Sports imPULSE

Technology Changing The Face Of Recruiting

In Facebook lingo, football coaches would like to add a number of hot-shot players as friends. And if they wanted to, these high school athletes could update their Facebook status on any given night to "listening to recruiting pitches."

Forget the future of recruiting. This is its present – for now at least.

Football and basketball coaches spent the offseason increasing their presence in cyberspace at a furious pace. By the end of May, dozens of head coaches and assistants in a number of sports had established Twitter pages. A few more had beefed-up their presence on Facebook. And that was before many of them knew the NCAA considered email-based correspondence on social networking sites to fall under the same rules as email, meaning they basically can be unlimited in nature.

Under NCAA rules, coaches in Division I and II can communicate with prospects via one-on-one messaging from social networking sites even if a recruit wants to receive the coach's message as a text. Phone-to-phone text messages and instant messaging, even through a social networking site, remain off-limits. In 2007, Division III prohibited social networking in recruiting along with text messages.

The exception for direct messaging via social networking sites is a change of pace for coaches, who have seen their ability to contact and evaluate prospects curtailed in recent years. The NCAA banned coach-to-recruit text messaging in 2007.

However, coaches are right to question how long Facebook and Twitter will be permissible as a recruiting tool.  What is legal today might not be legal a year from now, as coaches learned when text messaging was banned.

Sports Fans On Facebook May Violate NCAA Recruiting Rules

from the you gotta be kidding department

We've seen way too many situations where technology advancements has shown how ridiculous certain rules and regulations are. The latest involves the NCAA flipping out about students at certain colleges setting up Facebook groups pleading with high-profile high school athletes bto attend their respective universities. According to the NCAA such "recruiting" violates its rules that forbid trying to influence student athletes over which college to attend. Because of this, the NCAA has pushed the universities to reign in students, to the point that NC State sent one of its students a cease-and-desist, threatening "further action" if he didn't take down a Facebook group trying to attract a student athlete. The folks who sent the cease-and-desist admit that it's ridiculous, but they had to do so due to the NCAA pressure. They're hoping that the NCAA will back down on this:

"I think nationally the NCAA needs to address further Facebook and how these groups play a part in recruiting. Is it realistic for us to be able to monitor them? What harm is a group like this causing? But as the legislation stands right now, this is the position we have to take."

Of course, this is the same NCAA that has tried to limit reporters from live-blogging sporting events (though, it's done little to enforce those rules), so it would come as no surprise if it chose to continue down this path.

Seattle Sounders FC Connecting Fans In New Ways

By now many of us are well versed in social networking tools, with accounts on My Space, Facebook, LinkedIn, reading blogs (such as this) and using new apps on our iPhones.  Well, Seattle's Major League Soccer team, Seattle Sounders FC, is taking social networkng a step further by launching a new breed of fan clubs with actual powers over key team decisions, plus an interactive website that allows like-minded fans to get seats together at the stadium.

Perhaps most unusual is the new fan membership group that will be armed with the power to vote out the Sounders general manager if the team has a horrible run.  Every four years, the group will be able to vote on whether or not to retain the general manager. Membership comes with buying a season ticket or paying a $125 annual fee.  In the meantime, the group will name the team’s new marching band.   I can imagine there are a number of US football fans who would love to have that type of influence.

The first phase for the inaugural season's ticket sales will introduce social networking aspects to help fans identify sections of the stadium to find certain types of fans.  For example, do they want to sit next to the fans who plan to cheer and stand up during much of the game? Or sit with fans who are members of a certain local soccer league?

Having Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen as part owner of the new soccer venture will certainly continue to push the team with new technologies.

How soon will it be before other teams embrace social networking, give some power to the fans and in turn create a tighter bond with their fan base?