season. At that point, direct contact by phone or in person is allowed, but the coach is allowed to initiate just one phone call per week. During his senior year in high school a player can make five official visits to campuses that are paid for by those schools.

    Professional Teams

    • Baseball is one of the few high school sports in which players can be actively recruited and eventually drafted right out of high school by professional teams. Players are allowed to have contact with professional scouts, but they cannot hire an agent to represent them in those discussions. The hiring of an agent makes a player ineligible for college baseball. A major league team that drafts a high school player loses that player's rights once he begins classes at the college of his choice. That player can then no longer be drafted until he has completed three NCAA years.

    Number of Scholarships

    • Baseball is an equivalency sport when it comes to Division I and II scholarships. Division III teams cannot award scholarships. Unlike headcount sports, in which each scholarship must be awarded in full to one athlete, equivalency sports allow schools to divide the allocated scholarship funds among as many players as it chooses to, granting partial scholarships instead of full-ride grants. Full-rides are very rare. As of 2010, Division I baseball teams can award the equivalent dollars that add up to 11.7 total scholarships. Most schools will recruit as many as 20 players to share those funds. Division II programs can award the equivalent of nine full grants. Division III schools do not have any athletic scholarships, but teams may recruit players and help them get academic and other awards to assist with the costs of education.