Most serious high school baseball players, including myself, have the desire to play baseball in college. After playing numerous years of travel baseball and entering into my third year of high school baseball I think that it is easier to be seen and recruited through travel baseball.

It’s never guaranteed that a scout will show up to a high school baseball game, but in travel baseball there are scouted tournaments and camps.

As a team, you can sign up to play in tournaments that are scouted, and typically you will know how many scouts will be there and what school they are scouting for.

As a player, you can sign up to participate in scouted camps where you can make personal connections with college coaches and have the chance to show off your skills to them.

Though I believe that it is much easier to be recruited through travel baseball, scouts do come to high school games. Typically scouts come to high school games to watch a specific player that they met or contacted through travel ball or a recruitment website.

It is tough getting recruited, but recruitment websites help an athlete in very many ways. Thousands of scouts and coaches are a part of these websites and they can look at your stats, highlight clips and more. These websites are very beneficial to the high school athlete because the athlete knows when a coach views their profile and the athlete has the ability to email a coach to see how interested that coach is in them.

Though high school baseball is a great opportunity to play with your friends and to play for your school, the high school experience lacks college exposure. Don’t get me wrong, playing high school baseball is the most fun you’ll have as a high school athlete, but if you’re trying to play at the next level, travel baseball is the way to go.

Not only is it beneficial for an athlete to get exposure, it is important for an athlete to keep their composure. Once an athlete makes that a habit he or she should have no worries when there are scouts in the stands whether it’s a high school game, a travel ball game, or a camp.

In my last two years of high school and travel baseball I’ve been told to always play my hardest, and that’s the ultimate truth, whether high school or competitive and no matter who’s watching.