How to email a college football coach

The subject line

What a coach needs to triage, in order: your name, position, class, and whether there's film. Not "Recruiting". Not "HELLO COACH". A subject line that works:

2027 WR, 6'2", 4.61 forty, film attached

Note there's no school name in it. The school goes in the first line, not the subject — the subject is for the numbers he's scanning for.

The first three lines

1. Line 1 — who you are and why this program. One sentence naming the school and a real reason: a coach on the staff you've met, a camp you attended, a graduate you know. If there is no real reason, say why you're writing cold — honesty reads better than a manufactured connection.
2. Line 2 — your numbers. Height, weight, forty, GPA, and the honors line: two-year varsity starter, All-Conference as a junior. The same measurables the subject carried, once, in prose.
3. Line 3 — the film. The Hudl link and one sentence: which game, which half, why that clip. A coach opens film before he finishes your second paragraph. Put the link where his thumb already is.

What gets deleted

• A parent's name on the send. Coaches recruit the player, and every camp director says the same thing: the email should come from the kid, from his own address.
• A mass-send with no school name in the body. It reads as a blast because it is one.
• Any attachment. Links get opened on a phone; PDFs and videos get filtered and deleted. Send links only.
• "Potential" and "exposure". Both are recruiting-service words, and coaches read them as the services' vocabulary, not the player's. The numbers speak.

The follow-up

No reply after two weeks is normal, not rejection — coaches can't reply to every recruit email. The follow-up that works is short and gives new information: new film, new measurable, a camp date you'll be at. Two weeks out, one follow-up, then move to the next program on the list.