Video & Communication More Important Than Ever

By Scott Lowe - DMVProspects.com
 
These are strange days, indeed.
 
No one needs to tell you that right now. All you have to do is wake up and “commute” 50 feet to your new “office” or head downstairs to the new “classroom” that you share with your new “classmates,” who likely are your brother or sister, to realize this is a strange, new world.
 
When life sends a John Tortorella collapsing defense that has every possible shooting lane blocked your way, you can do one of two things: blast shots into shin guards or adapt and look for another option or take another approach.
 
Right now, most of the hockey world is taking a different approach.
 
We are smack in the middle of what would normally be tryout season. For AA and AAA players that often means a three- or four-day whirlwind of skates and evaluations, contract offers and pressure to make quick decisions. In addition, there is the challenge of wanting to try out for multiple teams that may have conflicting tryout dates to maximize your chances of playing at the level you prefer.
 
For junior players we are moving into what normally would be the beginning of NCDC and NAHL predraft camp season, while most Tier 3 teams would be holding tryouts over the next several weekends.
 
None of that is happening now, and we have no idea if or when any of this might take place.  
 
Teams are still hoping to get camps and tryouts in so that they can evaluate at least some players in person. Most NCDC teams seem to have given up hope on predraft camps and are moving on to filling their summer main camps.
 
NAHL predraft camps take place a little later, usually throughout the month of May, and are likely to be the next COVID-19 casualties. NAHL and USHL combines have been shut down, or at least postponed, and the annual Predraft Showcase in the Boston area has been moved from May to June 12-14, dates which at this point appear to be iffy at best.
 
In daily conversations with AAA coaches and junior coaches at all levels, here are some of the things we’ve heard:
 
EHL coach: “I’m moving forward as usual, just relying a bit more on video and making a lot of phone calls to players, advisors, scouts and other people I trust. I’m hoping that maybe we get on the ice in June and I’m looking for 4-5 players at the most.”
 
NCDC coach: “We are relying on people we trust, who know our program and know what we are looking for. We are watching as much video as we can and having a lot of conversations.”

NAHL coach: “In some ways we are in the same position we usually are at this time of year. We watch so many games during the season live and on video and have a pretty good idea who we are targeting to be on our team. For others I watch all the video I can and am on the phone every day with players, coaches, scouts, advisors – people we trust.”
 
NAHL Coach: “Lots of video and conversations.”
 
NCDC coach: “Right now we are just watching a lot of video and speaking with coaches, advisors and kids. We have postponed our predraft camp in May. Hopefully we can have a camp in June and then our main camp in July.”
 
EHL coach: “We are talking to players and making offers just like we normally would. We’ve been watching video and scouting players in person all year and knew who we wanted to go after. People we trust in other areas of the country are sending us players. There is a lot more going back and forth with calls and texts this year, probably because of the uncertainty everyone is feeling.”
 
AAA coach: “We have to get as much video on every kid as we can since we aren’t sure if we will get to see them in person before we need to have our roster filled.”
 
You get the point.
 
The main takeaway is that it is imperative for players to have video of themselves available to send to coaches. And the second takeaway is that communication is extremely important.
 
What’s ironic is that the need for video and good communication really is no different than any other year.
 
While February, March and April tend to be the “Christmas rush” for high-level players looking to move to different teams the following season, the process really should have started back in the fall – when there are so many scouted showcases going on – and continued throughout the hockey season.
 
Players who build that relationship along the way, let coaches and scouts know when they are playing in their area and provide regular updates – including video – throughout the season, are the ones who find their way on to team “lists” and end up getting drafted or receiving offers or tenders early in the spring.
 
At the very least, many of those players have shown enough interest and promise to warrant a true personal invitation from a coach to a tryout, predraft camp or main camp instead of the mass email hundreds of other players will receive. They have earned the opportunity to get a legitimate look and real consideration from the coaching staff.
 
In some cases, if the player isn’t good enough for a particular team, by building that relationship the coach might help him find a good home somewhere else in that league or help him get an opportunity with a good program that he has a relationship with at a lower level where he can keep an eye on the player’s progress.
 
The players who wait until the spring rush to start contacting coaches are always going to be scrambling. While they may get offers from some teams that are desperate to fill their roster or rosters right away – an immediate red flag if you’ve never spoken to a team or they’ve never seen you play – they are going to have to really stand out and probably be a dominant player in almost any tryout situation to get an offer or be invited back for a main camp or training camp.
 
If you are jumping into the recruiting process this late, you are approaching coaches at a very busy time during which they are making offers to players they really like and trying to convince other players they really want to come in for a camp or to want to play for their program.
 
As a late add-in, even if a team likes you as a player, it may have filled 75 percent of its open spots by now, meaning once again that when you skate at a tryout or camp you better be in the top few out of 100 or more players if you want to play for that team.
 
Also, if this was a normal year and you didn’t have any video ready to send to a team at this point it would hurt your chances. Coaches will say “I can watch you on Hockey TV,” and they might, but remember you are one of many players to whom the team is speaking.
 
It takes time to track down games on Hockey TV, watch them and analyze your play. What if they pick a game that you didn’t play well or didn’t play as much as usual? Given their time constraints, they may watch two or three shifts and write you off.
 
This year, when there may be few or no opportunities to skate for a coach, video is even more important than ever.
 
And while coaches don’t want to see “highlight reels” – they want to see how you play throughout a game and in all types of situations – by putting together the video yourself you can make sure that what you send them puts you in the best possible light while satisfying their need to see you do more than just score pretty goals.
 
I often get asked, “How did your son get drafted by both Tier 2 leagues?”
 
Usually, I start out by saying that he is a very good player who loves the game and worked as hard or harder than anyone he played with. He was the best player on his team – or at least the most productive player on his team – from the time he was 13 until he finished up at 18U and led his AAA league in scoring as a second-year 18U. He was a four-time team captain who also captained his high school sports teams – a leader who was coachable and never complained.
 
So, he had put together a nice a resume and a lot of people in his corner supporting him. When coaches talked to him as a 15-, 16- and 17-year-old and he wasn’t ready to leave home to play with them, he would stay in touch throughout the year and play with those teams in the spring and summer in exposure events.
 
And between the two of us, we put in countless hours over the years doing research so he could always make the best possible decision about where to play, communicating and providing updates to coaches and scouts, seeking advice and putting together video.
 
This process continued with college coaches while he played two years in the NCDC. Each weekend after watching him play I would get home and spend three or four hours pulling video of his shifts from the weekend off of Hockey TV and getting them to him so that he could stay in constant contact with college coaches.
 
So to summarize:
  • He was very good and all-in in terms of his on and off-ice commitment.
  • We built relationships that he maintained and helped him considerably in terms of providing opportunities and advice and serving as references.
  • We spent hours researching all the Tier 2 organizations, their reputations, how many players they used annually and the number of openings they might have – and only reached out to teams where we felt there was a legitimate opportunity.
  • He handled the communication with coaches and scouts unless they asked to speak to a parent.
  • Hundreds of hours were spent compiling the video that coaches wanted to see.
 
By no means am I an expert video editor, and at some point I will get some better editing software to make my videos a little fancier. But fancy isn’t what coaches want. They want nuts and bolts clips of full games, full shifts and players in all situations.
 
With that in mind, here is what we created for Devin and what I have since created for many other players. This takes a good deal of time, and I realize many people don’t have time to do this. We are happy to help, so if you are interested please email us at DMVProspects@gmail.com.
 
YouTube Video Channel
Here is how we approached video in a nutshell. I have heard from many coaches that they love how we did this because they can see a player in any situation they want in just a couple of clips.
 
  • Find the video of the game you want to use – from a video camera, Hockey TV, Livebarn, etc. You likely will need to save the raw video to a removable drive of some sort or upload it to Dropbox or a Google Drive.
  • Watch the game and pull out the player’s shifts from that game by doing a QuickTime or similar screen recording of each shift (We will post instructions soon on how to do this for those who need them). Email us if you need instructions sooner!
  • Create a YouTube account and upload each individual clip providing a title as well as a more in-depth description of the clip in the spaces provided.
  • When you upload the clip, you will have the option to create playlists and add the clips to different playlists; create a playlist for that game (something like Devin Lowe shifts vs. Northern Cyclones). Once you create the playlist, you can just check the box for that list and the clip is added.
  • If that clip is something that illustrates a situation or several situations, you can also add new playlists for those types of situations: penalty kill, power play, blocked shots, backchecks and defensive plays, faceoffs won, goals and assists might be other playlists you can create.
  • Once new playlists are created you can just click on those boxes, too, so now that clip is added to the shifts for that game playlist as well as any other playlists that you have checked off. It all can be done at the same time.
  • A link is created for each playlist, so that all you have to do is send a coach the various links and he can click on whatever he wants to see. If he clicks on the playlist that has all the game shifts, those shifts will play one after another. If he wants to see all penalty kill shifts, he clicks on that list, and those clips play one after the other. It’s one-stop shopping for the coach.
 
Once you upload shifts for three or four games and add the clips to multiple playlists, you will start to build a nice library of clips that a coach can access easily.
 
Here is a small sampling of what we did for Devin:
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
That is just a sampling. There are many more lists for all shifts in games as well as situational lists. Some clips appear on several lists. Just send the links to a coach and he can pick and choose exactly what he wants to see without having to watch an entire highlight reel that may only include a few clips of interest.
 
If you need help with your videos and are interested in having us put together a YouTube channel for you, please email us at DMVProspects@gmail.com. It does take a lot of time and patience, but isn’t hard to do.
 
A Few Thoughts About Communication
This article has stressed the importance of having video clips illustrating all aspects of your game available to coaches as well as communication and relationship building. Communication is extremely important as you progress up the hockey developmental ladder – and as you move into adulthood.
 
Hockey is a great way to prepare yourself for college and beyond in terms of growing up, taking responsibility and being accountable. Having your parents handle communication with adults – whether we are talking about coaches, scouts, teachers or school administrators – will be detrimental as you move into junior hockey or college or wherever life leads you beyond high school.
 
And frankly, coaches do not want to hear from parents.
 
There are certain discussions that parents should be involved with as players prepare to move to the junior level. If we are talking about the Tier 3 or “pay-to-play” level, it will be a large financial investment, and parents have every right to be involved with discussions involving the financial end of things, contract terms and housing.
 
But once the contract is signed and discussions become hockey-related, most coaches will only deal with players. Lately there have even been clauses in contracts stating that coaches will only discuss playing time and lineup issues with players. So it is imperative as young players are moving toward young adulthood that they are setting themselves up to handle these types of future situations by communicating with coaches, teachers and other adults on a regular basis.
 
Learning how to express yourself diplomatically, make a case for something, advocate for yourself or explain what you were thinking or doing are important communication skills to develop. Players should be handling communication with their coaches starting with their 15U year at the latest.
 
For example, this is one that often comes up in hockey.  A coach from a team that a player doesn’t want to play for reaches out with a contract offer, and the player wants to play at a higher level or for a better team. Too many times a player will say, “Thanks for the offer coach, but I’m hoping to play at a higher level this year.”
 
The player has no idea, but that can be extremely offensive to a coach. A better response might be, “Thank you so much for the offer coach. I’m flattered that you would think of me, but right now I have a few other options that think would be a better fit for me. If anything changes I will definitely let you know. Good luck with your season!”
 
See the difference?
 
Hockey is a small world. If a player is perceived to be disrespectful, not only will word spread, but that coach might just end up coaching a team the player wants to play for some day. It’s important to build relationships and not burn bridges in the hockey universe.
 
Many players will text me asking how they should respond in those situations, which is great and much better than possibly offending the coach. Likewise, parents can and should be involved in helping players learn about communicating politely and effectively with adults.
 
Getting involved and offering suggestions and advice is great. Doing the communicating for the player is not. It will hurt in the long run.
 
The danger in parents not getting involved at all – believe me, I lived it with my own kids and still do with the players I work with now – is that your child is still a child and may not understand the importance of being responsive. No reply is as bad – or worse – than a poorly formulated reply.
 
To most coaches, a lack of responsiveness is a sign of disinterest. They want players who want to play for them, and there are plenty of fish in the sea. If one kid isn’t interested a coach isn’t spending a ton of time on that player. It’s on to the next one.
 
Pretty much every week this time of year I will get a text or call from a coach in which he says, “I haven’t heard from so and so.” As someone who is trying to help a player realize his hockey goals and dreams, nothing disappoints me more than this. If I’m going to bat for a player with my network of coaches – a network which I have been carefully building over the past six years – the least that he can do is respond to a coach when he receives a call, text or email.
 
EMAIL!
 
Please check and respond to emails. I realize that email is an outdated form of communication for most kids, but colleges still rely very much on email communication with their students. Get used to using email now and it will benefit you in the future.  
 
A lack of responsiveness is the single most frustrating thing that I deal with. Not only does it make the player look bad, but it hurts my reputation as well. That could lead to a missed opportunity for a player and a lost connection for me.
 
It even happens to me frequently in my direct contact with players. I send them some good news or give them a task I need them to complete or a coach to reach out to and they simply don’t reply and don’t do it.
 
This comes down to what I always talk to young players about. Are you really committed to this process? Is this really your top priority?
 
You can say that it is, but your actions demonstrate whether that is true. Lack of responsiveness shows indifference and makes me less likely to continue recommending a player to people I trust and respect until that player demonstrates that this process truly is a priority.
 
Kids are busy. I get it.
 
They have school commitments, sports commitments, family commitments, jobs, social lives, etc. I’m busy, too. In this day and age of cell phones and other technological advances they also are juggling multiple social media accounts as well as communication with friends, family, coaches, teachers and who knows who else. There is no doubt that sometimes a player will get a message and be in the middle of something and mean to reply later, but 25 more messages come in and he forgets.
 
All understood. But what is the priority?
 
Are you really committed to this process and doing everything in your power to reach your hockey goals or are you “committed?” Are you willing to do whatever it takes or do you want people to think you are?
 
These can be difficult questions, but they need to be asked and truthfully answered before a player’s parents and family undertake the tremendous financial and time commitment – and make the incredible daily sacrifices – necessary to help him achieve his goals.
 
Actions often speak louder to words. For me – and for many coaches – a player who isn’t responsive is indicating that hockey is not a top priority. That may or may not true, but that’s the message that is being sent when there is no response within a reasonable amount of time.
 
It’s really very simple: Respond immediately.
 
While an immediate response may not be required – a player should never let a full day go by without replying – responding immediately shows interest and also is a sign of maturity – even if you are busy and can’t take the time to formulate a full response, have a phone conversation or you need to talk to your parents before responding.
 
This is a mature, perfectly acceptable response that checks all the boxes for the coach: “Hey coach. Thanks for your message! I’m busy with school right now (or practice or a family dinner or whatever), but will get back to you as soon as I have a chance. Talk to you soon!”
 
Done.
 
The coach thinks the player cares and likely is impressed by his maturity.
 
It’s really not that hard. If this is what you truly want to do, good communication can go a long way toward helping you achieve your goals and set you up for future success on and off the ice.