So the season is over, and either you won a bowl game or not. Regardless, recruiting is not over. Now we enter the off-season with just a handful of weeks left to pick up guys that have yet to commit. Your board should still be pretty much full from the season of recruiting. Anyone that has yet to commit will now have a few more options to get them into the fold.
Please note that you exit to the “Recruiting Central” screen to advance in the weeks with the start button.
Transfers ———
This is the first thing and I only got a transfer when I was a 1 star school, so I don’t know how this works but the guys just need checkmarks by their name and you can advance and you get them. It takes one scholarship, but for position guys like a HB or QB, always grab them if they are of high caliber no matter what, usually.
In-Home Visits ————–
Under Visit most will have “Ready” just like for when the players flew in during the season. This visit is much more personal as you will be flying to visit the player.
If they are ready, call them directly and schedule a visit, usually on the current week. Just like the other visit, also place three pitches you’ll try to sell while visiting. Luckily, there is a list of the values and how they match up when selecting them, so no need to try and remember what they like most.
Remember to always schedule the players you are battling for first. Usually it’s after a visit that players with you high in interest will commit. Sometimes to get guys that are soft committed to you, just visit them.
Promises ——–
These add a whole new dimension to the game and your dynasty. For one, it’s easy to make them and get the prospect to sign, but it may be a bit harder to keep up with each promise as time goes on.
I would say only use promises over recruits you are battling to get. There is no sense making a lofty promise to a guy if you’re the only one who’s after him.
To help this you have a Promises window in your recruiting tab.
It’s best to just make a few promises, but you can make more. You unlock more as time goes on and your prestige grows. For every promise, make sure it’s something within reason. It’s stupid to promise early playing time to a freshman at a flooded position. And saying “no redshirt” now is easy, but it could cost you when you need to redshirt guys. Again, you’ll just need to pop into the promises screen to see your performance on these.
If you didn’t realize, now is “go grab 2 or 1 star guys” to fill any needs you failed to address in the normal recruiting time. You have five weeks to get whatever is left of the bottom-dwellers.
Also, you may start getting mass commitments from recruits, and then you’ll start seeing your available scholarships go down. You can only grab 25 prospects, and some may not make the team, so just keep that in mind.
One of the oddest things is when you have guys that have never had interest in your program. By now you should have dropped the ones that had no interest in you, ever, and had multiple offers. But there may be one or two guys that have only gotten one offer, you, and they have yet to warm up. You could go after them with direct calls, but only if they are good players. They tend to be hard to talk to, so maybe wait until week 5 to call them up.
Another oddity is when you go to find prospects and then you see a couple of 4 star guys that are not committed. By week 4 you can add them to the list and offer a scholarship, and who knows. By now you really don’t need all your time anyway. Of course the less offers for these guys the better. Soft commits can get tossed as soon as you see the word. This is the only time I would recommend seeing the Russell Top 100.
Remember, recruits with 1 offer, you, and have “1st” in their interest column do not need to be suited anymore. Again, feel free to grab other prospects for other positions if you have the space.
One last thing, for week 5 feel free spending lots of time for quick calls before visits as this is the last week of recruiting. Keep in mind that if they do not commit, and even if they have had 1st interest in you from the start, they are not on your team. Sorry, it makes little sense.
Position Changes —————-
This is one of the funnest things to do, and also one of the worst if you mess it up. This is mainly for your athletes, but you could take guys from similar positions and move them over to another.
You simply select a guy, move him through the positions and see how his Overall rating compares to the proposed positions. If there is an increase, stick him there; if there is a slight decrease but it needs to be done, do that too.
If you are short at a position and need to slide some third-stringers over, here is a handy list if you are not familiar with football even now:
Offensive Linemen – LT, LG, C, RG, RT Defensive Linemen – LE, RE, DT Speedy, weak guys – WR, CB Smaller, strong guys – FS, SS Medium, strong guys – LOLB, MLB, ROLB Medium catchers/blockers – TE, FB, HB Cannot switch (usually) – QB, K, P
Again, these are just good spotters if you are overflooded at one position. Middle linebacker to either outside spot seems to improve a guy, and it could be possible to mix and match all linemen, but I highly doubt it.
Sometimes you have guys with similar body types that could switch to a whole new position, like a power running back to a defensive end. But these kinds of changes are probably not wise at all.
Your best bet is to change a right outside linebacker to the left, or however it turns out so that your overall LB squad is as good as possible.
Training ——–
You just see the results of automated stat boosting. Don’t freak out if you think you are short players at a position, this will only show you the guys that improved. They will have moderate or minimum improvement, and there is only one player that gets the “Most Improved” tag, and if it’s the kicker that may not be a bad thing. You should never see the player on the top of the list be passed up, FYI.
Cut Players ———–
You can only have 70 kids on your team, and if you are already below that, then congrats, you are done. If not, then you will have to cut out the bad players from flooded positions. No need to cut players you don’t need to. Just in case you are wondering, if you have 69/70, you are good.
Pre-Season ———-
And then it all comes full circle. Feel free to start at the top of this FAQ if you need help with this and onward.
