Coaches, Scouts Can’t Get Enough Video

John Barnes, Los Alamitos’ football coach, believes game film can be a great teacher.

Every poor block, blown coverage, missed tackle and bad pass shows up on the video screen, under the close scrutiny of Barnes and his coaching staff.

Film doesn’t lie, which is why Barnes and his staff invested in a $13,000 camera that produces high quality tapes.

And it’s also why he grabs an electronic chalkboard pen and draws passing routes and blocking schemes on a monitor, the same way CBS football analyst John Madden does on TV every Sunday.

“The No. 1 thing about film is that it gives the kids a chance to see themselves, and what they’re doing right and wrong,” Barnes said. “It makes them believers.”

It also makes believers of college recruiters.

A Texas recruiter visited Barnes’ office last spring to watch videotapes of the Griffins’ run-and-shoot offense. He left raving about junior quarterback Tim Carey.

“When he got done watching Tim, he turned to me and said, ‘This guy is special,’ ” Barnes said. “He told me Tim was the best junior he had seen, and he would have been one of the top five quarterbacks had he been a senior that year.”

The recruiter had never met Carey, never attended one of his games.

But his opinion, based entirely on that videotape, proved prophetic. Several of the nation’s top colleges are recruiting Carey, and Barnes is scrambling to meet demands for highlight tapes of his quarterback.

For years, game film has served a dual purpose, allowing coaches to both critique and promote their players.

And with technological advances, videotapes have replaced 16-millimeter film shown on projectors. Highlight tapes are becoming increasingly popular, especially in sports such as football, basketball and volleyball.

But some county football coaches think other prospects get lost on videotape, with recruiters using the fast-forward button to seek only the plays, and players, they want.

“The whole recruiting process has changed,” Trabuco Hills Coach Jim Barnett said. “I send out these tapes of (quarterback) Pat Barnes, and I keep expecting someone to ask me about No. 50 (Chad Peare, one of the county’s top linebackers).

“But with the tapes, they just fast-forward to the parts they want to see, and they miss a kid. (With film,) they used to have to sit through the whole thing and watch everybody.”

Houston recruiter Steve Staggs acknowledged that good players sometimes are overshadowed by great players on videotapes, but said many players still are discovered by recruiters who came to look at superstars.

“With the great players, you only need to see about five plays,” he said. “It’s the marginal players that you have to look harder for.

“I like to see at least two films of a marginal player, one against a tough opponent, one against another team. He might look great against the weak opponent and he might not show up at all against a great opponent. That’s how you tell the difference.”

Staggs visited Los Alamitos last week to watch game film of Carey. The Cougars are already stacked with quarterbacks, but they need offensive linemen, and Staggs might have found one.

Los Alamitos’ offense is somewhat similar to Houston’s, and while watching film with Barnes, he showed some interest in one of the Griffin linemen’s pass-blocking skills.

It’s not the first time this has happened at Los Alamitos.

In 1990, Nebraska recruited Los Alamitos quarterback Todd Gragnano, running back Erik Mitchell and defensive end Hartwell Brown. During a viewing of game film, the recruiter told Barnes, “I like all three of these guys, but who’s No. 33?”

It was Brian Havens, a linebacker nobody was recruiting.

“The guy watched another film of Brian and decided they wanted him,” Barnes said. “Once everyone knew Nebraska wanted him, the schools started lining up to recruit him.

“I learned from the Nebraska thing, that you have to mention all your guys when they (recruiters) come to visit.”

Havens and Gragnano eventually signed with Nebraska. They spent two seasons there before transferring, Havens to California and Gragnano to Louisville.

Santa Margarita Coach Jim Hartigan said videotapes allow coaches more angles to view players, although the 16-millimeter game film, which had no fast-forward capabilities, forced recruiters to watch every play. Most schools switched from film to tapes in the early 1980s.

“I think most recruiters will find a kid,” he said. “If he makes big play after big play, he’s going to get noticed.”

Roy Englebrecht feared big plays by his daughter, Allison, a senior on Corona del Mar’s volleyball team, would go unnoticed. She had received little attention from recruiters, despite being a starter on the nation’s top-ranked team.

So Englebrecht, a Newport Beach entrepreneur who runs a sportscasters camp, produced a 6 1/2-minute highlight tape featuring his daughter’s skills. He packaged it with a laser-printed label on the cover and sent it to 12 colleges Allison was interested in.

“Suddenly, the phone started ringing and recruiting letters started coming,” Englebrecht said. “Several of the coaches told me it was the best video they’ve ever seen. I started to think that maybe we had something here, a service we could provide to other high school players.”

Englebrecht pooled his resources with Charlie Brande, coach of the Orange County Volleyball Club, and started a business, College Volleyball Recruiting Video. For $300, Englebrecht will videotape a match, focusing on a specific player, then edit the tape into a highlight film similar to his daughter’s.

Englebrecht said he films players using three-quarter-inch videotape equipment, producing a higher quality tape than a commercial camcorder. The flashy packaging also catches the recruiters’ eyes, he said.

“In this day and age, there’s a lot of clutter in advertising,” Englebrecht said. “Coaches get hundreds of tapes, and we wanted this one to go to the top of the stack. You have to sell the sizzle.”

He already has produced highlight tapes for two other players--Corona del Mar’s Lori Newcomer and Foothill’s Becca Foltz--and plans to expand the business during the boys’ season and girls’ club season.

“It’s an investment in a student’s education and athletic future,” Englebrecht said. “That’s our slogan. You can get a great return on this investment with a $70,000 scholarship.”

Hartigan hires professional photographers to shoot Santa Margarita games. Barnes has a freshman coach tape Los Alamitos games.

Hartigan uses two cameras. One shoots wide angles from the press box to highlight the skill players. Another camera shoots tighter shots from the sideline or low grandstands, which show blocking schemes.

Hartigan and his staff later edit the tapes into categories that show all offensive or defensive plays, all blocking schemes, and passing or running plays. He said it makes it easier for the coaches to focus on a specific play or players.

Hartigan has sent out several videos of Eagle quarterback Sean O’Brien, whose list of college choices includes Colorado, Cal, USC and Washington. Hartigan said he prefers to send game film instead of highlight tapes.

“Recruiters want to see the real game film, the entire game,” he said. “With highlight tapes, you only see the good plays, and not the bad ones. We usually send one or two of Sean’s better games out to recruiters.”

Los Alamitos switched from 16-millimeter game film to videotapes last year, one of the last schools in the county to do so. Until last season, Empire League teams used only 16-millimeter film because videos, Barnes said, usually weren’t high quality.

With help from boosters, Los Alamitos bought equipment that produces sharp tapes that Barnes and his staff break down.

They produced an offensive highlight tape of the Griffins’ first four games. The tape features Carey throwing deep, in the flat and screen passes, as well as calling audibles, rolling out to pass and scrambling.

Staggs said he watches hundreds of tapes a season. Although film is important, it’s only a part of the recruiting process, he said.

“You really have to rely on the coaches,” Staggs said. “He can tell you what the film doesn’t show--work habits, attitude. Those are two of the most important things when you’re recruiting a player.”

Next installment, Dec . 23: A look at recruiting trips.